The Snake at Southampton Boat Show

With a briefcase full of bricks chained to his wrist, our slytherin correspondent gives his expert view on the boat show

There is a formula that all boat show exhibitors are familiar with. It states that the length of time a punter remains at the show is inversely proportional to the total amount of money he will spend. Thus, the sightseer arrives as soon as the gates open and will leave with the show’s staff at closing time having spent £3.00 on a humorously shaped, cork, ignition key ring. The Eastern European gangster, though, will spend 40 minutes on the Sunsqueaker stand, hand over a case full of gold bullion, conflict diamonds or Class A narcotics and leave the show as the proud owner of one of the company’s fabulously expensive Annihilator 80 powerboats. There is plenty at The Southampton Boat Show to satisfy both the ambling anorak and the Muscovite Mafioso.

The 35th Southampton Boat Show occupies a part of the town’s waterfront that is usually given over to part or car park. More than 550 boats are exhibited in the show’s three main areas, linked by footbridges over two of Southampton’s busier roads with a further 300 craft afloat on the temporary pontoons.

The diversity of visitors at the show is reflected in the extraordinary range of companies that have chosen to exhibit; as one clothing retailer commented: “You can sell just about anything here.” Subsequently, along with the more mainstream boat show fodder one can also visit Premier Ship Models (Stand A147) and buy one of the company’s exquisite, Mauritius-made models (a Labrador-sized representation of the Spanish galleon San Felipe costs £898.00 +VAT), or head to the massive Solent Hall tent and browse over some gardening equipment.

There are numerous sideshows running throughout each day: The Coastguard and RNLI run rescue helicopter winching displays, a replica of Drake’s Golden Hinde is moored in the pontoon area and there are an abundance of sailing demonstrations. Sadly, the fashion show feature has disappeared. This is a tragic loss as the sight of models prowling down a catwalk in full, offshore foul weather gear always provided a surreal and entertaining diversion.

The show, particularly Press and Preview Day, is an opportunity for the marine industry to launch new products; at least 20 companies held launch parties on the opening Friday. So, if the unveiling of Volvo’s 'new generation of leisure boat engines' or Sotherby’s seminar in 'The Art Market for Marine Paintings' flips your switch there is much scope for enjoyment. Professional sailing teams also use the show to announce and parade new projects. On the show’s opening day two of the 19 Open 60s currently entered for November’s, double-handed, transatlantic Transat Jaques Vabre race arrived on the pontoons: Mike Golding introduced his stunning, new Owen-Clarke designed Ecover to the yachting press and public and later in the day Ellen MacArthur re-launched Team Cowes (ex- Kingfisher) for the Anglo-Australian partnership of Sam Davies and Nick Moloney.

Press and publicity stunts aside; the show is fundamentally a conspicuous collection of expensive, luxury toys that are prone to dramatic and rapid depreciation. The recently published Ancaster Index, however, states that the depreciation in the value of boats priced between £60,000 and £500,000 has slowed. The two-year depreciation for sailboats has fallen from 21.75% to 20%. Likewise, the figure for powerboats has dropped from 22.67% to 18.46%. These are truly fascinating and encouraging figures, but boats are not (obviously) a financial investment although they can offer huge rewards in pleasure and enjoyment. Faced with £860,000 of spending money, The Snake is unsure whether he would buy Fairline’s striking Targa 62 (Berth 161) or (for the same price) a currently available 12 bedroom, fortified, medieval house in the Gironde region of southwest France, including 4.4 hectares of vine. It’s all a matter of priorities and taste.

Many people treat The Southampton Boat Show as a marine theme park where one can actually buy the rides. Unhappily, the British affliction of restraint equips some visitors with a reluctance to try out the more glamorous exhibits. This should not be so. Thus the Snake has spent a number of London and Southampton Boat Shows as an exhibitor and now presents...

The DOs and DON’Ts of bluffing one's way onto an expensive exhibit:

DON’T be concerned if you possess a number of highly visible tattoos and have difficulty in constructing an intelligible sentence; many super rich, professional football players are now breaking into the pleasure boating scene.

When planning to view a top of the range powerboat or sailing yacht DON’T attempt this when it is raining heavily. No sales person wants a punter dripping all over the fiddle-back maple veneer or soaking the 4 inch pile, Pashmina carpet. In such a situation you are likely to encounter the viewing by appointment only defensive gambit.

DON’T be intimidated by any initial scrutiny from the salesperson in a badly fitting blazer. He/she is only practicing the trade show skill of assessing you through appearance and anthroposcopy (the devination of character through facial features). While you are stepping onto the boat, the salesperson will be trying to evaluate whether you are a SITCOM (single income, two children, outrageous mortgage) and likely to be contemplating a finance deal, or a LOMBARD (loads of money, but a real dickhead) and, consequently, ready for a fleecing.

