Big Yachts Provocation?

I might be feeding a troll but here is my take.
After 30 years in the industry, my take is relaxation and family time. None of the owners I have worked for could care less about showing off their shiny object, in fact it is just the opposite.

jpaul
people buy big yachts because they can, for many different and weird reasons
but I am afraid you wouldn't understand that

Who cares????

Here are some thoughts:
-Challenges of preparing, navigating, provisioning and maintaining an asset
-Choosing to spend time with family and friends combining travel with adventure


The majority of the yacht owners I have met over the last 5 years are not show offs, not Thurston Howell III types, and not boating to “flip off the world.” In my experience of meeting fellow owners, in general, they are helpful, interesting, and generally did something really well for a long time to get to this point in their lives. I have met many long term married couples who are living their dream.

Sure, I’ve met a few @$$-Clowns with their newest girlfriends, but that has been the exception, not the rule....

I don’t feel like I’m showing my middle finger; I feel like I’m a genuinely interested traveler that wants to learn about everywhere I go, and spend $$ along the way.

I bet if you spent any time at a Marina, you’d have a much better opinion of the people who “yacht”.

To this point, docking a yacht is necessary sometimes. Maybe they're in port provisioning. Maybe they just came back from a long trip. Maybe the owner is in between trips and chooses not to charter while he/she is not using it. Maybe trips are on hold due to pandemic issues.

I'm not really understanding why a yacht at a dock is such a problem. Seems sort of like agonizing over the fact that someone has a BMW in their driveway. Just because a yacht is at a dock doesn't mean the owner's intentions are to show it off.

So, I'll bite the troll bait and attempt to answer. First, you are a troll. You're here with no purpose other than to question why the rest of us are here. Fits the definition.

As to being docked, is your car not parked somewhere while you're here?

I agree with Pascal that it's a ridiculous question as to all the other things he points out. You came in making judgements and classifying things and claiming we were pointing our fingers. Then I'll point as the owner of several boats that offend you and of a large home and cars sitting in my garage. I own as someone very lucky and fortunate who has worked hard to do so. My home is large, but often 30 or more people here sharing with us.

So now you want to know what justifies something so ostentatious. By even using the word you've questioned us. I'd ask what justifies you questioning us? What have you done so wonderful in your life that allows you to point fingers? Or are you so wrapped up in what others do, that you do nothing? I don't feel the need to justify anything I do to you, a total stranger. I do try to do right by the families in a town where we have a school or the orphanage we've long been involved with or our 14,000 employees, and to the people we help through our foundation, but nothing to you.

And my reason for owning any boat is the same. It's to see the country and the world by water. Just recently I saw Croatia for the first time with 13 others with me. I was exposed to something new, a country new to me and people new to me and I did it all by water. What a beautiful country and wonderful experience. Then today I took friends out and ran beyond Miami and back home and we all had wholesome and refreshing entertainment and the company of those important to me, of which you are not one. Tomorrow, I'll conduct business, but none today.

I hope you find time in your life to enjoy leisure time with family and friends. That's all I'm doing and how I go about doing it is none of your ^%$#^ business. So, guess that gives you the rise you wanted. Now, hope you leave our presence and go trolling elsewhere.

Here you go.

I live in the Pacific North West. Boats are about adventure and nature.

I love when trolls are so obvious that they feel they need to try to announce they aren't trolls. It's like someone with a business repeats over and over how religious they are right before cheating you.

We're in a world where almost every question has an instant answer. So what's unusual about a curious person asking about something so obvious and expensive as a yacht? But there are a lot of reasons from addiction to the sea to needing a tax write-off, then there's those who use their boats for research. Interesting how defensive some are. Yes showing off is a big part of it whether for the looky-loos along the Miami River or Canes or to impress people they do business with or want to. You don't cruise into a marina on a hundred or 200' yacht cause you don't want to be noticed. However, like a home it gives the owner control of his environment. The only people who get to come close are those they invite. For many today it's also place to park money. A lot of people today have more money than they know what to do with. Sticking it in a bank is boring. The one thing you can count on is that most don't buy yachts to increase their wealth (except by generating business deals with people they impress).

Neither YOUR owners or guests want their pictures plastered on line but many people LIVE to be seen.
The videos of the Miami river that I have seen ensure that I will never be show up on a YT video.