SailingBritcan
Experience Liveaboard Life With Us!
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The Top Level Scoop
We’ve opened up our lives and our boat to those that want to experience what it’s like to live on a liveaboard boat. Our weeklong Britican Experience will provide the perfect opportunity for couples, families and singles to try the liveaboard life before they buy. Experiences are currently operating out of the Caribbean.
Scroll down for full details, testimonials, sample itinerary, what's included, pricing, Q&A and more.
But before you carry on, let me first start off by saying that The Britican Experience is not like chartering a boat for a week. The experience is all about you OR you and your partner OR you and your family discovering what it’s like to live like liveaboard sailing cruisers. It’s not about sailing to exotic white beaches, drinking gin and tonics at a tiki bar or snorkeling amazing dive sites (although that is included). The Britican Experience has been set up for you to get an honest look at what it’s like to keep a boat afloat, sail to beautiful destinations and operate as a couple or family (singles are welcome too) all the while picking our brains for a full week.
Throughout the year we also offer special regatta racing experiences like the week-long Antigua Oyster Regatta.
Watch the short video below to get a small taste for what the Britican Experience offers and then carry on reading to find out if it's for you.
Reasons People Join Britican
For some, it’s a try before you buy
Try the liveaboard lifestyle for a week to determine if you really want to spend $10,000’s and $100,000’s on a boat. The amount of people we’ve met that get the boat, spend months and years fixing it up only to realize that they don’t like to sail or their partner hates the boat or…
With the Britican Experience you can gain an insight into the lifestyle to truly determine if it’s a ‘yes’ for all parties involved.
For others, it’s something solid to aim for
The Experience offers the sights, smells, sounds, tastes, and feelings that come with living the dream. It’s hard to visualize a future lifestyle if you haven’t yet lived it. By spending a week aboard Britican, you’ll taste the sea air, hear the sea birds calling, see the white tropical beaches lined with palm trees and feel the warm sun on your skin.
You’ll also taste vinegar and water (it’s the mixture we use to clean everything on the boat), hear the generator purring (to make us water, cook our food and keep our batteries topped up), see the underside of the hull (if the barnacles need to be cleaned off) and feel what it feels like when a job or task takes five hours longer than it should have.
Being a liveaboard cruiser is amazing
The perks are many – heck, when we get tired of looking at one incredibly beautiful view we can sail for a couple of hours and choose another one. We can travel all over the world and come home to our home and our bed every night. We can choose to say in warm weather all the time or we can explore cooler regions (although I’m not sure what the appeal is with that)! And best of all, it costs absolutely nothing to anchor.
But it’s also hard work
I always tell people that are interested in the lifestyle how hard it is but people neglect to hear me. I suppose it’s like having a baby. People tell you that it’s tough but you don’t really understand what they meant until you give birth and struggle to survive the first year.
With the Britican Experience you get to see the good and the not-so-good. And the not-so-good isn’t bad – it’s actually not bad…it’s just different from what we’ve grown to know and understand. As I always say, you don’t know what you don’t know. Boy – when it comes go owning and maintaining a boat you really don’t know what you don’t know.
The Britican Experience will help prospective boat buyers/owners/cruisers to bridge that gap.
Feedback From A Britican Experience Couple
First, I can say the experience is an excellent experience and you couldn’t meet nicer people. Simon and Kim customized the week specifically for our needs. We have experience with crewing our own trips thru charters but are restricted to daytime sailing. Our longest trip prior to the Britican Experience was a one-way trip from St. Lucia to Grenada that was spread over 7 days. Our goal was to gain more offshore experience and understand how cruisers lived. Pulling the trigger on a purchase of a boat is not something you want to do without ample knowledge into the total experience. Living in Kansas does not generally provide you with accessibility to the lifestyle, the Britican Experience was a great match for our needs.
