Miami Boat Show

Who's going to the boat show?

Maybe. In the words of Jimmy Buffet, "indecision may or may not be my problem".

I had planned to but... I'm in Key West. By the time I rent a car and a hotel room it gets pretty expensive. So likely I'll just stay here and relax

Arch

Arch said:

I had planned to but... I'm in Key West. By the time I rent a car and a hotel room it gets pretty expensive. So likely I'll just stay here and relax

Arch

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Sorry about your predicament, Arch.

I guess I'll probably do a single day at the show this year. I got most of what I needed last year, but would like to see a show price on a new auto-pilot....you know....one of those that I can put a joy stick on my helm chair so I don't have to lean forward and stress myself flicking the auto pilot on and off.

I'm going one of the days.

N4712 said:

Who's going to the boat show?

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I hope for your and every-bodies sake it's a whole lot better than recent SF show... IMO, it sucked.

Let us know good reports if they can be gleaned from the Miami Boat Show!

I'm a hoping that the pleasure-marine industry still has life...

Art said:

I hope for your and every-bodies sake it's a whole lot better than recent SF show... IMO, it sucked.

Let us know good reports if they can be gleaned from the Miami Boat Show!

I'm a hoping that the pleasure-marine industry still has life...

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Well, it is in Miami Beach, you know. If the show is not good there will be enough hype that we think it is.

Life? You want to see life? Go to Miami Beach. Lot's of life. Even the creepy crawly kind.

Yep...will be there.

Looks like we might be missing it now, were probably going go to bimini on Friday and come back Monday since it's a long weekend. Could always go Thursday to the boat show though.

My company has one of the rooms upstairs at the west end of the convention center. I'll be spending time there and at the Lehr outboard booth. Please stop by and say hello. Ask for Parks. Yes that's my first name.

I'll be there Thursday and Friday. Then heading down to KW for the weekend.

I'll be there...

I am planning on going!

Started setting up our room at the show today. My guys have three days to build three small stores. I'm glad I'm too old for that anymore.

I will be at The Miami Yacht and Brokerage Show on Collins Ave, Miami Beach. That is a different show than the new boats at the convention center but there are shuttle buses between the four locations of boat shows this weekend.
Strictly Sail is of course for sailboats, new boats only in the water at the Sealine Marina downtown, the convention center in Miami beach for new boats and then the big boats and yachts at the brokerage show. There are many new boats at Collins Ave such as Hatteras, Viking, and most of the European builders. This where all the megayachts will be on display.

Last fall at the Fort Lauderdale show I had a boat under display that certainly was not a trawler but ran at trawler speeds, a 1939 90' Mathis Trumpy. This weekend I will have one of my listings in the show that may not appeal to forum members, a 2006 62' Pershing with twin 1550 hp MAN engines running through Arneson surface drives. Cruising speed at 80% engine load is 36 knots.

I picked up the boat in Naples FL a few weeks ago and ran it to Fort Lauderdale myself, a 250 mile trip through Lake Okeechobee and then south on the ocean. That was my first time running a boat of that size with Arneson drives, it was a good trip and now I can talk about how the boat ran from personal experience.

Bradford Marine Yacht Sales display is located at the end of ramp 17, if you are walking by say Hi!

I picked a hellofatime to go overseas

Tomorrow I'll spend my day there, if somebody wants to meet me (786) 999-2408 and we can lunch

I'm stuck here in Sarasota.....guess no show for me. I thought I'd be in Stuart by Tuesday and be able to strike on Thursday. Maybe it's better this way....I had a pocket full of cash I was going to spend at Hopkins-Carter (Parks) store. Oh well.

Larry, Now you tell me! I'll make some boat show specials for you next time you're in the store.

There seems to be some kind of front going through Miami right now. I hope it blows through tonight and we get one of those nice clear winter days Miami is famous for.
If it keeps raining, I'll sell foul weather gear!

