sailing round the world

i know there has been a lot of posts out there asking a similar question.

however i have been unable to get the answer I've been looking for my self and my my family are going to be selling the family business so we can spend the next 4 to 5 year sailing around the word we not looking to take part in any race. we just want to enjoy the sites sounds and smells.

my question is we are looking for a yacht at the moment weather we build one or buy one we are not to sure at the moment. could any of you please give us some advice as what sort and size of yacht would be suitable to allow a family of five two adults and three children under 10.

i thank you all for your time reading my post.

 

Sounds like great plans. How much long distance sailing experiance do you have? It seems awfully risky to me to take small children on long distance sailing trips, it would be hard to keep them all safe with that many little ones wandering around on a deck.

However, this is what I would consider: take the family on several multi-day charter sailing excursions with a professional crew. Join a yatch club and get to know others that have sailed with their family. take classes on deep water sailing, navigation, boat handling, etc. to learn what you need to know. With this basic knowledge than you can look at the size boat you find is comfortable with you and your family.

I would guess that for long term living you would want something in the 36 to 45 foot long range. Get the boat and use it on local coastal cruising and see how it all works out for the family. You will find you will want to refit the boat (or even get another one all together) as you get more experience with it and your family together in a small space.

And I would wait until my youngest was about 10 before I do any long distance sailing with them to foreign ports. Make sure they all get lots of swimming lessons, first aid training and general survival/camping experience long before you shove off.

 

You don't say a lot. For example your own experience, your preferred material, draft, budget, areas and seasons you want to cruise.

But I can only heartily encourage you to go while the children are young.

Cruising with children is very rewarding for the children, safety is not an issue kids a lot of families cruise and the reality is that kids are as safe on a well found boat as anywhere. But they stay below when conditions are rough. Kids also break the ice with officials and get you invites and gifts and assistance you would otherwise not receive. You can also send them to local schools for a couple of weeks and everyone enjoys the interaction.

If you can afford it around 50 feet is a really good size for a cruising family since it usually adds a midships cabin usable at sea along with an aft cabin of a good size. I'd also opt for a wheelhouse if you can and behind the wheelhouse a good sheltered cockpit with a decent shade cover in warm climates you'll spend a lot of time in the cockpit. A mid cockpit is really good on a larger boat with kids.

I wouldn't look for performance, rather a boat on the heavier side with a smaller rig will still get you places and it will be a lot more comfortable and can carry a lot of cruising gear supplies water and fuel without affecting stability detrimentally.

Count on having at least one extra adult aboard for passages and make sure there's enough safe heavy weather berths aft of the mainmast for everyone.

I cannot stress enough the need for enough space for everyone to be able to shut a cabin door and be in their own space, with kids their own bunk does the trick and under over bunks give privacy. For the adults look for cabins at least in port and you can use the forepeak in port too.

Two heads is nice but not essential but a good sit down shower that you can plug and put a few inches of water in is good with kids.

A comfortable galley is the heart of the ship and should be practical and midships or aft rather than fwd.

Put fish netting on the railings makes the railings child safe too.

Here's a few pics of the realities, some in port and some in heavy weather, look behind the womans legs in the wheelhouse pic and you'll see a child asleep in the rope locker ! Wilma ( the woman) was the cook and we were 3 days at sea already and she had just woken and had a shower and coming up for a watch at 6am. Also look at the kids braced against the boat the sea conditions were Gale force wind with gusts to 50 Knots, enough to chuck the boat around a bit but with the adults confident the kids love it. they are also very adept and finding secure comfortable places to curl up.

 

I ditto the above comments and also add that sailing around the world, even leisurely is a big effort logistically. There are places in the world you just don't want to be anywhere near or have your country's flag flying in sight.

I think you can have you cake and eat it too. Kids aboard aren't a problem for the experienced cruising family and do offer "avenues of pursuit" that other wise wouldn't be available.

There all all sorts of choices. On the smaller side, see if you can find an old Gillmer 39. It's a nice sea boat and has some ability to eat up miles too. Nice side decks a healthy cockpit (which some will hate) and state rooms fore and aft with two convertible settees for more bodies. It's small enough to single hand and slip fees will be modest.

Another smaller choice is the Reliance 37 with again fore and aft state rooms and convertible settees.

If you can afford it, see if you can get one of the few that come up on the market Cherubinni 44's or 48's. They're very nice sea boats, comfortable and relatively shoal for their length. It's hard to beat their beauty and construction too. They are well appointed, so bring a healthy purse.

The selection of yachts, particularly in this market is wide open, especially if you can find a deal on a boat in distress and have it upgraded or repaired. I know of a few 65'ers that can be had for 20% of their value, though they need rigs, sails and engines. If you're handy and industrious, these can be redone to your desires and still had for less then 50% of their value.

As eluded to by most here, experience is the real key to this type of adventure. You'll need more than a few weekends on a buddy's Hobie 16 before contemplating a circumnavigation. You'd be wise to strongly consider some bareboat time and off shore sail training.

 

I have extensive experience at sea but not mush with sailing yachts. i spent 15 years as a navigation officer with the Royal Navy. i have have the the lovely experience of building my own home on my own with my partner. i have also built a few kit cars when i was younger. so i am quite a handy person.

i would be more than happy to take the best bits from more than one yacht and build one with my partner and children. i also have access to a number of ex Royal Navy mates that would be more than happy to build one with us.

i was looking a the Swan 131 yesterday i know i could never afford a yacht like that but i sure have the time and space to but something like it.