Passage making
My goals for the passage was to learn and understand:
- watch schedules
- what do you do while on watch,
- can you sleep between watches
- if you get seasick can you function afterward
- will you acclimate to the motion after a few days
- and just observe someone with experience dealing with whatever happens
I had hoped for a challenging squall, moderate seas, and some brisk winds. I can say we met our goals except for the squall, however, I did not specifically request a squall. I’m sure if I had Simon and Kim could have arranged that as well as they accommodated everything we requested and went the extra mile to make the experience perfect.
The watch schedule was 3 hours on and 3 hours off, that worked well for me and I had no issues sleeping while not on watch, in fact, I slept better than at home. While on watch we monitored location, heading, sails, wind, AIS, and took a hard look for traffic every 10 minutes. Once we found some traffic it gained all attention until determined it would not be a factor.
I did get sea sick at night while attempting to read a Lat/Lon on an unfamiliar chart plotter to make a logbook entry, the 12 hours prior I was fine and 3 hours later I was back to 100%. The next night I spent much time looking at the chart plotter and the iPad for navigation and had zero issues with seasickness, so I feel pretty good with that.
The winds for the trip were a constant 25 to 30 knots on the beam for the first day and night with seas to match. The boat responded with confidence and had no issues with the conditions. We ran the first reef in the main the entire trip and would reef the genoa as appropriate. Britican has powerful electric furling for the genoa, that was pretty sweet in the conditions and made reefing the genoa under load a non-event.
I felt completely comfortable in the wind and sea state and would have no issue on a longer trip. We arrived in Falmouth Harbour at night and I enjoyed using range lights and lighted buoys to make our path into the harbor. Getting to see the nav aids for real at night and making sure I understood all of what the chart had to offer was a great learning experience for me. Some of it was a bit confusing several miles out but all lined up as we got closer to the entrance.
I can say we had no issues on our trip, that says a lot for the condition of the boat and the experience of the crew. Simon is a master when dealing with the boat and keeps it in tip top shape.
Understanding how cruisers Live
My previous trips have been sailing as much as we possibly can. My crews vary but generally they want to sail when given the choice. This trip we were not responsible for making sure our shipmates had a great adventure, so I wanted to take the opportunity to just stay in one spot and see how the days panned out when hanging with a couple of seasoned cruisers. This data point may be skewed a bit since we are sailing with YouTube stars that have a 9-year-old, both of which expand your social relationships.
At customs when checking into Antigua, Simon ran into a somebody they had met at a previous anchorage. It was not long after being in port that several contacts were made and plans for a gathering for sundowners quickly developed. I observed during sundowners that only 2 of 10 folks knew the Brown’s thru the YouTube channel/website demonstrating lots of friends were made at previous anchorages. Communication to other folks was thru various methods such as Facebook Messenger, Whatsapp, and VHF, it did not seem difficult to locate old friends they had met previously at other locations.
This is a big positive for me as one would not want to be isolated on a boat. We like to get out and do stuff. Day 2 we rented a car, toured the island and did a zip line adventure followed by lunch at a great beach restaurant. Days 3 and 4 were hiking on some beautiful trails of Antigua, meeting more folks for lunch, dinner, and sundowners. A good time was had by all and seems to be a great social network. The most important things I learned was life at anchorage is fun, friends can be made and to order an Old Fashion rum punch whenever given the opportunity.
Jon & Jennifer Carr, Britican Experience April 2019
Watch a short 2-minute video showcasing Jon & Jennifer's experience, click the button below.
But Who Are We?
Meet the Brown's
If you don’t know who we are, check us out on YouTube. Also, spend time looking over our 400+ articles that are on the website. You’ll quickly decide whether you like us and our style or not. We’ve been sailing an Oyster 56′ (monohull) since 2014 and have done over 30,000 nautical miles circumnavigating the Mediterranean, crossing the Atlantic and sailing the US east coast and the Caribbean (twice).
