It's been a bit over 2 years since Jesse bought our old boat. In that time, he's done a lot more with it than I ever did, and he's made it a better machine for sure. It was a great first boat for us that did exactly what we needed it to, but it got to where it was time to get rid of it for reasons explained in pages past.
Our kids are now 2 years older - 6 (approaching 7) and 4.5. Our son is a great swimmer and can confidently swim all around the pool, including the deep end, without any life jacket on. Our girls are doing well in swim lessons but, as you'd expect, not at that level yet. Plus now we have the Ram, which is capable of towing just about anything you can hook to the bumper. Although we have no shortage of projects going on, we're at the point where the kids are getting better to take places on the whole, we can get them to sit down and for a few minutes as needed, and they understand and can follow logic better.
So... I'm thinking about [another] boat.
Where we last left off, my wife had shown interest in pontoon boats. That's a potential, but when I think about the things that annoy my wife the most and how I think we'd end up using it in the coming years, I think there are a few negatives with a pontoon. For one, too slow. For now the kids are still at a point where tubing slow is fine, but it won't take long before they want to go faster, and it won't take long after that before they want to start skiing or wakeboarding.
Another issue is that I think this time around, I think we'd be better off with something with a bit better cabin than what we had, and specifically something that has air conditioning for the cabin. My wife doesn't like feeling super hot and likes a place to get out of the heat. Conversely, boats with AC tend to also have heat, and we enjoyed using our boat during off-peak times. For that, it's nice to have someplace that you can have a warmer temperature if so desired.
@jesse and I have been talking some and I think that a want, but not need, is to have a twin. The biggest reason here is because we're talking a bigger boat, and in a single these bigger boats would either have a big block with a Bravo outdrive (if Mercruiser) or two V6s or small block V8s with an Alpha. The Bravos are a lot more expensive, so that makes me think I'd rather have the twin. Plus, redundancy when one engine fails.
Our last boat was 23 foot. This now has me looking more in the 27-31 foot range. The boats we're looking at are also in the 9'6" width range instead of the 8'6" or so, which also makes the deck and cabin nicer.
The problem with the width is that technically puts me in an oversize permit range, so I need to do some research on what that means from a practical perspective. Most of these have trailers associated with them. The obvious best thing to do would be to get a slip and just park it there, trailering it at the beginning and end of the season or if we were going to go to a different lake for a long weekend. I didn't like these aspects before, but I think that it's worth it now. I think the ability to trailer makes sense if nothing else because we weren't a big fan of the lake closest to our house, and so we probably want to do some exploring to determine where exactly we want to park the thing if we do put it on a slip. Plus, slips sometimes have wait lists, so there's no guaranteeing we could actually accomplish the goal of having the boat on a slip.
We liked the Sea Ray we had before, but I'm not tied to Sea Ray as a brand at all. The Sundancers are more what we'd be looking at, and plenty around what I'd consider a reasonable investment. I'm open to other brands as well, but it seems like regardless they're all about the same dimensions, so it's more a matter of features, condition, trailer included, etc.
What worked well for us last time around was buying something in the 2nd half/tail end of the season when values drop. I'm thinking that we start looking around and what's available and start gearing up to strike at an appropriate time.
Fire away with thoughts and telling me I'm wrong. Jesse should also have input since he's already said he wants to buy whatever I buy from me in a few years.
