What Floats Your Boat?

For many of us, this is an easy question to answer. We all know 8Knots true love, Jeff likes "hot rod" boats. For me, it's the sportfishermen that tickle my fancy, and more recently, the downeast/lobster boats (mostly because I can't afford my true love ) Ray Hunt/Richard Bertram's 31 footer is one of my all time favorites, as well as the Hunt designed Chris Craft 30 Tournament Sport Fish. The Bertram 28 flybridge is also one of my favorites. Though I'll never own one, I really love the Merritt and Rybovich sport fishermen, and Ricky Scarborough Carolina boats. I think Ted Brewer's Deer Island 28 is one of the nicest small boats I've ever seen, though I'd extend the house a little further aft if (when? ) I built her. I think she's "the one." So what floats your boat?

 

I have been on all of the above, been on many sailboats, and I still catch more fish, share more good times, and net out more bang for the buck in my 16 foot garvey runabout. With a four stroke on it, I spend around two dollars a day of fuel, and it will return me more than any fishing offshore in a fifty footer, for my sanity, too. when its blows, I pull out the Old Town Canoe, and cruise the marshes for birding, trout and redfish, or puppy drum as its known i many parts of the world.

 

While I'm basically a rag-boat kinda guy (check the name ), I do have to admit that the Bertram 31 has been a long favourite in the stink-pot department. Along with other notables such as Surfury, Barbarina, and most of Sonny Levi's designs.
I am partial to traditional boats, modern boats, dinghies of all sorts, kayaks, motor launches, what-have-you, AS LONG AS they are well-designed and well-built.
I guess that pretty much covers everything that floats, except (big admission) US-style canoes. Don't know why, they just never appealed too much.
Boats that are mass-produced, esp. power boats, don't do much for me, but a bad day in one of them is still better than not being on the water.
Steve

 

Most of us are products of our upbringing. I spent most of my youth in Mississippi backwaters with row boats and open canoes. I have owned many motorboats from 5hp-80hp; I never was very attached to any of them. Today I have a 16’ aluminum skiff with a 40hp outboard, I use it for fishing only if the wife is with me or I want to cover a lot of water. My fleet of canoes is what gets me excited about being on the water; I like to go slow and quiet. I now have 4 and each fills a specific need. I have a large sea kayak, but find it uncomfortable after about an hour. (getting old) I’m sure I would like sailing but I guy can’t do everything. The only big boat I see in my future is a Deer Isle 28, which I plan to build to a work boat finish and use to explore the Great Lakes.

Gary

 

I'm new to powerboating, have sailed for many years, and there are just way too many awesome boats out there to just choose one. However, I did recently see a boat that I coveted, the OCEAN TECH SS-4000 EXPRESS 40 CAT BOAT! It is way out of my price range, but it has a real beauty to it in its design and specific functionality. I'd happily spend a day on any boat, so it doesn't really matter. We spent last Sunday on a 56' Matthews, eating burgers and watching the Blue Angels fly overhead during the MacDill Air Show in Tampa. Three generations, two families on the water, great fun!

Kovas

 

I like tugs.

 

CDBarry - very nice
Short, to the point, maybe a leeettle bit brutal - but it goes with the tug thing...

Steve

 

I'll never own one but the Nortic tug looks awsome.. but my first love is the carolina sportsfishing boat. Oh and the Flat bottom skiff and canoe and......... Well even a log if it floats and has a motor.

 

Boats have floated my life

I’ve grown up on a lake, and boats have always been part of my life. We enjoyed our 1954 12-foot aluminum Crestliner with an 18 HP Evinrude for many, many years. I’ve always also enjoyed canoeing and rowing. We had a Laser for several years; she was a real blast! Somehow, I’ve gravitated more toward boats that I can point in the desired direction and just go, so sailing sadly fell by the way.

Our first exposure to any kind of boat you could live and vacation aboard was on a rented houseboat on Lake Winnipesaukee, New Hampshire, in 1973. We rented from the same company and cruised Lake Champlain and environs in 1975, ‘6 and ‘7, then acquired our 1972 25-foot Luhrs cabin cruiser in 1978. She gave us years of weekend and vacation pleasure through the early Eighties.

I believe it was when my dad took me to the New York Boat Show for the first time in 1976 that I decided to pursue naval architecture as a career path. (I earned the Bachelor of Engineering degree from Stevens Tech in Hoboken, NJ, in 1984, majoring in ocean engineering. With 18 years’ experience, I am now moving toward yacht design as well as other types of small craft.)

My fleet now consists of one Playbuoy 14-ft. pontoon boat, a Mad River Malecite canoe, a windsurfer (tag sale special), an ’85 Huntsman sea kayak (British build), two rowing shells (one Small Craft, one Little River) and an aluminum utility row/motor boat. (Our lakeside association director doubted my verity when I claimed I needed ID stickers for six boats last year.)

I’m a long-time fan of sportfishing yachts! Believe it or not, I’m no fisherman, nor could I afford one – I’ve just always seen an aesthetic appeal in the long bows, rakish, set-back deckhouses, and sweeping sheer lines of these boats. The best cabins are plush, but not ostentatious – the archetypal “boys’ cabin in the woods”, but you wouldn’t be embarrassed to take a girl there! In fact, I’m working on a sportfish design for the MacNaughton YDS at this time! Just learning about planing hulls and studying how various design elements affect planing performance has been an adventure. Incidentally, in addition to all my naval architecture books and resources for college, work and YDS, I have some 27 years’ worth of back issues of Motorboat, Boating, Yachting, Power and Motoryacht, Powerboat Reports, … you see where I’m going? Yes, I’m a boat magazine pack rat, but I count these as vital historical and at least qualitative design assist resources. (I believe there are at least two interviews with John Rybovich somewhere in my collection, and I know of at least one feature on Jon Bannenberg. You just don’t throw some things away.)

As for my own personal “real-world-use”, my Little River rowing shell gets as much use as I’m able to put her to in the summer on Lake Waccabuc! My sea kayak also serves well, at home as well as on car-top day trips and on vacation! These are the boats that literally get my heart racing; nothing like a good, invigorating, 45-minute row!

Don Gale
South Salem, NY