We’re a family of three. The Captain is Simon, a Brit that had very little prior experience with sailing or boat ownership until leaving land. The First Mate is Kim, an American that sat on boats all her life and tried to look pretty (and learned nothing about boating). And then there’s Sienna, a true Britican, that has spent more of her life on a boat than on land. She’s the Admiral 
Feedback From A Britican Experience Guest
As a young boy, I became enchanted with sailing after watching the late fifties TV series "Adventures in Paradise", written by James Michener and staring Gardner McKay, as Captain Adam Troy.
Adam was the handsome, swashbuckling captain of the schooner "Tiki" which sailed the South Pacific looking for adventure.
I thought "WOW", that's what I want to do someday; well it didn't quite turn out that way.
However, while surfing sailing YouTube videos I came across the series "Sailing Britican".
It recorded the adventures of a young family who sold out, bought a beautiful Oyster 56, a blue water sailing yacht and started out on a journey that most of us only dream about.
Today, after sailing several years in the Med, Caribbean and making several ocean crossings to the States, they are sharing this extraordinary adventure with their viewers by offering the Britican Experience.
Without hesitation, I jumped at the chance to have my "Adventures in Paradise" with Captain Simon Brown, his wife, Kim (a terrific first mate and best cook I've ever met) and their sweetheart, very entertaining, daughter, Sienna. It was a great experience.
Furthermore, without hesitation, I highly recommend this wonderful, action-packed adventure, to anyone having the "DREAM" to sail the seven seas.
Captain Bob, Britican Experience March 2019
What will you experience?
Depending on what each family member is looking for we’ll create a weeklong experience on Britican that includes any or all of the following (just to mention a small sample):
- Sailing skills
- Boat handling/docking
- Anchoring/mooring balls
- Engine/generator servicing
- Long passages (overnight or 2-night passages)
- Cooking, provisioning, BBQ, solar cooking
- Convincing your better half that boating is a good idea
- Rigging inspection/going up the mast
- Man Over Board drills
- Safety equipment and use
- Passage planning
- Weather forecasting for full-time cruisers
- Using the VHF and experiencing Cruiser Net's
- Communications for full-time liveaboards
- Troubleshooting - in all senses of the word!
- Ancillary – watermaker, pumps, refrigeration
- Homeschooling and family life
- Medical/First Aid
- Booking into another country
- Night sailing
- Meeting other cruisers
- Regatta racing (when available)
- Creating income streams, blogging, YouTube and more!
Some people want to learn how to sail, others want to get to grips with the intricacies of being a liveaboard and others simply want to see what it's like to sail a 56' Oyster yacht for a week. We'll work together to create an itinerary that helps to bring you closer to achieving your own boat dreams.
Feedback From Past Britican Crew
I first met Kim, Simon and Sienna in Marina Di Ragusa, on the South coast of Sicily in the winter of 2014.
After socialising with them for the winter (and very enjoyable it was!) they asked me to help move Britican to Preveza in Greece, for routine maintenance. It proved to be a fast and fun trip and it was great to experience life on a larger yacht.
After the trip they asked if I would be interested in joining them on the 2015 ARC, I agreed to this immediately and with pleasure, as it would be an excellent experience for my own up and coming Atlantic crossing in 2017.
Having sailed for 3 weeks and over 3,000 miles with Kim, Simon and Sienna I can definitely say Britican is a fast, well found and comfortable yacht. Kim and Simon are very positive people and excellent company (and Sienna can always be relied upon to lighten the mood!)
If you want to experience the liveaboard lifestyle or just brush up your own sailing skills with a view to taking the full time plunge, Britican and her crew will give you a first-rate introduction into the joys of a cruising life.
From the basics like provisioning, route planning, boat handling, Customs, through to the trials and tribulations of maintenance and boat management that all cruisers encounter, Britican’s owners can always be counted on to have done the research and have a variety of solutions and advice to share.
Through their extensive network of fellow liveaboards you can also guarantee that you will get a comprehensive insight into various yacht types, budgeting options and life style choices.
