Why would a family with three young children swap their home for a boat in the Mediterranean? Phillida Eves explains how they're realising their dream of blue water cruising.

I'm surrounded by boxes I can't face. Soracha, our beautiful two-and-a-half-year-old, is screaming at Cian, her five-year-old brother, whenever he tries to come in to watch television. He's cracking up. "It's my favourite programme," he protests. Nine-year-old Oisín is in our bed, home early from school with a headache. He wants chopped fruit and his Walkman. It's probably packed. I don't care about the mayhem - in three weeks we're setting sail and going to live on a boat in the Mediterranean.

We were so excited when we told my parents about our idea that I can't exactly remember their reaction. The notion had come about after a conversation with a friend, Diane, who has a yacht-crewing agency in Majorca. My husband, Tedd, and I wanted a family adventure to do with boats, had no ready cash and wanted a lifestyle change with a way of earning a living. Not knowing where to start, I phoned Diane to see if many jobs were going for a marine engineer and former sail-training watch leader and teacher with three young children. She laughed and said: "What you need to do is sell your house, buy a boat, become live-aboards and go blue water cruising. We did it for eight years with two young children."

A dream was born. I didn't know there was a name for what we wanted to do, but blue water cruising - which is to say sailing the open sea - sounded fantastic. And she's right. It can be done.

Tedd is a marine engineer; we met on a beautiful square-rigged sail-training ship in Australia. Tedd was the ship's engineer; I worked as a watch leader, cook or purser. We sailed for four incredible years. When we settled down to family life I promised myself that we would have a family adventure before Oisín was 10.

We have been living with our three children in Rosscahill, 12 miles west of Galway, in a rural area, with great views. And we have been happy but frustrated. Tedd works hard at a challenging job as a maintenance manager in a small factory in Oughterard, but although our mortgage is small the pay cheque is gobbled up by the repayments and by food, insurance, heating oil and all the other demands.

Financially we have been going nowhere. It's not that we want more material things - we feel trapped in a domestic grind and want to live a freer, more adventurous life. We love the outdoors and want to spend time with our children. We want to try a different way of life. A line from a Mary Oliver poem challenges me: "Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?"

I remember Mum looked a bit pale when we told her. "How exciting," she said. Our Australian friends were more direct. Quite a lot of silence on the phone, followed by two e-mails urging us to forget the whole thing. Reg warned us of the divorce- inducing strain of living in a space the size of a wardrobe.

As my body and mind slowly untangled the tentacles of fear and humiliation, I talked more to family and friends, explaining what we wanted to do. Rent out our house in Rosscahill, buy a boat and live on it in the Mediterranean, anchoring at beaches in the summer and taking it very slowly and safely. We would stop and work in the winter at large centres for boats, such as Barcelona or Palma. Tedd's marine-engineering skills should enable us to support ourselves and save for the summers. Summer on a yacht can be inexpensive. Anchoring is free and your needs are simple.

We had spoken to a few families living in a similar way, and they assured us it could be done. Articles in Yachting Monthly said life on board costs about half what it costs on land. I am a primary-school teacher so can home-school the children, or they may go to a local school. I could teach English. If things go well we hope to live on the boat for at least a couple of years. Slowly our friends have come around to the idea, urging us to go for it.

We spent long winter evenings in front of the computer and poring over Yachting Monthly. Eventually, after Tedd looked at several boats in Spain, he put in an offer on one. Several hundred e-mails, faxes and phone calls later it was ours. We had bought a 30-year-old Nicholson 48 ketch.

We plan to spend this summer cruising round a small area of Spain, next winter working in Barcelona and then, next summer, to cruise round Greece and Croatia. I'm loath to plan too much, however, as everything seems to take much longer than you expect. It's taken almost two years to get this far. By spring we had remortgaged the house and sold some land. The bank manager shook my hand and said: "Well, it's different, anyhow."

Our other preparations have included getting teach-yourself-Spanish tapes, doing marine courses and learning how to make yeast bread. We've also had lessons in first aid and resuscitation. Tedd has done courses in marine refrigeration - we hear some people will pay anything to have cold beer on board their boats. The kids have been practising wearing their safety harnesses on the climbing frame.

We're leaving the television but bringing Lego, Duplo, Meccano and loads of books.And our springer spaniel, Poppy, is coming too. She's been vaccinated and has her passport and a very short haircut. With luck she'll learn to do her business on newspaper on the deck when we're away from land.

How the children will get used to the boat is another story. Oisín was happy and excited by the idea when we told him two years ago. He got fed up waiting for it to happen last winter and went off boats for a while, but he's enthusiastic again now. He is unhappy about leaving his friends and school. We hope friends will come and visit us. Cian feels much the same. I know that taking a toddler, Soracha, on a boat sounds mad, but other families who've done it say the younger the better. The sides of the boat will be covered in netting and the children will always wear harnesses clipped to safety lines when they're on deck. We will fix Soracha's car seat in the cockpit so she will be safe and contained but able to see us when we're doing tricky stuff like coming in and out of the marinas or anchoring.

We went on a seminar on blue water cruising in Southampton. I was encouraged, relieved and very sceptical when they said the money is not the most difficult part of going sailing or making a big change in your lifestyle. They said the hardest part is the cutting of ties and the leaving. I'm beginning to believe them.

We have no detailed plans and want to take it all very slowly. If we find it's just not working, or two months are long enough, or the children hate it or are unbearably seasick, or Tedd and I can't cope with the small spaces and each other, then we will come home for September, back to school and our friends, and look for work. At least we'll have tried.

I'm finding the packing and leaving hard. Sometimes I feel overwhelmed and sad about leaving family and friends. At times I seem to lose sight of why we're packing and see only the mountain of things to do in front of me.

Yesterday, as I was leaning over a box, Soracha looked up and said: "Where's Mummy gone?" At the same time, I have a wonderful warm glow about our adventure that never leaves me. It's the next best thing to being in love. When friends call and we get out the photos of the boat and start talking about it, an incredible excitement and sense of lightness set in.

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The price of boats varies enormously, depending on the size, make, age and type of material used to make the hull. We went for a large boat, with five permanent beds, as we want to live on it full time.

You don't need a permit to live and sail in most of the Mediterranean, although there is talk of introducing one. You do need an annual permit to sail in Greek waters, however.

If you're looking for websites that will give you a flavour of life atsea, try www.thecruisinglife.com and www.northernmagic.com, an inspirational account of a family with three young children who sailed round the world. There's also www.yachtingmonthly.com.

For books, try Boatowner's Practical And Technical Cruising Manual by Nigel Calder and The Voyager's Handbook - The Essential Guide To Blue Water Cruising by Beth Leonard.