If you are unprepossessing in appearance DO try and find a Victoria’s Secret underwear model to accompany you. Failing this, handcuff a calfskin briefcase to your wrist and persuade your largest and fiercest looking friend to follow you round in a black puffa jacket scowling a lot. Talking in Terminator-style cyborgspeke will enhance the illusion of cash rich, foreign criminality. Alternatively, if you are a long term tenant of Geek Street in Dorksville, Nurdingshire masquerading as a scruffy nonentity-turned-temporary celebrity from one of the moronic reality TV shows currently saturating the media may enable access to a top-end exhibit.

Once on board, DON’T ask too many banal questions through nervousness or excitement. Although, “Are you able to deliver her to Monte Carlo?” and throw away comments along the lines of “Oh! A landing pad. My wife, Chantelle-Marie, has just got her helicopter licence,” are likely to launch the salesman fridge-wards in search of celebratory refreshments.

During the sales pitch, DON’T bother feigning too much interest. Anyone who can afford a ridiculously expensive boat is unlikely to be enthralled by the precise number of backup, bilge pumps on board. Also, DO try to resist the boat show custom of GRP Tapping (the inability of visitors to pass an exhibit without rapping their knuckles confidently on the hull, presumably to confirm that the boat is not a hologram) The urge to stroke and finger any lovingly polished, stainless steel fittings should likewise be avoided. Tapping and stroking are the boat show equivalent of kicking tyres in a car showroom or forecourt.

However, DO be wary of any attempts by a tricky salesperson to catch you out or humiliate you. While bored senseless as a yacht exhibitor, The Snake would torment the obvious timewasters with details of fictional, optional extras: Interior or cockpit airbags for high-speed collisions, a water-filled mast to increase lavatory flushing pressure, a liferaft fitted with a 12 stack, solar powered CD player including a factory installed selection of soothing, mood music etc., etc.

If you do genuinely plan to purchase an expensive boat, the first person you will encounter is likely to be the commission-based salesman/woman. DO try and avoid him/her if possible. Skulking around at the rear of the stand is the person you need to speak to first. He is usually recognisable by the obvious discomfort he is experiencing through being forced to wear a neck tie for the first time in his life (sailboats), or will be attempting to conceal that he smells of lubricating oil and has filthy fingernails (powerboats). This man is the hands-on company employee who has been dragged to the show and must chat amiably with the tourists and timewasters about halyards and horsepower while the bona fide sales staff hunt out the real money. He is not a salesman, doesn’t want to be there and with subtle encouragement may well be coaxed into telling you if the boat is under-built, poorly manufactured or has the sea-keeping characteristics of a garden shed. Armed with this knowledge you may then approach the salesperson.

Finally, DO try and steal a press pass. It is extraordinary the power that this small piece of laminated paper wields and the absurd respect it endows upon the holder. In the wrong hands it can be devastatingly dangerous.

Aware that The Daily Sail has a readership with busy and hectic lives, there follows a brief guide to a few of the exhibits that should be visited and, where practical, purchased:

Powerboats

Picture, if you can, Buddha and Satan in the deckhouse of a Princess 61. The fat guy appreciates the harmony of proportion, the abundance of soft, nearly natural curves and the karma produced by deep cushions, the gentle, expensive hum of low voltage lights and the clink of ice in a cocktail glass. Conversely, your man in black recognises that once his hands are on the wheel and the throttles slide forward, any preconceived ideas on mortality become futile and that, perhaps, being kicked out of Paradise is a small price to pay when you have 16,000hp with a potential of 33 knots in your back pocket. A price tag of £701,450 (ex-VAT) for the company’s flagship seems devilishly good value.

Cruising yachts

The German Frers designed Hallberg Rassy 62 (Berth 217) is one of the finest sailboats at the show. Internally and externally the entire package is pleasing to the eye and operating any system onboard can be carried out from the push-button console on the steering pedestal. With all sheeting and furling systems electronically controlled it is likely that the most strenuous activity at sea may well be opening a bottle of wine.

This shorthanded sailing capability is one of the major appeals of the yacht. Indeed, the boat on display is owned by 70 year old Mr. Rassy who frequently takes the boat out sailing single-handed. At £980,000 (incl-VAT) you can take delivery of your new HR62 in May 2005.

Dinghies

The dinghy area of the show is a confusing riot of small boats and seems to be the most consistently popular section of the event. One of the more visually impressive displays is the collection of WindRider craft at Stand B50. The 17ft WindRider Rave, hydrofoil trimaran has enough moving parts to keep the two-man crew occupied while they take-off at speeds approaching 30 mph. For those less obsessed with airborne speed the single sail WindRider 16 (£3,367) offers rather more sedate, three-hulled entertainment.

Racing yacht

Standing in the open air Guinness Bar and gazing over the trade marquees at the collection of masts it is noticeable how few racing yachts are on display. However, trespassing in this forest of beefy cruising spars are two skinny intruders. At the base of these rigs sit a pair of Reichel-Pugh designed Seaquest 36s (Stand F11). With a standard specification price of £88,725 and an aluminium or carbon mast option the boat offers comfortable racer/cruiser capability.