 

I have extensive experience at sea but not mush with sailing yachts. i spent 15 years as a navigation officer with the Royal Navy. i have have the the lovely experience of building my own home on my own with my partner. i have also built a few kit cars when i was younger. so i am quite a handy person.

i would be more than happy to take the best bits from more than one yacht and build one with my partner and children. i also have access to a number of ex Royal Navy mates that would be more than happy to build one with us.

i was looking a the Swan 131 yesterday i know i could never afford a yacht like that but i sure have the time and space to build something like it.

 

First off realize that you are not sailing a Swan 131 anywhere without professional level crew. You've said you can't afford the $30m Swan so what can you afford? Establishing a purchase and then an operating budget are your first steps. In the current market buying will be far less expensive than building.

Put your purchase budget +50% into the advanced search in Yacthworld and you will find hundreds of possibilities.......good luck.

 

Oh and great pics Mike.........

 

We actually did this (I was one of the kids), on an Irwin 54. I also know families that did it on much smaller boats, and we ran into a family that has cruised from SE Asia to the Carribean on a 140'. Personally I would consider two heads to be minimum, and a cabin for every kid almost mandatory. A little space to call your own can solve a lot of problems when living on top of each other for extended periods of time.

 

All the above,plus consider your unpaid time in building the boat.

I've knew a guy who quit a $110k a year job + pension to build a boat and it took 3 years,yet the sale value of when he was done was a fraction that.
He lost $330k in salary plus maybe $30k in pension contributions,plus he spent $350k (that's what he told me,I'd bet good money that was a lie and was much more)on the boat,so $710k and the boat was worth maybe $200k
He coulda/shoulda just worked 18 months longer and bought a nice boat,and not also lost his wife in the process.

If you really can and want to go ahead and build, but perhaps another possibility is to keep the business an extra year or two,practice up on charter boats for holidays,and buy yourself a decent and low hassle boat when the time comes.

Backyards,storage lots,and marinas worldwide are littered with uncompleted boats when the dream/patience/money/wife's interest faded.

 

Here's some advice:

1. Save up at around 100K US. Say 25K for some good training, the rest for the boat & supplies.

2. Drive on down to Portsmouth & sign up for at least 1 leg of the Clipper RTW yacht race and get some great training & at least a few thousand miles of ocean under your belt.

3. Buy/rent/charter a good bluewater hull and sail it for a while until you're very comfortable with it.

Pack your bags.

Of course, your family had better be 100% behind you. I've read some bad stories about fathers dragging their kids off on an endless cruise. Childhoods have been scarred. I'm sure marriages have been broken too. In short, everyone must be 100% mentally and emotionally on board (yes, no mental issues...bipolar people may want to jump to the bottom of the drink).

If the family opts out, just go with option 1 above and do one or two legs of the Clipper race to quench your thirst. That's what I'm doing. I've already sailed on many of the worlds oceans and I don't want a repeat of those. I am specifically craving the Southern Ocean only for some big wave action.

 

If you think that building a boat is going to save you money over buying one, think again. It won't. It's going to take you years even with the assistance of free labour. Meanwhile your kids grow up, your wife gets more embedded in her social network, the boat project consumes all available time & money.....

I'm building one because I want to build one. What I do with it or where I go in it is purely secondary to the desire to build one. I also planned for it years in advance while I was at sea on research vessels so I built all the infrastructure (shed etc) before even buying materials for the hull.

Buy a boat, go now if that's what you want to do. Building your own means it'll be anywhere from 3 to 10 years to never before you go anywhere.

PDW

 

1. you sound fairly confident in your abilities, how about the rest of the crew. I'd recommend sending the better half off to sailing school for cruisers. One example of several--

look for female instructor with round the world experience.

http://www.womanship.com/

I know a family of seven that lives on a 28 foot wooden boat that lacks standing headroom below. They upgraded from a 26 footer when a couple of the kids hit 6'. They cruise and work from Maine to the Caribbean. So size is whatever you want to afford.
Ditto what everyone else said, you can't build a comparable boat for the price of a new one, and used ones are dirt cheap. If you gave me $500 today, I could show up in England in a couple months with enough change to do laundry, and a serviceable boat.

You're in Hull, England? "hull" is a bit confusing considering the nature of the forum.

 

I disagree. Most can't, but some can, though appointments may not be apples to apples, it will be a comparable boat. I may have used winches gotten at 20% of the retail value, a rebuilt engine at half and veneers instead of solid wood trim, but certainly in all the ways you'd enjoy the vessel just as able and comparable. Given a half million + for a new 50'er, I think I can beat this price point and sill have a reasonable and quite competitive result, maybe even toss in some carbon parts, just to be trendy.

 

"some" sailed across the Atlantic on a three meters boat - even less! "some" may have cruised down the East coast - mostly inland waterways....but so what???!?!?
Five adults plus three kids on a 35 footer is certainly NOT the plan of this gentleman!
Main question was: buy or build?
Considering the number of perfectly good, well equipped (sailing) boats that are for sale at the moment makes this time the best for buying one. Does not have to be the last model, but just a good, sound, solid boat with the amenities for such a large group of people.
That number may, actually, be where the risk is highest: are these five adults going to be able to live together in such a small area? Have they been already cruising together? I have just too often seen best friends part after only a couple of weeks - not to mention couples!
A big word of caution there...!