My cool houseboat

Cool examples of how houseboats can offer an attractive, practical, and alternative place to live, as well as amazing and often idiosyncratic solutions to living successfully in a small space. People fall in love with boats and own them for a variety of reasons: out of affordability and necessity; a love of the water; closeness to nature and the environment; or just because they yearn for a different and more relaxed style of living/working space. The houseboats covered here include canal boats, riverboats, narrow and wide beam boats, barges, Dutch barges, static houseboats, and even seaworthy cruisers moored in marinas. They are from the UK, North America, Europe, and Australia, and each one has fascinating history and owners' stories. The chapter on unusual workspaces ranges from bookshops to business offices, while the home chapter covers everything from stylish Seattle houseboats to a community made up of an eclectic mix of converted barges, tugs, minesweepers, and torpedo boats. Repurposed and rescued boats covered here range from ones on dry land to a mariner's restaurant; urban boats include city canal living and village life, from Paris to London and Amsterdam; and lastly, there is a chapter on get-away-from-it-all boats and retreats.