When Diane and Noel Diotte began dreaming of leaving their San Gabriel Valley condominium to live full time on their 34-foot sloop, one question nagged at them. What would they do with all their stuff?
"A year later, my husband asked what we had in storage and I couldn't even remember," said Diane Diotte, an executive for an El Segundo-based software company. "That's how quickly you realize just how little possessions matter."
What is important to people such as the Diottes, who discovered this serene and simple life years ago, is the lifestyle living on the water affords.
"It's hard to describe," said Diotte, who has called Redondo Beach's King Harbor her home for about nine years. "There's a sense of well-being that comes from living so close to nature and from learning to hold on to only those things in life that really matter."
But opportunities to experience this alternative to traditional housing are getting harder to find in Southern California. As the price of living on land has continued to rise, the costs of living on water have remained comparatively affordable. And demand for slips for "live-aboards" -- the nickname for the people who live full time on boats and for those boats themselves -- remains high at a time when local marinas are limiting them.
"I've pretty much stopped accepting new live-aboards," said Horia Ispas, dock master of three marinas in Marina del Rey. "I haven't written them off entirely, but unless it's a big boat with its own bathroom and things, I'm staying away from them."
Some of the people who use live-aboards as low-cost housing have blighted marinas in recent years, Ispas said. "We've had problems."
For that reason, some other marinas in such places as Marina del Rey and Newport Beach have stopped accepting live-aboards altogether.
"Most of the marinas here, if not all of them, are phasing out live-aboards," said Chris Miller, who works for the Harbor Resources Department of Newport Beach. The city, however, still allows live-aboards on offshore moorings that are rented as places to berth boats.
Although Newport Beach allows up to 51 live-aboards at its offshore moorings, only about 30 boat owners currently opt for this rugged lifestyle. With no access to electricity at a dock, most mooring live-aboards generate their own power with solar panels. Residents must regularly bring their boats to pump-out stations to empty sewage holds. To get to and from the shore, they use dinghies like other people use cars. Despite the inconveniences, some wouldn't have it any other way.
