Four Months on Parlay Revival: Panama, San Blas and Delos

Parlay is a 45-foot catamaran that sank in Tortola after Hurricane Irma. Today it's home to one of the biggest sailing channels on YouTube, and for four months it was home to Coastline Films founder Jacob DeGrace, who joined the crew to film and edit the show.

This is the story of those four months: a boatyard in Panama, a few hundred islands off its coast, and a race against another sailing channel.

What is Parlay Revival?

Parlay Revival is a sailing channel run by Colin MacRae, a New Zealand superyacht engineer some people know from Bravo's reality TV show Below Deck Sailing Yacht. In 2017, Hurricane Irma wrecked a 2012 Lagoon 450 catamaran in Tortola. Colin bought it, rebuilt it with friends, and filmed every step. The rebuild became a channel, and the channel became a way of life: sailing around the world with a rotating crew and putting out a new episode every Sunday.

The channel now sits above 400,000 subscribers and 85 million views. People don't stick around for 400-plus episodes because of drone shots. They stick around because they know the crew and they've been there for every breakdown, fix, and passage.

Life aboard

There's no separate production team on a boat like this. Jacob came aboard as crew first, and the camera came along for all of it. The edit happens wherever there's battery power and a signal, and the Sunday deadline doesn't move.

The haul-out in Panama

Before you cross the Pacific, you take a hard look at your boat. Parlay's turned up bulkhead damage, the structural panels that hold a catamaran together under load. That's not a cosmetic fix, and it's not something you take across thousands of miles of open ocean. The boat came out of the water in Panama and the crossing went on hold.

Boatyard life is nothing like life at anchor. The boat sits on stands, the days run on a repair list, and the weather window for the crossing keeps getting closer. No sailing, no new islands, no fixed date to leave.

For the channel, it's the hardest stretch to film. The yard episodes had to make the waiting worth watching: the stakes, the setbacks, the fixes, and the people grinding through them. Jacob edited some of the most important episodes of that stretch on board, while the work went on around him. When Parlay finally went back in the water, the audience had earned that moment with the crew.

San Blas

With Parlay back in the water, the crew pointed her at San Blas.

The San Blas Islands sit off Panama's Caribbean coast inside Guna Yala, a territory governed by the Guna people. It's a few hundred small islands, most of them sand, palms, and reef, and plenty you can walk around in ten minutes. For weeks that was home. The crew island hopped, dropped anchor wherever looked good, and spent time with the Guna communities on the islands they visited.

Countless nights turned into a dinghy ride to shore, a bonfire, and dinner on the beach with the locals. Then the beers came out, then the dancing around the fire started, and nobody was ever in a hurry to get back to the boat.

New Year's Eve was a fireworks show on a private island, with Parlay and about 15 other sailboats anchored off the beach. Clear sky, no city glow, nothing between the fleet and the show.

San Blas isn't known as a surf trip, but some of the atolls around the islands have reef breaks if you go looking. The crew would run the dinghy out and surf whatever was working.

Reef breaks come with a cost. First wave one morning, Jacob came off and landed his foot square on fire coral. He pulled the chunk out of the bottom of his foot, sat out the session in the dinghy, then headed back to Parlay to soak it in a bucket of the hottest lemon water the galley could make. First wave of the day was also the last.

None of it was a shoot. It was just life on the boat, which is exactly why it worked on camera.

Delos vs. Parlay

San Blas is also where Parlay met up with SV Delos, Brian Trautman's crew and another of YouTube's big sailing channels. Two boats in one anchorage turns into a race fast. This one turned into a full regatta: Delos, a heavy bluewater cruising ketch, against Parlay, a Lagoon 450 production catamaran. Plus beach fires, drinks, and a lot of new friends.

Parlay took it. Afterward, a photo of the winning Parlay crew went up on the wall aboard Delos, which is about as good as a trophy gets between two boats.

Both channels told the story, and a lot of the aerials came off Jacob's drone. When Delos released their side of it, Brian credited Jacob and Parlay for sharing “all the amazing footage and especially drone shots.”

Two crews, two audiences, one race, and footage that carried both edits.

Looking back

Four months, one boatyard, a few hundred islands, and a regatta win against another of YouTube's big sailing crews. Parlay went on to cross the Pacific, and the channel is still putting out an episode every Sunday. That stretch in Panama is a good reminder of why people watch: not for the boat, but for the people on it, and for everything nobody planned.

See more of our work here.

Frequently asked questions

What is Parlay Revival?

A sailing YouTube channel following Captain Colin MacRae, a cast member on Bravo's Below Deck Sailing Yacht, and his crew aboard SV Parlay, a hurricane-damaged Lagoon 450 catamaran rebuilt and now sailing around the world.

Who is Jacob DeGrace?

The founder of Coastline Films, a premium video and photo production company in Canada. He spent four months filming and editing Parlay Revival.

Where was Parlay repaired before crossing the Pacific?

In Panama, after bulkhead damage was found during pre-crossing checks.

Where are the San Blas Islands?

Off Panama's Caribbean coast, in Guna Yala, a territory governed by the Guna people.

Where did Delos and Parlay race?

In the San Blas Islands, Panama, during a weekend regatta covered on both channels.

Who won the Delos vs. Parlay race?

Parlay. A photo of the winning crew was hung aboard SV Delos afterward.

Who shot the drone footage in Delos vs. Parlay?

Jacob DeGrace (@lifeofjacob), founder of Coastline Films, who SV Delos credited for footage and drone shots.