Milton Miller

Mad scientist

Oh don't worry, you will not have to read about everything I did since the last century. I will only mention a few facts that I consider relevant to this project.

The first of it is that I had an unusual education. My parents had many books in the house. Too many, actually. I had access to all kinds of encyclopedias, technical books, incomprehensible books, classics, modern literature, mostly in English but also some in a few other languages. When I was a kid my parents gave me chests full of thousands of Lego pieces. Books and legos: powerful combination.

Since my teenage years I leaned towards sciences and business. I was going to be a high school dropout but I stuck to it so I could graduate and get into what I really wanted to do: Study electronics at the local trade school. Later I got into college to learn business management but that only lasted a few weeks. For the most part I was self-taught. I became a computer programmer as soon as there were computers with screens and keyboards. I became a software engineer and after a number of years I was a Senior Software Engineer working at a major corporation, just a mile from Harvard and MIT. Most of my colleagues were Engineers with diplomas and Masters and PhDs from those schools. I was the oddball.

In 2002 I was reading one of several books written by Amyr Klink, about his travels by sailboat to Antarctica and many other places. I fell in love with the idea of building a sailboat and traveling the world then. So I did what seemed obvious: I searched for his phone number, picked up the phone, and called his office. I talked to him and also to the designer and builder of some of his latest boats, Thierry Stump. He was gracious and generous with his time, answering my many questions. In 2004 and 2005 I went to Brazil and paid for a preliminary design of an exploration boat build in aluminum, and good for sailing in high-latitudes.

I didn't move forward with that project, as my thinking and lifestyle were not matching with what a project like this requires. I will not bore you with all I did (or thought) wrong at the time. It is enough to say that nothing much happened until 2006 when I discovered another construction method called “Sheathed Strip Construction” and decided to go to Eastport, Maine, to talk to the author of the system: Tom MacNaughton. He put me in touch with a competent team of naval engineers in his town and I bought another preliminary project.

At this point I had purchased the basic engineering plans and architecture of two boats, and had access to the design studios and boatyards of several builders and visited dozens of boats that had solutions that later I would use. Even though I didn't build anything so far, I learned a lot though the access I “bought”.

Then in 2017 I realized that it is time to get it started. My life is finite, so there is no time to waste.

When I started telling all my friends about what I set out to do, they didn't look very surprised. I have been leading an unusual life lately. I quit my last job in 2003, and have been an entrepreneur since then. I have been riding my motorcycle through 37 states in the USA, some of Canada and Mexico, and 24 countries in Europe. In fact, I still go to Europe during Summer each year to ride my motorcycle there. I also ran across America, from Miami to Los Angeles in 2011, and again from Los Angeles to Miami in 2014. So my friends know I have some screws lose in my head.

Mike Spencer Bown

The world's most travelled man

Mike Spencer Bown is a Canadian traveler who extensively visited numerous locations backpacking over a span of 23 years, and was said to have been the first tourist to Mogadishu in many years. Mike, who is a resident of Calgary, Alberta and has travelled to every country in the world.

Mike is our first senior advisor in this project and will be a frequent resident on the boat. His advise and insight are very important to keep us going in the right direction.

Anna Renner

Shark diving expert

Anna has many hours of close interaction dives with sharks in their own natural environment. But saying that risks distracting you from her many talents that are important to our adventures: Anna is an experienced rock climber, free diver, motorcycle rider, and german paramedic. She has recently graduated from Universität Innsbruck where she studied biology and is now pursuing a Masters in behavioral, neural and cognitive biology. She is a React Right Instructor and Open Water Diving Instructor as well as Stress and Rescue Enriched Air Nitrox and Dive Guide. She will be in charge of guiding our guests that want to dive with sharks in the wild, and will also be teaching scuba diving on board. In fact, we will have our own diving school.

Why are we in this together?

All of this comes as a reflection and culmination of our collective experiences on other boats we’ve sailed and lived aboard during our many travels and adventures throughout the world.

Mike spent 23 years backpacking quite literally to every country in the world. The body of knowledge and wisdom he accumulated during that period is impressive, and the stories he tells us both entertain and educate even the most experienced travelers and adventurers.

Anna has been diving with sharks, climbing mountains, free diving, and riding motorcycles and has achieved a level of mastery in those activities that would inspire any of us. She has been studying marine animal behaviour and she has special interests in conservation and study of sharks.

I have been sailing other people's boats occasionally for over two decades and then became fascinated with designing my own. Now out of a sense of challenge (or masochism) I decided to build it.