Get out there and live the dream!
Murray Basingthwaighte, Currently sailing the east coast of America
Sample Itinerary
Some Of The Views You'll Enjoy
The Cost
Considering that it might cost you $50,000 to $1,000,000 to buy a boat, getting an insight into the lifestyle could be invaluable. You might think that it's an unlikely thing - for someone to spend huge amounts of money buying a boat, preparing it for long-term adventures and then eventually determining that sailing isn't for them, HOWEVER, this happens all the time!
Every week we see people spend months, if not years, getting the boat ready only to go out once and determine they made a mistake. Perhaps they didn't gain enough confidence or experience? Or maybe they failed to get full buy-in from their partner? Many take the boat out and get scared not realizing the many situations that can crop up when sailing the seas.
When you try-before-you-buy with the Britican Experience, it's way less than Chartering a boat with crew. It's actually comparable to renting a bareboat (no crew/no support boat) but with the Britican Experience, you'll gain much more.
Instead of just seeing the sights, you'll gain valuable experience that will help you/your partner/your family determine if the liveaboard life truly is worth all the time and effort (It is!!!) and just how to make it happen.
To book, provided spaces are available, there's a $250 booking fee. The full cost for a couple is $6,000 (total) with children going free (up to two children). If you're a single sailor it's $4,500 unless you're willing to share a berth and the price reduces to $3,000. Currency quoted is in USD. Any questions? Email info@SailingBritican.com
The fee's include room and board on Britican for one week with a custom made itinerary based on you/your families requirements.
What is not included are flights, airport transfers, alcohol, excursions (dives, land-based tours, etc.), and any meals eaten out at restaurants.
Video Interviews &/or Clips of Britican Experience Guests
Questions & Answers
Q. My family I are interested in buying a Catamaran. Is it worth coming on Britican considering it’s a monohull?
A. Catamarans are great boats. We did not set up our Britican Experience to sell people on the boat but to sell them on the lifestyle. Around 95% of what you’ll learn from us will be the same whether you’re on a Catamaran or Monohull. But saying that, it’s the same with Monohulls – all boats are different and you’ll have to learn how the boat you want to buy is configured. In other words, every boat has a different setup. However, the principles of sailing and more importantly, the lifestyle, are the same no matter what boat you’re in. Furthermore, we know so many Catamaran owners that we’d be able to provide you with a look at Cats while you’re with us.
Q. How does the payment work?
A. As soon as we confirm the dates that you want are free, you can book the $250.00 non-refundable booking fee up above. You’ll then have to pay 50% of the fee one month before the Experience and the remainder is due one week before you arrive.
Q. Do you provide qualifications (ex. RYA)?
A. No. We’re not here to teach by the book. We’re here to show you what life is like living aboard a sailboat. We’re here to give you a fly-on-the-wall look at what it’s really like to be a liveaboard cruiser. You will not find paper charts on our boat (although we do have them in a drawer). No one uses charts any more – all passage planning is done on a plotter or iPad nowadays. And we’re not going to drone on for a full day about how to use every safety mechanism on the boat (although safety is very important to us).
Hey – it’s important to know how to do things the old school way so we definitely advise people to get qualifications. Learn how to do a passage on a paper chart. Learn how to hold a flare in the right way. Learn what every night-time boat light configuration means. And when you want a real-life experiential situation, come join us and we’ll show you what living on a boat is like 
Feedback From Past Britican Crew
I had the most incredible experience on Britican with Simon, Kim, and Sienna. They are extremely knowledgeable with years of cruising experience and it shows. During my stay with them I got to learn how they provision for long passages, plan for weather, determine the appropriate routes for passages, as well as get direct experience with night sailing, navigation, passage making, radio communications, and many other things.
There is no substitute for getting hands on experience to understand what it’s like to be a liveaboard cruiser and to feel more comfortable and confident with the skills required to do it.
