A family who spent eight years sailing the globe full-time say their monthly expenditure has doubled since returning to the UK. Alan Wood, 57, travelled the world with his wife, Irenka, 55, and their three children from 2017 to 2025 and are now adjusting to life back on home soil.
The family departed on their 53-foot 1997 Amel Super Maramu sailboat from Greece in 2017 when the children were aged just five, eight and 11. They covered more than 40,000 nautical miles across more than 40 countries and territories, with their eldest child, Rowan, returning to the UK for her education five years into the voyage.
Costs double after return
Now that the family has come home following their remarkable adventure, they have been confronted with eight years' worth of inflation all at once, having previously managed on just £1,500 in monthly outgoings for years. Since their return, that figure has risen to nearly £3,000, driven by higher energy bills, the cost-of-living crisis and school expenses for the boys.
The two youngest children, brothers Darroch, 17, and Yewan, 14, are also now getting used to full-time education and unrestricted access to mobile phones and social media.
Amazing adventure
Alan, an author living in Brighton, East Sussex, said: "It was an amazing adventure for us as a family, but the adjustment back to real life has taken us aback, especially for our youngest, Yewan, who has spent more years of his life on sea than on land. When you go from bribing your way through the Suez Canal with fuel or fleeing from Sudanese pirates to a regular school day, it takes a moment!"
Alan and Irenka embarked on the voyage from Greece in 2017, having become "tired of the rat race". Alan said: "We had been seriously thinking about doing a long-term sailing trip ever since Yewan was born. He was born en caul - a rare occurrence when a baby is born with its head still inside an intact amniotic sac."
"According to folklore these babies were deemed lucky and sailors believed them to be a talisman. We reached a point where each of the kids were going to be entering a new stage of education and felt if we didn't do it then, we never would."
Rented out their house
The couple placed their Brighton property on the rental market and departed on S/V Mothership. The rental income they received from the property helped cover the mortgage and some living costs, while a further 25% of their income came from producing YouTube and Patreon videos.
Alan explained: "The rent on our place back in Brighton really helped see us through at first. But we'd also started making videos, just for ourselves, so when I'd go see a boat we might want to buy, I'd post the video online for Irenka to see it as well. Over time we decided to make more videos and it became a decent source of income over the eight years."
Throughout their adventures, the family ventured to every corner of the globe, providing the children with an education both aboard and ashore. Alan said: "We homeschooled the kids while on the boat, usually taking up about two hours of the day. But to be honest, their education was as much off the boat than on it. Seeing wild seals in the Galapagos Islands was like a geography and biology lesson in one. Learning how to sail is all physics and they were constantly surrounded by new languages, cultures and foods."
Return to UK
The family chose to head back to the UK in May 2025, following a terrifying encounter with a vessel of men "waving AK-47s at them" in the Red Sea. Their two youngest children had reached the age at which they needed to sit examinations, such as A-levels and GCSEs, while their eldest, Rowan, had already returned to England to continue her studies since 2022.
Alan said: "Rowan had headed back to the UK about five years into the journey when she was 16 to complete her studies. The boys were now reaching an age where we'd want them to return back to a more normal life, get their qualifications and grow up. We felt we'd given everything we could to this experience and it gave back to us in equal measure."
Having returned to Brighton just over a year ago, the family is now settling back into everyday life, with the boys attending six-hour school days rather than the two-hour sessions they were accustomed to, while also having greater access to screens than ever before.
Alan said: "To be honest it's been a bit of an assault on the senses, in a good and bad way. It's been an adjustment for the boys to get involved in school, not only academically, as it's a whole new framework, but also socially in some ways. But the kids are very adaptable and have gotten used to things- especially being on phones and tablets. We were always out and about while sailing, but back home there's a lot of life that happens on screens, as we're learning."
Increased costs
Irenka and Alan also faced a period of adjustment, as eight years' worth of inflation hit them all at once. Their weekly shopping bill had doubled and energy costs rocketed, particularly when compared to the solar panels and hydro generator they had relied upon aboard the boat.
Alan is now releasing a memoir and guide about their seafaring adventures, entitled 'If you want to do it, do it!', as part of rebuilding their life back on dry land. He said: "The effect of inflation hit us big time, especially as we're having trouble selling our boat because the market's pretty flat right now. Our weekly shops almost doubled in cost and the price of heat and electricity was truly stunning."
"Our old gas boiler was struggling, so we turned to our wood burning stove and found that a dumpy bag of kiln-dried logs was now well over £100. Additionally, water - which we had produced with a watermaker or rain catchers - and electricity - which we'd produced with solar panels and a hydro generator - were expenses we hadn't properly accounted for. I spent most of the last year creating this book detailing our story as a family and Irenka has started her gardening business and worked as a senior sailing instructor."
