Okay, it’s nice to sleep together, but not practical on a small boat. If you can fit a full size bed amidships or forward, as well as two good sea berths, that would be ideal. When we were younger and skinnier we could actually sleep in a pulled out salon berth which gave us about 3 feet of width. As long as we turned over together we could stay in the bed.
What you need on an Ocean cruiser is two berths that are 6’ 2” +, two feet wide and parallel to the centerline of the boat.
We have four berths like this. All are at the waterline where the motion is least. We switch sides when we tack (which isn’t often at sea.) In a gale you should be able to sleep well, and not be disturbed by the motion or by the on-watch moving around (charting for instance, or making tea.) Here is the chart table in use and the off-watch can be sleeping underneath it.
Berths should be insulated from the cold and from the noise of water rushing by the hull. Here there are lockers full of clothing insulating you from the noise. The hulll is balsa cored and that also damps the noise. You will be sleeping on the low side and close to the water. There must be good ventilation at the head end with your head in the open. You must be able to sit up without bumping against anything, and you have to be able to get in and out while the boat is going to weather in a blow. At one time I had wooden leeboards, but they were difficult to climb over, so now I sleep on the low side. We use 9 inches foam, with firm and soft layers.
When you lie down it should be so inviting that you hum yourself to sleep. To keep you in, as the boat rolls downwind, you will need a barrier along the side of the berth - either plywood or canvas. It is very important that there is good ventilation. You don’t want a pilot berth or a quarter berth that is a tunnel. Of course, you cannot sleep in the bow. Everything is wrong in the bow: the berths are not parallel to the centerline, they are poorly ventilated, high off the waterline, and don’t give enough headroom. A convertible dinette is the worst arrangement for sleeping at sea.
