Monday, January 18, 2010

Toronto International Boat Show

W finally got to the boat show on its last day. Now the cheapness in me comes out:

Parking) $12
Admission) $15 x 2 = $30
Binoculars:) $89
Captains hat) $10
Crew hat (pink) ) $10
Pleasure Craft Operating Card) $60
Water & soda pop) $8
Smoked meat sandwich) $10

So for $229 we had a good day. I love my hat, it looks like the Skippers on Gilligans Island...lol The guys at the marina are going to get a kick out of it. My new binoculars are phenomenal too. What a difference in optics from a really, really cheap pair (Which we got at a yard sale years ago) and these.

My wife bought herself a bright pink crew hat. She looks adorable and sexy in any hat.

The black listings are acceptable expenses. The place has to make money. period.

The yellow listing is good in theory, but man oh man, make it challenging. Make an applicant study for it at the very least! What it amounts to is a boating tax, pure and simple. The hardest part about the exam was trying to make out the hand drawn pictures that you had to choose from.

For example, in one question there was 6 drawings and you had to choose the 4 that would require assistance. Drawing 1 was a boat with wavy gunnel's, #2 was, I don't know, a picture of a divers down flag, # 3 was a person in an inflatable life raft, another was of a person holding on a flare. There were more but you get the point. Most were straight forward but the boat and flare pictures were a bloody mess, I truly did not have a notion of what they were representing. I guessed and got it right though. What I didn't get right was a question on gross weight allowed on the boat, I put the entire boat its equipment and the passengers and their gear, while I believe the correct answer was just the passengers and their gear! I am guessing as they don't tell you what you got wrong nor the correct answer.

The red lists just disgusted me. We will picnic next year.

We saw a good friend, Martin, who is an assistant manager at our favorite chandler's, (That is a boat store Kat). We learned on face book later on from his lovely wife,Sue, that his assistant locked the keys in the stores van...

We looked at new boats and were amazed.

We looked at Zodiacs and were astounded at the prices. There was one zodiac about 30' long with two (2) 300 HP Yamahas on the back. Now get this, it had a smaller Zodiac on davits (a small crane) on its bow (front end). The wife was amazed, she didn't know they could breed....lol But for a mere $130,000.oo they could keep it.

What is a baby zodiac called? A calf? Pup? Cub? Any zoologists out there?

Good time, though I woke up this morning with a scratchy throat and a severely runny nose...