Do What You Love

The crew of Delos have made a living out of sailing the world

- John Clarke

Shortly before taking a software analyst job with Microsoft in 2001, Brian Trautman walked into the Bellevue Pubic Library just east of Seattle. He discovered Three Years in a Twelve-Foot Boat, Stephen G. Ladd’s book about a 15,000-mile sailing voyage through South America.

“After that I was hooked on sailing, completely obsessed,” says Trautman, 40, who grew up in landlocked Flagstaff, Arizona.

The book gnawed at him during his time at Microsoft. The obsession followed him to his own consulting firm, where he clocked 70-hour weeks.

“I was wrapped up in things that don’t matter,” he says. “Everything I was doing was targeted towards work. I needed to start living a little more.”

He bought a daysailer and taught himself to sail around Seattle. He busied himself with Dove by Robin Lee Graham, The Long Way by Bernard Moitessier, Chasing The Rainbow: The Drama of a Single-handed Sailing Race Around the World by Hal Roth and The Voyager’s Handbook: The Essential Guide to Blue Water Cruising by Beth Leonard. He saved and bought a bigger boat, the 53-foot Amel Super Maramu Delos built in La Rochelle, France, in 2000. Eventually he left his job, sold everything he owned and set sail for a seven-month cruise to Australia. 

Eight years later, he’s still at it.