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My wife has been talking about the idea for a while, and considering the vast area of this inland sea, there must be others who have taken to this life_style_. I would love to hear from them and any recommendations thay may have about making this leap.

(Yep, I know it gets cold, but we live in a snowy place now. It would be fine.)

Thanks!

Puget sound is not exactly houseboat country.Visit the local marinas and sound out how the locals do it. Rent or charter a boat similar to what you have in mind and give it a try. A cruiser or sailboat may be more popular in this area.

I do know of a good number of live-aboards in the Puget Sound region. There are also live-aboards in Seattle's Lake Washington and Lake Union which both connect to the salt water of Puget Sound through a lock. One popular live-aboard boat is the Cruise-A-Home which is a houseboat _style_ cabin on a sea-going hull. About 500 of them were built in Everett, Washington, between 1969 and 1980. There is a de_script_ion of the boat at:

http://www.geocities.com/ctenning/index.html

Puget Sound is a really great cruising area and you can easily cruise into Canada and their wilderness inside passages.

We have posted some of our cruise photos of this area at:

http://carlten.tripod.com/index.html

Carl and Gloria Tenning

"Q E Too"

Now that is a nice boat. I sure wish someone would start building them again. you would never put a car on top of todays similarly designed Houseboat. The hull is super resembles a plucky. and the cabin is trawler _style_. Great looking boat. I imagine that is off shore capable.  Chris corinthian had a similiar look.

A 42-foot version of the Cruise-A-Home Corsair was built as late as 1990 by a follow-on company called Omni-Marine in Bellingham, Washington. I still see them offered for sale in the Puget Sound area. I have been aboard one and it is a really nice boat with two sleeping cabins, not including the salon (which probably makes up for sleeping too). One thing I like about this design, besides the wide cabin, is the forward position of the lower helm. Around here we need good forward visibility for avoiding logs. Most express cruisers have to be piloted from the upper helm just to get enough forward visability and around here that means "cold". So you see most of them enclosed in clear plastic which looks ugly both from the outside as well as looking out.

As for the weather around Puget Sound, today the high temperature was 43 degrees and it was clear and calm for cruising. I was out in our 31-footer for about four hours and it was most comfortable. Although I wouldn't plan on an extended cruise this time of year, because we do have occasional gales, some people around here do.