Water We Thinking

Owning a boat is hard work and expensive.  If you start out with a great boat it can be easier and less costly.  If you saw our last post about what boat you should buy you hopefully have some insight into what boat you want and how to make sure it's the right boat for you.  So now you've made up your mind on what boat you want, you have the model, size, and year picked out, or maybe you have the exact boat picked out.  Now what?  Take a Coast Guard Auxiliary boater safety course.  There are lots of options at different times of the year and the cost is negligible. Check it out at http://www.cgaux.org 1.  I want it, how do I get it? You found the boat, and you had a survey and sea trial and everything looks great.  If you don't have the outright cash to pay for the boat you'll need a loan.  Your local credit union or bank may finance you but there are specialty banks that deal in boat loans like boatbanker.com or Google other...

Let's face it, boats are not easy things to live with.  There are many people out there who have been around boating their entire lives and are still learning.  Every boat is different and every boat owner has a different skillset of what they can and can't do.  We know a few people who've been boating for years or even decades and don't know how to drive a boat.  We know people who take to it immediately and can dock a large boat without any help.  If you have never been a boater or you are thinking about moving from a small boat to something much bigger (like we did) there are a myriad of things you need to know.  We're going to start with the most basic stuff and let you know all the things you need to know about owning a boat before you make a bad and costly decision by buying a boat that isn't for you. A nice new Carver ready for you to buy it. Feel free to post questions in the comments but we'll make this a multi-part series since there is a LO...

First we must apologize for not blogging in a little while, we've both been relatively busy with work (Colette especially) and just plain lazy about writing. On January 17 we spent four hours working the River City booth at the Boat Show .  We did the 10-2 shift which gave us some time afterward to explore the show with our good friends Adam and Holly and their lovely daughter Claire.  In the beginning it was a bit slow, but quickly it filled up and we grabbed people walking through to talk about River City.  Now, let me say that River City isn't perfect, it has some problems here and there, but overall we really like it.  Mostly we like the location and the fact that you can liveaboard year round.  So we put on our happy faces and told people about our "neighborhood." If you were one of the people that stopped by I hope you gained some great information from us and learned more about the marina, if you didn't make it that's too bad because we had a gr...

As you may know, our first boat "Two Wrights" hasn't been doing too well.  She was in need of some parts that are not too easy to find given that she was built in 1971.  As much as we loved Two Wrights and wanted her to live on, we decided it was best to let her go.  We initially posted a for sale add on Craigslist, hoping someone looking for a classic boat project would sweep her up.  After a few months and no bites we looked into donating her.  We spoke to a few different companies and settled on Kars 4 Kids .  (You may be familiar with their commercial jingle.)  They came and picked her and her trailer up and now they'll get her ready to be auctioned off.  By donating we get a $500 tax write off.  They then sell her at an auction. If the sale price is greater than $500 we can write off the final sale amount.  The money earned then goes to the charity.  This is the standard operation of all these donation companies. Sail Away ...