Behan Gifford

LATEST ARTICLES ( 537 )

• Healthcare While Cruising

  

  Laughter is good medecine, but we do rely on more than funShuffling down the corridor of the hospital on Langkawi last week, I realized with a start that this... Read more

  Posted on 14 April 2014 FAMILY, OUTDOORS, SEA, TRAVEL

• Normalizing the View of Family Life Afloat

  

  Most of the time, the general public really has no view, or interest, in our very different way of living. The events on Rebel Heart have changed that... Read more

  Posted on 11 April 2014 FAMILY, OUTDOORS, SEA, TRAVEL

• Crazy People, Taking Children Cruising

  

  What kind of irresponsible parent would take their children cruising? That seems to be the underlying message from many corners in the wake of the Kaufman... Read more

  Posted on 08 April 2014 FAMILY, OUTDOORS, SEA, TRAVEL

• Managing Power on a Cruising Boat

  

  Living off the grid, providing your own power, is a tremendous feeling. On Totem, it’s one of the compelling aspects of life afloat, hand in hand with a more... Read more

  Posted on 01 April 2014 FAMILY, OUTDOORS, SEA, TRAVEL

• Your Most Valuable Cruising Equipment

  

  Important pieces of cruising gear aren't always obvious. A reader who hopes to go cruising emailed recently to ask: "When you look back at your years of sailing... Read more

  Posted on 28 March 2014 FAMILY, OUTDOORS, SEA, TRAVEL

• Staying in Touch While Cruising

  

  What a gift it is to be so far away, but so readily in touch with people we love.Just today, we were able to Skype several times, to see and hear familiar... Read more

  Posted on 19 March 2014 FAMILY, OUTDOORS, SEA, TRAVEL

• Making Instead of Buying: Fizzy Drinks

  

  Making our own lotion lends itself nicely to cruiser self-sufficiency, but is mostly born from my skepticism about common ingredients in commercial... Read more

  Posted on 17 March 2014 FAMILY, OUTDOORS, SEA, TRAVEL

• Facing Fears About Raising Kids on a Sailboat

  

  I was not programmed to be different. If anything, my life until we left to go cruising was a careful series of practical steps designed to fulfill the... Read more

  Posted on 14 March 2014 FAMILY, OUTDOORS, SEA, TRAVEL

• What Do Cruising Kids Do All Day?

  

  It seems that the everyday life of the Totem cruising kids is somewhat opaque in recent blog content (thank you reader email for pointing that out!). Read more

  Posted on 10 March 2014 FAMILY, OUTDOORS, SEA, TRAVEL

• The Cost of Cruising: the Rest of Totem's Maintenance List

  

  The roundup of our current maintenance projects isn't complete without a look at the work we've recently done. Totem is just one case, but a reasonable... Read more

  Posted on 06 March 2014 FAMILY, OUTDOORS, SEA, TRAVEL

• The Cost of Cruising: Totem's Maintenance List

  

  Totem is just a sample size of one, but it’s not a bad proxy for the maintenance you might expect on a well-found boat after a handful of years of tropical... Read more

  Posted on 03 March 2014 FAMILY, OUTDOORS, SEA, TRAVEL

• Cruising Costs, Routine Maintenance, and the 10% (15%, 20%) Rule

  

  What does it cost to go cruising? Most of these discussions focus on month to month living expenses. Do you eat out in restaurants or stick to the boat? Do you... Read more

  Posted on 28 February 2014 FAMILY, OUTDOORS, SEA, TRAVEL

• What Does It Take to Be an Adventurous Family?

  

  We met the most fascinating cruiser recently. Erik and his family cruised through less traveled corners of the eastern Mediterranean and north Africa. They... Read more

  Posted on 27 February 2014 FAMILY, OUTDOORS, SEA, TRAVEL

• Leaving with a Piece of Thailand

  

  On our last night in Thailand, we had dinner aboard Love Song with friends we first met five years ago in Mexico. A boat coming into the anchorage earlier had... Read more

  Posted on 25 February 2014 FAMILY, OUTDOORS, SEA, TRAVEL

• Bad Things Come in Threes, Right?

  

  It was a trio of unfortunate events on a day that began with a beautiful sail, after a day anchored off another stunning Thai island. Read more

  Posted on 21 February 2014 FAMILY, OUTDOORS, SEA, TRAVEL

• Would You Eat Insects?

  

  We all process cultures in different ways and through different filters. One of my favorites is food, and in that respect, Thailand is truly a feast: delicious... Read more

  Posted on 18 February 2014 FAMILY, OUTDOORS, SEA, TRAVEL

• DIY on Board: Making Instead of Buying

  

  There are a host of reasons why it makes sense for cruisers to make things that are normally purchased in a store. The most obvious is that you might be out in... Read more

  Posted on 14 February 2014 FAMILY, OUTDOORS, SEA, TRAVEL

• Listen Up: Your Boat is Talking to You

  

  It was not one of our sunnier mornings.Oh, the sun was up and blazing, but the utter lack of sleep the night before- when Totem sat beam onto a swell rolling... Read more

  Posted on 12 February 2014 FAMILY, OUTDOORS, SEA, TRAVEL

• Cruising: Vacation Vs Lifestyle

  

  Sometimes cruising really is exactly the way people with landlocked lives and snowy driveways imagine it to be. A morning of exploring a new bay, an afternoon o... Read more

  Posted on 10 February 2014 FAMILY, OUTDOORS, SEA, TRAVEL

• Confessions of a Reef Snob

  

  In than forty minutes of water time at Richelieu rock, we saw more intense marine life than we have seen anywhere in Thailand by a wide margin. Read more

  Posted on 07 February 2014 FAMILY, OUTDOORS, SEA, TRAVEL