Crafton Family Sails The World For 7 Years (VIDEO)

The Crafton family left home seven years ago to travel the world on a 43-foot sailboat. The family of five left Maryland and visited 23 countries, including Mexico, Papua New Guinea and New Zealand, where they spent a year and a half.

They're now home back in the States and spoke with CBS News about their journey.

WATCH, below:

Comments

[Gwen Hamlin]

05:01 PM on 08/06/2010

To landlubbers who are unaware of the global cruising community, the Crafton family's circumnavigation seems so audacious a thing to attempt, that it must be singular, so unfamiliar, it must be irresponsible.

The fact is it is not. They are just one of many, many families who cruise (or have cruised) far and wide aboard their sailboat-home. Saying so takes nothing away from the Crafton's accomplishment. Far from it. As the Craftons state, the choice to take a family long distance cruising is rarely made to achieve a specific goal (like a circumnavigation, crossing an ocean, or setting some record..although many do), but rather to provide one's whole family with an exceptional learning opportunity partnered with years of quality family time.

For those interested, www.womenandcruising.com is mounting a huge project that has been in the works for many months featuring the experiences of 12 Cruising Families. Full of pictures and practical advice, the web project shares insights on the challenges and rewards of this lifestyle choice from participants contributing from all corners of the world. For those who assume this is just a frivolity of the well-to-do, you will see that it is often the result of hard work and single-minded thrift by committed parents who don't just sail their boat-home, but sometimes build it, always outfit it, constantly navigate and maintain it, all while educating their children in other cultures and languages, usually at less expense than "staying home."

[Graceless]

10:07 PM on 08/06/2010

Thank you for sharing! My husband and I had been discussing the very points you mentioned (must cost a lot of money, definitely out of our reach) all while jealous of the experience they were able to provide their families, and the learning opportunities that can't be matched.

I look forward to reading the website!

[MNTom]

12:03 PM on 08/05/2010

Good for them. I wish I could have gone with them. Sounds like a great time.

[borameysopha]

02:13 AM on 08/05/2010

WOW...that is such an interesting experience for that family. 7years travelling by sailing to many different countries needs a lot of money. If I had enough to spend, I would like to do something like this :)

[webgeek]

08:38 PM on 08/04/2010

I wish I had that kind of money.

[GerryS]

08:00 PM on 08/04/2010

I wonder how much the 7 years cost them, in $$??

[Ethiopianbuzz Mike]

07:02 PM on 08/04/2010

people who travel a lot like this they became more open minded .it good for them and for the society ,

[lightist]

06:47 PM on 08/04/2010

Bravo. This 'family' successfully stepped out of society and stepped into the adventure of a lifetime. Each member of that family has gained strength of character and a feeling for the world-at-large so rare in our times that I could well understand if they felt like "outsiders" in a world gone mad with despair. They experienced each other and themselves in ways rich and valuable enough to last a lifetime. I actually want to meet them.

[fscuttle]

06:39 PM on 08/04/2010

Am i wrong or did those kids have some kind of speech impediment?

[OmegaHunter]

07:40 AM on 08/05/2010

The ABC article says that the two of them (apparently twins) have severe speech and developmental delays.

That's what bugs me about this. It isn't that the family decided to do their own thing it's how and why they seemingly went about it.

It seems that the two parents each had a major mid-life crisis. It sounds nice when they talk about it but that's exactly what it seems to boil down to, mid-life crisis. Why else would careers they were happy with suddenly become not good enough and they need to change every single thing about their life and in extremely severe ways?

So what do they do? They pull their 10 and 7 year old children out of school, sell their stuff and hop on a boat for 7 years.

Those twins probably needed lots of help. They are very apparently mentally challenged and needed professional help, not mommy homeschooling them on a small boat while on a 7 year voyage (assuming she was properly homeschooling them anyway which I somehow doubt). So while the family may have all these cool memories, their children have crippled futures. Three children with no real education past the ages of 10 and 7, two of which probably cannot function very well in society.

[Graceless]

07:01 PM on 08/05/2010

Those are some mighty big assumptions made upon reading a rather short article and a few minutes of puff questions on a tv show.

Where exactly do you get enough information about their lives in order to make judgements about things like the manner in which they schooled their children, that the children are in need of help due to some sort of traumatization, and that you are somehow in a better position to judge what these people need?

I don't know why I expect HuffPo commenters to be any different than the lowest common denominator.

[butlerdi]

08:09 AM on 08/06/2010

You done got some serious issues ......

[Canuknotusa]

06:17 PM on 08/04/2010

The interviewer was so unimaginative with her questions, and spoke so quickly it was difficult to understand her.
How about more information about the boat? What kinds of equipment did they have on board? What did they do when things broke or failed?
How about some questions about dealing with the hurricanes they encountered?
The map showed them crossing vast expanses of ocean at one time. I doubt they did that.
This was a terrible interview and a waste of time to watch.
By the way, I'm currently living on a sailboat and planning to cruise to Caribbean countries for the next 5 years. It takes a lot of planning and requires a very different approach to basic living conveniences as well as knowing about conserving resources such as fuel, food and water - not to mention knowing how to sail and navigate on the open ocean!
This is not something that can be properly addressed in a 6 minute fluff interview like this.

[clabberty]

06:10 PM on 08/04/2010

Now if they can only break the kids of peppering their conversations with "Avast!", "Arrrrrr!", "Shiver my timbers", and calling everyone "Matey" they can now go to real school. No parrots in class, kids. Hope they get their land legs back real soon.

[peowlemeow]

06:01 PM on 08/04/2010

I don't want to hear about it .I'd love to do it.Seven years away from all the bedlam.Awesome.

[camanokat]

05:56 PM on 08/04/2010

Video won't load and clicking on the link says Google Chrome (my browser..LOVE IT) already has the latest version of flash.

[hglu]

05:43 PM on 08/04/2010

Lucky dog.

[JennaS]

05:25 PM on 08/04/2010

Wow! Good for the family to go and take a leap of faith to explore the world. Of course they had the means! This is one of the things on my bucket list!