Crafton Family of 5 Now Back on Land in Maryland After Sailing Around World for 7 Years

Aug. 3, 2010— -- The five members of the Crafton family still are getting their land legs back after spending seven years at sea.

"It seems like we were gone a lifetime sometimes, and other times, it seems like we were gone [for] a snapshot," Tom Crafton said. "Part of it, I really didn't want to end."

Tom Crafton and his wife, Kathy, were living in Alaska in 2003 when they decided that the life they'd created for their three children with two houses, cars, motorcycles and promising careers, wasn't enough.

"As we looked in the future, I didn't want to see my teenagers on the telephone in their room with their own TV," Kathy said. "I wanted to really know who they were ... to know them and they to know us, not the babysitter or the nanny."

Tom Crafton left his job as a child psychologist. Kathy Crafton stopped her work as a nurse. They sold their possessions and bought a boat, calling it Nueva Vida, a new life.

The Craftons and their three children -- Jena, Kalena and Ben -- pulled away from a dock in Severna Park, Md., in 2003, setting sail on a journey that would take them around the world. Their youngest child, Ben, was just seven years old when they first set sail.

The real life Swiss Family Robinson traveled 30,000 miles, going around the world and then some. They did it all in a space not much larger than a minivan.

"It brought us closer together as a family," Kathy Crafton said. "We don't fight. We don't raise our voice. You know, there's just no tolerance for it, so everybody learned to have their own space."

Tom and Kathy Crafton said that the kids never complained, that sibling rivalry stopped the day the masts went up.

Each of the children had rotating duties regarding sailing the boat.

"You have to actually work," said eldest daughter Jena, now 21. "You have to pull the line and make sure the sail is OK."