It’s hard to know everything when planning to start a cruising lifestyle, but getting direct exposure to their knowledge and experience will help you save time and make better, more informed decisions. And best of all they are great people who I am glad I had the chance to meet and spend time on their boat.
Kenny Jones, from Atlanta Georgia
Britican Guests Feedback
What Do Others Have To Say?
My husband and I met Kim and Simon in Georgetown, the Bahamas in early 2018. Unfortunately for them, but lucky for us, they were stuck there waiting for engine parts to repair their engine. We too were having engine problems and were there waiting out a transmission rebuild.
During the 6 weeks that we were there together, as we became friends, they quickly realized how new and inexperienced we were at sailing. We had basically quit our jobs, took a couple of sailing courses, bought a 46’ Beneteau and took our kids out of school to travel and live out a life-long dream.
We had very little experience with sailing, anchoring, or fixing anything mechanical on the boat. We somehow made it to Georgetown in the southern Bahamas by sailing (with a lot of motoring) on calm days. It was a good thing we had to stay there because it gave us an opportunity to learn some much-needed skills and learn about fixing some of the vital systems on the boat.
Even though Kim and Simon had their own engine issues on Britican, Simon was always there to lend a helping hand or answer a question when we needed help. Simon took it upon himself to help us learn to anchor much better (we had been having dragging issues because we had the wrong type of anchor for sandy bottoms), as well as how to communicate with each other when anchoring.
He also showed us how to go up the mast for the first time and how to service and grease the winches. Whenever we had any issues Simon was the first person to answer our calls for assistance on the cruisers net.
Anything from a water pump failure, to troubleshooting the autopilot, to sailing onto a mooring ball with no transmission/engine, he helped us with it all... and not because he felt obligated to, but because that’s just who he is and it’s in his nature to want to teach and help people.
Not one time did I ever feel like Simon was being condescending, he honestly enjoys passing along his knowledge of boating.
Kim is equally supportive and helped us stay positive especially when we would stumble upon another challenge that we were up against. She was always encouraging us when we were disappointed and helping us have PMA (Positive Mental Attitude)!
I honestly believe that we would never have made it out of Georgetown to head southeast to the Caribbean if it weren’t for both Kim and Simon’s encouragement and support! They are some of the nicest and most genuine people you will meet, and they have so much knowledge to share with anyone who wants to learn.
I think the Britican Club and the Britican Experience are a perfect fit for Kim and Simon, and a natural next step in educating and helping other cruisers learn to live the cruising lifestyle. If you go on the Britican Experience expect to learn a lot every day, but also expect to enjoy yourself with these great people!
Ansley Wren-Key, South Carolina, USA
Availability & Prebooking
To Express Interest: Check dates in the calendar. If they're green, you're most likely good to go. Bookings are taken on a first come, first serve basis. Include your name, phone number, number in your party (maximum is two adults and two children) and put the dates down that you're interested in.
Please check flight availability into Grenada before emailing. We'll follow up with an email/phone call to discuss things further.
Note that this is not a booking form. This is only to express an interest.
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Feedback From Past Britican Crew
After watching Sailing Britican videos, I reached out to Kim regarding the Britican Experience opportunity. I had three primary goals; learn to navigate, experience sailing life and checking in and out of country’s. After my time with Kim, Simon and Sienna, I can without a doubt say I got more from my experience than just meeting my goals.
They treated me like family, including me in all their sailing discussions and decision. Simon and Kim are patient, easy going and welcoming. I remember my first night watch alone in a part of the Caribbean where Cargo traffic is frequent. Simon spent the time to reiterate what it means when you see different navigation lights on the ships, how to maneuver and our plan for when/if a boat was within a certain range.
There were lots of discussion about weather and what to do in varying situations, from knowing where we could duck into protection or to how/when to reduce sail area.
My only regret was that I had to return to work.
Kyle Ian Martindale, Virginia