No settee?

[markpj23]

Here's what I have to port today:


And here's something similar to what I plan to build (photo courtesy of Hallberg-Rassey):

You didn't specify but I assume you are talking about a sailboat, and all of my comments below are addressed to that. If you are talking about a motorboat, then your RV experience is more appropriate and can most likely be directly transfered.

If you are going to use your boat as a liveaboard at a fixed dock with occasional daysails, or short term coastal cruising, you can be creative and do what ever works for your comfort and storage needs.

If you plan on any real bluewater cruising, you need to remember that you will NEED comfortable seaberths. You also need a place to sit in comfort on both tacks. A good seaberth is long enough and straight enough to fully stretch out in. Wide enough to rollover, narrow enough to hold you in place and is parralel to the mid line of the boat. and for comfort, they should be as far from the bow and stern as practical. Boats above a certain size can have good sea berths outside of the main cabin, but for most of us that is where they have to go. A lot of "modern" boats designed for the boat show and yacht club crowd don't have sea berths any more. But for long offshore voyages your alternative is to sleep on the cabin sole.

As alluded to above, no matter where you stand in the cabin, you need to be with in arms reach of a good solid handhold no matter which way you fall. Dance floors do NOT make good small boat cabins. Overhead handholds work for us tall people, but if you have a 6'3" overhead clearance, and a 5'1" crew member it will be a long reach.

You say that your RV bounces on bad roads, but it will never spend hours at a time bounceing while heeled over at 15 to 30 degrees, it's a very different world.

Most of the issues you raise about the comfort of setees can and should be addressable by a good cushion design, especially the angle of the back, and the depth and height of the seat. For sleeping the back cushions can always come off.

[Latitude9.5]

we have no settees only two eikhorn recliners and foot rests, wouldnt have it any other way

[mudnut]

Mark, that looks cool,very lounge room like,for two people cruising that looks like it will work.

When two people cruise they take whatch's.My thought was the good old hamock would at least give the off-whatch person a more comfortable sleep.At the dock I couldn't agree more with the lounge room look and feel.Mudnut.

[GordMay]

Captain Scott:
The recliners look really great, but where do you eat?

[Latitude9.5]

We have an enclosed cockpit so we eat there, at the cockpit table. Even when we had the dinette in the other boat we found ourselves eating in the cockpit.

I'm actually going to put a small pedestal table between the two recliners.

[SkiprJohn]

Aloha Latitude,
I did some interisland sailing on a Cal 2-46. If yours is nearly the same then you have a dance floor down there that you could put nearly anything in. You could have the recliners and settees with room left over.
JohnL

[Latitude9.5]

Its a similar layout, the navstation is located in the salon and the kitchen was relocated to the hallway between the salon and master cabin. Actually prolly a little more room in the salon in the 3-46. I like having the openess with all the windows it seems that much bigger.

[infopubs]

Scott and Mark, your setups are appealing to me. Sean, the fold out table is an interesting idea. GreatKetch, we are looking at trawlers, not sailboats, but thanks for your persective. I figured that furniture issues were universal, but I suppose they really aren't given the whole heeling/tacking thing.

Interesting to me, when I contributed to a similar thread about tables on an RV forum, the vast majority of folks said we were crazy to have no table. Well, three years of full-timing later, we still don't miss having a table. So, I guess we're weird in both worlds. But I definitely can see how having a place for charts would be very important.

Thanks to everyone who replied. Learning every day...

-Louise

[Auspicious]

And here's something similar to what I plan to build (photo courtesy of Hallberg-Rassey):

<grin> I have armchairs on my HR, with a settee opposite. All the people who told me I would regret giving up a sea berth for the chairs always want to sit in the chairs when they come visit. I make them sit on the settee.

The chairs are great. On my boat, the best "sea berth" is the floor in the walkthrough, followed by the floor along the nav station, with the settee and lee cloth third.

The chairs on the other hand are great for hanging out, reading, working on my laptop, watching TV, and -- with the leaf of the table out -- eating.

sail fast, dave