Size of Boat for Family with Two Kids

[roverhi]

We met a couple cruising with a 10 year old boy on a Kendall 32, progenitor of the Westsail 32. The boat had a good sized quarter berth that was the boys condo. Because of his size it held all his toys, cloths and was a playroom for him and a friend when the occasion arose. You might want to look for a boat with two quarter berths for your girls. That would give them each their own space and keep the kid clutter out of the main living area of the boat. The forepeak could be your domain with the main cabin as group space. Think that would be quite comfortable for your situation and keep the costs down to what you can afford.

[barnakiel]

Originally Posted by Nick1

I’ve never been on a Gemini cat, and I wonder how the sailing / space / safety would compare with a, let’s say 38ft monohull?

Well much up to which monohull we mean. Cats are safer/faster/roomier than monos but they are not a great choice where a lot of upwind work is expected in rough conditions. So probably also take your planned cruising grounds into consideration.

b.

[mason_jj]

If you're wondering about cruising on a gemini, there is a website that I read about a family of 4 that are cruising on one. Better yet I believe it is even for sale!

here is the link

STEELE STREET OCEANEERS

Jeff

[hthrnnclrk]

I've been looking for an answer to this one too. I keep seeing people reference having to add 10 ft or so on top of what they'd want for a couple in order to accomodate their kids, but that sees like a lot to me.

There are several families cruising on Geminis that have web sites. One is sailboatfamily.com. It's definitely a boat that we're considering for our family of three. What I'm trying to figure out is, would we be ok with slightly less length than that if it's arranged well? There are lots of boats in the 30-36' range that look like they'd tick our boxes otherwise, but I want to make sure we don't feel like we're camping. Since we live in the Midwest, there are virtually no cruising catamarans around, full stop, makes it really tough to get a feel for space.

[Hudson Force]

We raised our two children, for most of their years aboard, on a center cockpit with an aft cabin "master" cabin. We were pleased to have the V-berth and split the aft cabin into two smaller cabins for our children.

[tallyhorob]

guess a big thing is how old the kids are and what they are used to. I grew up sharing a small room with my brother, now a days kids all have there own rooms

[rberrey]

I worked with a guy in Key West in the late 80s who had 3 or 4 kids on a 31' or 33' mono home build, it might all depend on how close your family really is.

[capnorv]

We've had 2 grandchildren(5,7) with us on our Hans Christian 34T for three years, a couple weeks at a time. Last summer they outgrew sharing the quarterberth. Since we plan on spending their summer vacation out this year, we went larger.We bought a Hardin 45, plenty of stowage, adequate tankage, and reasonable, $73500+ tax. We were out about a half a day today, drizzley and miserable, but we were all happy in the cockpit. We plan on extending our cruising soon, and I believe this boat will accomadate quite nicly.She's not fast 6.8 knot, but then if I waanted fast it'd be a Scarab not a sailboat.

[Hudson Force]

Originally Posted by tallyhorob

guess a big thing is how old the kids are and what they are used to. I grew up sharing a small room with my brother, now a days kids all have there own rooms

'a wise message here! Our children were aboard from newborn to adulthood, so they never had to adapt until they left home. When our daughter moved to a college dorm room she had to hang sheets around her bed because she could not sleep in the huge cavernous space!

[JJB]

Originally Posted by Nick1

We’re a family with two girls, 3ys and 5yrs. The intention is to go sailing, initially for 1 year in the Caribbean, and then we'll take it from there, i.e. to continue, to go back or to put in on hold. We have experienced before sailing the Caribbean mostly on monohull boats from 36ft to 45ft, but without kids.

I'm about starting looking for a suitable boat, and the size of the boat appears to be quite a dilemma. Due to budget constraint, and in order to take off sooner rather then later, we’re looking for something rather small in size. But how small can we go?

At this point it would help to find out what other similar families decided in terms of the size of the boat?

Any input is highly appreciated. Thanks!

I have three kids, we went for a custom designed mono with our kids and requirements in mind, I would be looking more on the 45ft area of the criteria you gave, there are many great cruising boats out there that size, but will still give you and your family plenty of room to grow, and have space from one another when you need it.
If you just plan on cruising around the Caribbean, without doing long ocean passages, I also don't see why a 35 wouldn't do the job if you will be away from the boat every now and then, most 30-35's have quarter berths, so space shouldn't be an issue.

[delmitch2]

We were the family mentioned in an earlier post (steele street oceaneers). I really need to update the Blog!

We just sold our 1996 Gemini105M after owning her for a little over 4 years. The kids were 4 and 6 when we got her. Been through the Erie Canal twice, Welland Canal, numerous weeks in the 1000 Islands, across lake Ontario a few times, then finally from Lake Ontario to the Bahamas and back to Florida.

The Gemini is a FANTASTIC boat for kids!!

1. each kid had their own cabin. Big enough for them to be comfortable, but small enough for us to use the excuse that there wasn't enough room to bring certain items when preparing to liveaboard for a year (my son plays drums!)
2. Always connected to the action. It would have gotten old very fast always telling the kids "You are either down below or in the cockpit". I even had a day, while motoring on the Erie Canal where my daughter was skipping rope in the cockpit.
3. very shallow draft. Oftentimes we would come right in close to the beach so that the kids could step off the back of the boat and still be able to walk. This is fantastic when they want to go play in the sand, no ferrying them in with the dinghy, just tell them to go for a walk.
4. very stable, no seasickness
5. When anchored out there was plenty of room on deck to laze around. Also, because the boat was so stable, the kids got in the habit of climbing the mast, making swing ropes from the stays, etc...

I could go on, but we were really pleased with the boat.

[navigator54]

For what it is worth, we circumnavigated with our two children on a Catalina 42, 3 cabin version. The kids each had their own cabin and the older they get the more important that becomes. Depending on your cruising style a lot more time is spent at anchor than sailing. iIth their own cabins they could have sleep-overs, personalise their space and other things that kids normally want to do. For any long term cruising I would strongly recommend this.