Josh, I think you need to consider the purpose and intention you have for the boat. The Cabo Rico 38 and other similar designs are decidedly on the long distance cruiser side of things. Regarding the B layout: This is the layout we have on Eclipse. We like it for the reasons of
offshore cruising. It makes the most of the available space while preserving
storage. There's room for two to lounge comfortably. The wraparound settee allows good seating at
anchor, but also is a great large working table surface. I think it works well for this size boat. On a larger boat, a different layout may be more comfortable, but a bigger boat is a bigger boat. There is a lot of
storage under and behind the settees. Some of the things that were important to me were: The boat was not too big to be
single handed by my wife if necessary, A separate stand-up
shower, A good sea berth, Good tankage, Good
deck plan and wide side decks, A workable
galley for long passages, A reasonable space on the rear deck for grilling (very important
, reasonable stern for adding davits/solar (not really practical on double enders). I think it's important to remember that the CR-38 is really an extended version of the original Tiburon, which was a 36. CR essentially added to the stern. This gave a bit more room below, but added a lot of storage. The rear deck behind the
cockpit add a lot of utility and storage. If comparing the CR-38 to other 36 foot boats, it begins to make more sense. I started out with the assumption that I wanted the smallest cruising boat we could be happy with. It seems that boat bucks and
maintenance time invested go up geometrically with
LOA, a smaller boat makes my life simpler. On the other hand, if we were were planning for purely coastal and
Carribean cruising, something less heavy and with more room for entertaining would be better. Regarding the fridge space, Eclipse has the standard 7 cubic foot box. In the rear of the box (port side) is the evaporator / freezer. The box is pretty big relative to the size of the boat. A bigger box will require more amp-hours to keep cool and on a long distance cruiser, counting amp-hours is important. Before I'm done, I'll likely
rebuild the fridge box to give a larger freezer section with spillover to the fridge, all while dramatically increasing the
insulation (likely with aero-gel type insulation). I won't change the cabinet space, just the insides. I like the boat for a cruising couple or possibly with a small child. We are a couple and a golden retriever, and it seems to be ok. I'd like more room to spread out when in the marina, but not at the expense of the other things I mentioned for off shore. I'd like more room in the
cockpit, but not at the expense of storage space. I'd really like a dedicated workbench /
work room, but not at the long-term expense such a boat would require. I'm in lust of the room and layout of a friend's Outbound 46, but it's out of my pay-grade. So you pay's your
money and makes your choice. Any boat's a compromise, you just need to know yourself. And in the end, to be honest, we fell in love with the boat the first time aboard. I'm sure there will be times when the
water will seem bluer on some other boat, but then I'll remind myself of all the reasons we chose Eclipse and hopefully reason will soon prevail. Hope this helps. -Tom