Our floating home is a 2013 Hanse 445 called Kawai and we really love her.

She's a German-built 44ft (13.5m) monohull with three cabins and two electric heads (toilets).

Stew and I get the big 'ensuite bedroom' at the front, so we have a large ‘island’ berth (bed), a small double wardrobe each, a toilet and a separate shower room (which we actually just use for storage). The 'main bathroom' is off the saloon (lounge) and has a toilet and shower cubicle. The kids both have equal-sized cabins at the back- so thankfully, no arguing over room sizes. Each of their rooms has a double wall-to-wall berth & a wardrobe, one sea-side viewing window and two hatches that open into the cockpit. The walls between them house the engine and a generator, and we discovered that when they are both in their rooms, they like to conspire together by whispering through the AC vents or secretly passing things to each other through their hatches!

We have a small but fully functioning galley (kitchen) with a gas oven, two burner gas hob and a double sink. Yes, we have a kettle and toaster! We have three fridges of varying small sizes, and 2 of them have little ice boxes - so we can store a few bags of frozen peas and an ice tray for my Gin & Tonics. The saloon (lounge) has U-shaped couch seating around a large dining table and another L-shaped couch on the far side. There are loads of cupboards as well as bilge storage (underfloor). The storage areas under our seating house the air con unit, water maker and batteries. There's a desk area with all the controls, and we have a decent-sized TV and built-in stereo. There's even a wine cabinet!

The beam (widest point) is 4.4m across, so it's small by housing standards, but it was surprisingly easy to adapt to living on board. The kids and I do schooling around the table while Stew works from the couch opposite or in the bedroom, usually with noise-cancelling headphones on!
The floor-to-ceiling height is decent, at about 200cm, so we don’t have to bend down or anything.

Up top, we have a twin helm (steering wheel), a double fold-out table that comfortably fits 4, cockpit seating for 8ish people, plus room for extras dotted about the place (we've hosted 9 adults before). One of my favourite parts of the boat is the swim platform, which drops down at the back, creating extra space right above the water surface—perfect for lounging or launching.

We have an in-mast furling main sail and a self-tacking jib. Our engine is a 75hp Volvo Penta, our draft is 2.25m, we can hold 450l of water and 230l of fuel. (We use our water for washing etc but drink bottled water.) We have 3 solar panels that bring in 1050 watts which is plenty to keep us going all day. Our cruising speed is about 6 knots and max speed is supposed to be 8 knots but we’ve managed to squeeze more out of her at times, yeeha!

That's the gist of it, but if you want to get a bit more technical, feel free to geek out on the specs below…