Here are some fun facts about Miami, Florida: it is the only US city founded by a woman (Julia Tuttle), it is home to the world’s largest collection of Art Deco architecture, one of the first ever “recipes” for sunscreen was invented here (now on a shelf in a drug store near you known as Coppertone), and it is home to one of the world’s best boat shows. Marla, my wife and co-captain, and I decided to fly across the country so that we could attend the Miami International Boat Show this year. What a spectacular event!
If you are obsessed with boats and you have not experienced this particular show, you need to see it for yourself. The word massive does not even begin to describe this event. At the end of one day alone, my Apple watch congratulated me for walking 11,000 steps. I must admit that I thought it was broken when I first looked down and saw that stat. As far as the eye could see, there were boats, on top of boats, on top of more boats.
After months of extensive research, we decided that we wanted to purchase a catamaran. Much to our surprise, very few catamarans that were listed for sale were located on the West Coast. But to be honest, this did not bother us because we also decided that we want to spend the next few years sailing and exploring the East Coast.
Fast forward to our time in Miami. For those of you who know how exhausting it is to find “the one” (our next yacht of course), I am sure that it will not come as a surprise to you that we were up at the crack of dawn and, on most nights, in bed by 9. For others who may not know, perhaps you can relate to the process of buying a home which is eerily similar. We had initially started our search by scrolling through listings on Yacht World (the MLS for the boating community). After looking at what felt like a million catamarans, we set up several appointments with a broker that started right after we checked into our hotel. Naturally, we did not want these appointments to interfere with the show, hence the reason for the “crack of dawn” wake up call.
One feature that is important to both of us is a master bedroom that has room to comfortably walk around the entire bed. One ship we saw even had a nightstand which would enable us to keep essentials in arm’s reach: clock, phone, morning cup of coffee. Correction: it would afford one of us this luxury. Of course, it just so happened to be located on what is usually deemed Marla’s side of the bed. As I am the coffee addict of the pair, the obvious solution if we bought this vessel is that we would simply switch sides, right? And Marla’s clever retort, “As long as you are willing to pass me my cup every time I want to take a sip, it is fine by me.” I think we all know how this story would end.
Needless to say, I believe we may have started a new annual tradition: attending the Miami International Boat Show. Check back next month to hear about the start of our new adventure on our brand-new boat!