Ridiculously Small Doors | Tiny House Living On A Boat

Compared to most Americans, we live in a pretty tiny house. The average size of a house in the States is probably somewhere around 2,000 sq ft (610 sq m). Our house is less than 400 sq ft (122 sq m). Our house also has one other big difference from most American homes - it's on the water. Yep, we live on a boat. A tiny boat.

Do you know what happens when you live in a tiny boat? Your doors are ridiculously small.

You would think I wouldn't be too surprised by this. After all, we spent some time living on an even smaller boat, which was probably less than 250 sq ft (76 sq m). And we lived in a tiny Scamp travel trailer which only had enough floor space for one person to stand up at a time.

Compared to our first boat and our travel trailer, our current boat is enormous. Except for the doors.

Do you know what I've learned from my ridiculously small doors? 

1 - I need to wear a helmet.

2 - Measuring things is important.

Take the door to our bedroom in the aft cabin. It's only 46 in (117 cm) tall. Just take a minute and have a think about how tall you are. Chances are, you're taller than our door. 

A normal sized door is around 6 1/2 ft (2 m) tall. They're designed to fit normal size human beings. Ours is designed for hobbits. Scott is 6 ft (1.8 m tall). The contortions that he has to do to fit through the hobbit hole are pretty funny.  I'm 5 ft (1.5 m) tall and don't have to bend down as much, but pretty much every single time I go through the door, I bang my head. You would think I would remember to duck more, but I never do. I really need to start wearing a helmet. 

 
And then there's the door to our v-berth (the cabin at the pointy end of the boat). It's taller than our aft cabin door, but it isn't very wide - only 16 in (41 cm). A door you'd find in a normal house would be around 30 in (76 cm) wide. 

This is where measuring comes in. I recently bought a new Sailrite sewing machine, but I was too cheap to buy the carrying case. Instead, I went and got a plastic storage container at Walmat to put the Sailrite in so that we can store it in the v-berth when we aren't using it. I measured the Sailrite carefully and got a container that it would fit in.

One problem - I didn't even think about measuring the door. Wouldn't you know it, the storage container was too big to fit through the door, not matter which way I turned it.  

I guess I still need to do a lot more tiny house / boat living before I get used to our ridiculously small doors!

If you want to see more pictures of our tiny boat - click here.

Do you live in a tiny house or boat? How big are your doors? 

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