Modern classic

Cornish Crabbers include the Piper 24 on their elegant stand (F4). This beautiful boat is a faithful reproduction of a 1960s three-man, racing daysailer built in the Clyde, Scotland (where many of the original fleet still compete). The £21,326 (incl-VAT) price includes a cockpit tent for two people to camp in.

Clothing

Although 1930s Chicago is synonymous with pin-stripped hoodlums, this period was also the heyday of the city’s biggest sailmakers, Murphy & Nye (Stand A49). 70 years on, the company is Italian-owned and produces arguably the most stylish and well made sailing gear (clothing, footwear, luggage) on the market. Certainly their Westport PR, inshore two-piece outfit is appealing at £512.00.

German clothing company Marine Pool (Stand G92) produce practical and affordable foul weather gear that seems to lack the design appeal, kudos and popularity of Henri Lloyd and Musto. However, for those who have tired of Kevlar sailcloth luggage, the company’s range of bags is unequalled. Decently priced and with Germanic durability the gear is constructed to withstand brutal punishment. Their trolly-bag at £54.99 is about the size of a Panzer tank and could probably carry the entire cast and props department of The Chinese State Circus.

Clothing retailers use this event to shift surplus summer stock and all but a few hold end of season sales during the show. It has often been the case that prices are reduced further over the show’s final weekend.

RIBs

Revenger (Stand E59) build and sell some of the best looking RIBS around. At the show you can buy the customised 33ft RIB that broke The Round Britain record in June of this year. At an average speed of 52 knots the three-man crew beat the existing record by just under 10 hours, completing the circumnavigation in 33 hrs 11 min 04 sec.

This is not the boat for those that choose to spend their afternoon mackerel fishing, but if blasting across The Channel for a light lunch sounds appealing, then spending £80,000 on this rocket ship seems sensible.

The improbable exhibit

At The Paris Boat Show it quickly becomes apparent that the French have a big thing for jacuzzis; there are hundreds of the tubs bubbling and gurgling around the exhibition halls. On the show’s opening, invitation only, professionals day many of these exhibits are actually occupied by...well, women not wearing very much at all. It’s all very French and rather unsettling. In England we will not tolerate any naughty, continental mischief of that sort.

However, Jacuzzis at a boat show seem highly plausible when encountering Stand A2 at Southampton. Chook sell chandlery, but use the show to exhibit an extremely business-like range of hedge and branch trimmers. With telescopic handles the tool is a bargain at £40.00. Chook have been exhibiting at Southampton for seven years and claim that their success is due to the reality that yachtsmen never visit garden centres.

Professor Potts

At every boat show, tucked away in one of the far-flung corners on the outer rim of the exhibiting galaxy sits Professor Potts. He is often a one man band and has invented and funded (with the help of Mrs. Potts) the development of a new tool, gadget, widget, accessory, device or solvent based product and is using the show as a launch opportunity.

John Mills (Stand D32) houses a massively bearded professor displaying his range of workbench vices. On press day the prof declined to demonstrate the instruments capabilities, but they clearly look the Gucci tool for any discerning craftsman.

Drink

There are a number of questions presently vexing your correspondent: Is Al Jazeera the only TV network not broadcasting Friends? Why are most of the people in Scotland wearing kilts in fact American? How on earth did Guinness form such strong links with yachting? The Guinness Bar (Stand E55) has been a constant feature at The London Boat Show (all male bar staff - and many inexplicably former airline pilots) and here in Southampton (all female bar staff) for as long as anyone can remember. Huge quantities of this dietary supplement are consumed by people who wouldn’t normally touch the stuff.

Last week, the four day Defence Systems & Equipment International Show was held in London’s Docklands. Tastefully positioned around 11 September this trade fair, dubbed a 'torturer's picnic' by one British newspaper, gave arms dealers and Third World tyrants a chance to mingle and chat informally about new techniques of brutality and the latest developments in nerve agents, cluster bombs, landmines etc., while viewing the armaments industry’s latest toys. There follows a not very useful table of comparisons between The Southampton Boat Show and this terror bazaar:

	Southampton Boat Show	DS & EI show
Duration	10 days	4 days
No of exhibitors	310	950
Emtry fee	Invitation or £12.00	Invitation only
Overseas visitors	15%	50%
Numbers of protestors arrested pre-Opening Day	0	54
No of security personnel	150	2,600
Idiotic euphemism	Personal water transport (a jetski)	Air delivered weapon (a bomb)
Food and alcohol stands	10	20
Celebrity appearance	Ellen MacArthur (Britain's Sailing Ambassador)	Geoff Hoon (Britain's Secretary of Defence)
An affordable practical purchase	A floating mobile phone case (stand A153) describes as "to be used in dirty damp, cold, sunny and wet conditions". Price £20.00	The Anti-Personnel, Anti-Material cartridge from Israel Military Industries. Described as a "real breakthrough in anti-personnel warfare." Price: POA