I worked the show today. I think it'll be a good one. Here is a picture of our boat show booth in 1950. My birthday always falls during the Miami International Boat show. It occurs to me that I might have been born during that one. I wonder if my father left the show to take Mom to the hospital?

HopCar said:

I worked the show today. I think it'll be a good one. Here is a picture of our boat show booth in 1950. My birthday always falls during the Miami International Boat show. It occurs to me that I might have been born during that one. I wonder if my father left the show to take Mom to the hospital?

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WOW - V-COOL TY, Art

Took the boat out today, and hit all 4 outdoor venues and was disheartened by lack of exhibitors at the Marriott. Other than 4 Marlows, there really were no big boats. The outer dock/seawall had zero boats on the outside, and few inside. In past years not only would both be packed with boats moored Med style, but there were floating docks extending out on the north side. Not this year!
The Sail Only at Bayside seemed to have more boats than before, but 90% were French catamarans. If you were shopping for a cat and had multi-million dollar budget, you had a wonderful selection. Also saw a gorgeous totally restored world cruiser mono hull.
Zipped over to Miami Beach Marina which had lots of empty slips. Contender had the entire floating dock for the restaurant, and seemed to be giving a robust amount of boatr rides to people they were shuttling in, but the groups I saw looked more like tourists (Chinese) than fishing boat guys that buy Contenders. My experience as years of beingl3 the Lien Hwa dealer here tells me, that if those guys break out notebooks and cameras, then next year Contender will be seeing suspiciously similar boats built in China. On the "big" yachts -brokers like Dennison were advertising at that venue looked empty. Didn't see anybody on or near them.
Not unusual though, as people just don't go there even for special invitation events with hot women and free drinks. Lack of parking doesn't help. Lack of finger piers makes watching people trying to board boats a spectator event there, especially if ships going by are causing surges. But saw none today. There were a couple of big yachts we couldn't figure out how to board at low tide (which it was) as the swim platforms were a good 8' down, and side decks had no entrances.
Then on to Indian Creek for the brokerage show. There we saw many of the dealers that used to exhibit at the Marriott. BUT ONLY saw a couple of SeaRays and Meridians together at the Brunswick display. Viking had a good selection and display. Saw Fairlines, a couple of Rivieras, less Sunseekers than last year, but made up by having larger ones. The trawler section was much smaller than last year. NOT as many large yachts as last year. But what really got me was lack of traffic on Collins (usually insanely thick) and lack of people! Afriend of mine working Sunseeker from NY blamed it on the weather up north, and the airport delays. Ok, but supposedly BUYERs are all from South America, and there's no weather delays from down South, easr or West. BTW the weather was picture book perfect. Clear skys, low70s, light breeze. OTHER than us, maybe saw only 7 other boats on the water in that whole expanse. Saw more stand up paddle boarders than anybody else. One young buck had a 10 in a bikini lying on his board as he paddled past mega million boats as if to rub in the fact that it's NOT the size of your boat.
I'll post some photos asap.

Man typing on a tablet is difficult! I'll be going back to thr brokerage show by land, so hope to see all the boats I couldn't see via water. I haven't been IN the Convention center for the boat show in decades, so have no clue what's there.

this is the Marriott. Remember how the dock/seawall would be totally surrounded by boats moored Med style? The inside of the marina along the dock also was empty.

The Marlow display

Lot's of Catamarans

Really nice monohull at the far left

I hung out at the Lehr Outboard booth today. I really like the new 15.
With it being a beautiful sunny day, we sold a bunch of hats at the Gill booth in Strictly Sail. Fishing tackle and Columbia shirts were moving out of our booth at the convention center.

pilothouse king said:

One young buck had a 10 in a bikini lying on his board as he paddled past mega million boats as if to rub in the fact that it's NOT the size of your boat.

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What that young buck doesn't understand is that she was shopping for someone who could afford more than a paddle board.

Maybe a megayacht owner on a paddle board looking at the "small" boats?