Min-Rant
077
PassageMaker
- January / February 2010
Making
the cost of boating make sense
People often get stymied achieving their boating dreams or flummoxed deciding which boat to buy trying to justify costs. It’s easy to see why. Wanting to avoid an unrealistic financial burden is natural. For many, however, the sticking point seems less about the affordability of boating and more about coming to terms with the decision itself. It seems they’re searching for some validation that their dreams make sense or are really cost effective.
Unfortunately the ability
to afford notwithstanding, looking for such validation probably misses the
point when you’re reaching out to capture memories for a lifetime. Years ago
I had the opportunity to fly with a couple and their small child on their private
jet to a boatyard in Eastern Canada. After picking me up in Maryland we had
a couple hours en route to talk about their plans. On the ground before noon
we enjoyed a quick lunch then took a tour of the boatyard and had other discussions.
Back in the air by mid-afternoon they dropped me at my destination, flying
off to their evening commitments. Somewhere during the day the owner was asked
“do you find your jet cost effective?” With a smile he responded that a jet
like his was “never cost effective”. What it did however was allow his family
to do things they could never have done without it.
And really, isn’t that’s
the point of boating, though for different reasons. Unlike the jet, boating
is really not about transportation. Boating is the summer home with ever changing
vistas surrounded by your own predictable and dependable creature comforts.
It’s about traveling with your stuff: family, friends, pets, belongings and
hobbies. Along the way places become available only because you are boating.
It is about a lifestyle that is unavailable without it. But, is it cost effective?
No it’s much more than that. To quote the ad, “It’s priceless”.
But then that’s just
my opinion.
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