CLIBBERY, James Brett & PACKWOOD, Sarah Justine

Two months ago, I spoke to my father of 39 years. He talked about his upcoming journey with his wife, Sarah. They were planning the first leg of their trip around the world. The duo said their goodbyes and promised to visit on their way back through. That was the last time I spoke to them. Their journey ended together on July 10th when they were discovered deceased on Sable Island.

Brett lived a full life. Retired for 17 years, but never stagnant. After 25 years with CP Rail, my father worked many jobs—from scuba instructor to sailing instructor to BC Ferries employee—always striving to improve the lives of those around him.

With Sarah by his side, they had many adventures. First meeting at a bus stop in the UK, they quickly discovered they shared a love for adventure. Together, they completed three Camino routes and worked to build a home on Salt Spring Island.

The pair were always on the front lines of social justice, from decrying the genocidal actions of countries around the world to supporting many social action movements. My father believed this country could change. With enough people standing up, anything was possible. His work ethic and intelligence allowed him to make a difference in every corner he encountered.

He was actively involved in politics his whole life. Campaigning for Pierre Trudeau in his youth, he always supported the people he believed in. Once, while campaigning in Thunder Bay, Ontario, he was unable to win a seat as alderman but managed to place second. His later years saw a shift in his political beliefs, striving to make the world a better place for everyone. He joined protests for freedom and rights for all and took direct action by engaging with elected officials, often in direct conflict with them.

The friends he made around the world grieve his loss. One of his best friends, Pat Brett from his youth, recalls what Brett was like as a kid and young adult:

“As a kid, Brett was loved and respected by everyone who knew him, male and female alike. As a young teenager, Brett hung out with a group of similarly aged friends. He was one of our leaders because he had access to a car. It was a 1950s-60s Ford Falcon, and boy, did we have fun. He was an exceptional driver for his young age. We could fit six to eight people and spent hours cruising dirt roads around all the sand and gravel pits in Kenora. In fact, we were four-wheeling before four-wheeling became cool. Didn’t need a four-by-four when Brett was at the wheel!

Brett had the travel bug as a young man and made the most of it to go everywhere. When he was old enough to drive, he and his friend ‘Beefy’—Rick Holiday—packed a packsack, picked up four cartons of smokes, and blew out of town to work for CPR as section men. Forty below, fixing railroad tracks between Dryden and Thunder Bay. He went out to Edmonton to live with ‘Granny Maluish.’ His grandfather lived in a little house on the creek. He had a charge account at Smith’s Grocery store, which Brett made good use of. Grandpa would ask Brett to pick up some groceries for him, and he would add a couple of cartons of smokes. As an older teen, he spent a couple of years in Winnipeg as roommates with me, Pat Brett, when I was entertaining all over the city. Brett had no problem telling people where I played that he was my manager. Back in Kenora one morning, Brett’s sisters gave him a perm complete with cute little blonde kiss curls. The boys were gathered around the kitchen table at Dan Donnelly’s house when Brett charged in, all thrilled with his new hairdo. The boys got on his case bad, but by the end of the conversation, he was so cute that we christened him ‘Rosie,’ and it stuck with him for life. And he liked it so much he got a rose tattoo.

Brett’s friends all really admired him as the guy who had a dream of sailing the world and made a point of seeing it through. Unfortunately, his journey was cut short. To those who knew them, it was abundantly clear that Sarah was really good for Brett, and they were so happy together. All along, he made a point of staying in touch with all of us whenever he was coming through Kenora to visit his mother, Peggy. He will be missed by his family and friends around the world.”

Only our love for you is left. Smooth skies and steady winds are what I wish for you.

Forever missed, never forgotten.

Sarah Justine Packwood was born in 1970 to Sean and Kate Packwood. She grew up in the quiet Warwickshire village of Long Itchington, England. Her horizons started to expand when she left home for university in Durham to study biology, after which she went on to obtain an MSc from Bangor University in Wales. Those horizons never really stopped expanding. Sarah chose a career in international aid work and worked on the ground with many different aid agencies in places such as Kosovo, South Sudan, Tanzania/Rwanda, Haiti, India, Namibia, and Papua New Guinea. She faced many hardships and witnessed more trauma than many of us will in a lifetime, but she always persevered and somehow never became hardened by her experiences. When she eventually chose to work closer to home, she continued to work on projects that enabled her to pass on her knowledge to the next generation of aid workers and improve disaster response effectiveness, including working for the UK government Department for International Development (now the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office).

One time she was urgently called in to work and, after a ruined weekend in the office, eventually escaped and waited at the bus stop to go home. She got chatting to one Brett Clibbery, and the rest, as they say, is history. Sarah’s mum was terminally ill when she met Brett, and Brett’s sister was in need of a kidney donation from Brett. They each supported the other, and their friendship quickly deepened. After her mum’s death in 2015, Sarah walked the 500-mile pilgrimage route of the Camino de Santiago (the Way of St. James) in the French Pyrenees and northern Spain in her memory. This sparked a passion for Camino walking that she then shared with Brett (they did three Camino routes together and were planning to revisit one this year). Brett, in turn, shared his passion for sailing, and they embarked on sailing adventures on board Brett’s sailboat, Theros. They married in Canada on Theros in 2016 and followed it the next spring with a traditional dawn handfasting ceremony at Stonehenge in England.

Sarah embraced what she called “free-range living”: balancing part-time consultancy work, helping Brett build their home on Salt Spring Island, travelling and adventuring with Brett, pursuing her interests in spirituality, nature, music, and songwriting in the bardic tradition, and documenting it all as an enthusiastic budding videographer. That consultancy work involved using her extensive humanitarian aid work experience to help NGOs and international organisations such as UNHCR become more inclusive and effective. She shared her and Brett’s experiences of building their off-grid home from scratch in the ‘Two Blondes on a Build’ YouTube series, joining other Two Blondes projects including: ‘on a boat’ (sailing on Theros) and ‘on a walk’ (their three Caminohiking expeditions).

As a singer/songwriter/bard, her creativity was blossoming: her first single, ‘Meet Me at Table,’ about the friendships made on the Camino, was released last year and had won her recognition as a new songwriter and podcast appearances. Like Brett, Sarah never failed to make friends wherever she went. Her gentleness, kindness, creativity, and positivity touched and inspired many lives around the world, and she will be sorely missed.