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Living on a Self-Sufficient Sailboat for 10 Years

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A decade after buying a boat for what was supposed to be an 18-month break, Brian Trautman is still out there — now with a six-month-old daughter aboard.

Brian and Karin Trautman have spent ten years living aboard SV Delos, a 53-foot ketch rigged for months of total self-sufficiency far from any marina. In a new tour from the YouTube channel Exploring Alternatives, the couple walks through exactly how a boat generates its own power, makes its own drinking water, and stores enough food to disappear from civilization for weeks at a stretch. The episode lands at a turning point for the family: after years of rotating volunteer crew through the boat, Delos is now home base for a baby.

• Brian bought Delos in May 2008 planning an 18-month sabbatical and never really came back — the boat had logged over 83,000 nautical miles by early 2020, more than three times the Earth’s circumference at the equator.
• The boat runs on rooftop solar panels, a wind generator, and a reverse-osmosis watermaker that converts seawater into freshwater, alongside multiple deep freezers, a full pantry, and a compact washing machine for a crew of up to six.
• Cruising costs have averaged roughly $500 per person per month in living expenses, with annual maintenance running about 1.5% to 3% of the boat’s value — and the family has just installed a diesel heater to prep Delos for Arctic sailing after years in the Tropics.

A 2000 Amel Super Maramu Built for the Long Haul

Delos is a 2000 Amel Super Maramu, a French-built ketch that Brian Trautman purchased in May 2008 with what he figured would be a year-and-a-half cruising break before returning to a normal life on land. That plan dissolved somewhere along the way, and the “sabbatical” turned into a full-time voyage that’s now stretched past a decade and past 83,000 nautical miles — more than three trips around the planet at the equator. Along the way, the Trautmans built an audience by documenting the journey rather than just living it quietly.

The Off-Grid Systems That Make Months at Sea Possible

The tour breaks down the engineering that lets Delos sit at anchor for extended stretches without ever pulling into a marina for supplies or power. Rooftop solar panels and a wind generator keep the batteries charged, while a reverse-osmosis desalination system — the “watermaker” — turns seawater into drinking water on demand, removing the need to haul jugs ashore. Inside, extensive pantry storage and multiple deep freezers let the crew stock months of food at a time, and a compact washing machine handles laundry without a trip to a laundromat.

Delos sleeps up to six people, a layout built for the revolving cast of volunteer crew who’ve joined Brian and Karin over the years to help sail, film, and maintain the boat between ports.

Actual Costs of This Lifestyle

The financial picture the Trautmans lay out is specific: personal living expenses have averaged around $500 per person per month over their years cruising, and keeping the boat itself seaworthy — hauling out, replacing rigging, servicing systems — runs about 1.5% to 3% of the boat’s value annually. That’s the real math behind “self-sufficient,” and it’s a number a lot of aspiring cruisers never see spelled out.

Delos has now sailed more than 83,000 nautical miles — over three times around the Earth at the equator — since Brian bought her in May 2008.

From Rotating Crew to a Family of Three

The bigger shift in this tour isn’t mechanical, it’s personal. Brian and Karin’s daughter, Sierra, was born in late 2019, and at six months old she’s now living aboard Delos full-time rather than the boat cycling through a rotation of guest crew. That change is pushing new decisions, too — the family has installed an onboard diesel heating system specifically to prepare for high-latitude sailing in the Arctic, a significant departure after years spent cruising warm tropical waters.

Readers who like this kind of hands-on look at life on the water may also want to check out the Trautmans’ own earlier episode, Catch and Cook from Isolation — Uninhabited Island Paradise, or see how another crew handles power generation at sea in The Unstoppable Silent 80 Solar Powered Catamaran.

Sierra’s first big voyage is shaping up to be the Arctic run the diesel heater was installed for — a long way from the Tropics Delos has called home for years, and the next real test of whether a decade-old off-grid setup built for two adults and a rotating crew can handle a baby in cold water.