Pontoon Boat & Deck Boat Forum

So what I noticed last year on the water is that more and more boats were rafting or just tossing an anchor and swimming. So I figured I would see how the prices have effected Toon owners.

Everybody keeps asking me if the higher prices would keep me off the water. My answer was heck no. My floating living room and huge surrounding swimming pool / Fish aquarium get the same amount of use. The only difference is less hours on the engine and less tubing. For the same money I spend taking a family of four to a movie I can put enough gas in the boat and beer in the cooler to spend an entire day on the lake and that includes cruising around checking out houses we wish we could afford.

I think it is even funnier when friends with go fast boats tie up to us and then chill on the pontoon boat leaving their boats empty. This works out great for me because I can use their boats to pull tubes and let them chill on my boat which costs me nothing...

No changes for me. My family ski's a ton! Fish more an more! But the day I can't afford it is the day I quit my job I dislike an find a cheaper hobby!lol I have never been with out a boat an don't see that changing anytime! I think my son would kill me! Life goes way to fast an I want enjoy my family every chance I can!

I have a 06 rinker and a 96 toon. I still enjoy the toon more myself. 6 gallons of gas and lots of relaxing time. Can beat that. A good day of wake boarding in the rinker will cost me around $75 in gas and the cost of towing it to the lake. Easily over $100 for gas and then snacks and drinks.
Once my boys no longer want to hang out with the old man, I''l sell the rinker and go back to just a toon. Much cheaper on gas and easier to maintain.

Gas Prices don't effect me much here. We really don't use much gas in our boat. I think we maybe used 3/4 of a tank last year... total. We raft up so much, or just cruise that it doesn't matter what gas prices are like. Now the people we go out with, may be effected more my the $4 a gallon gas, as their boat typically goes through a tank a day on the lake (197X Mastercraft Stars & Stripes edition ski boat). I found that last year they rafted up with us quite a bit b/c they have no room for anything more than 3-4 people, and a small cooler. They use us as the floating moving dock. Then we ski/tube/knee board behind their boat.

Our typical boat ride is a couple hours and I only burn 2 or 3 gallons of gas. I can live with that. We spend more on beer

locally we just wont tube as much. living in Nebraska not only do we not have a football team we don't have any water ether. to get to good water I have a minimum of 300 miles one way gas prices are gonna make that suck just a little, on the good side I just hit 50 Saturday so I cant care now

Our only change will be less traveling to new lakes and rivers. Also we won't do as many loaded lake cruises that last hours and hours.
We travel to our raft site about 4 miles on Sunday afternoon and that won't change.

I'll give up other things before I give up gas for the boat.

I spend about $150 bucks a weekend on gas in the pontoon, but it's alot better than the performance boats I had.

I doubt that we'll reduce our time on the water, regardless of gas prices. Most of our friends have pontoons; we were the only ones with a bow rider. Now we all have essentially the same type of boat. We have one set of friends that like to go out for moonlight boat rides but the husband doesn't see well out of one eye, so they always wait for us to call when that occasion arises. But they reciprocate by taking their toon during the day time.
I'm still breaking in the Yamaha so I don't know what kind of fuel usage we'll get. It's a drag going up and down the rpm scale waiting for the 10 hour mark, but it should be over soon and then we will find out just how fast this bad girl is!
High gas prices. What high gas prices? Like someone said, it cost less for a day on the lake than to take four to a movie: Tickets: $40; Popcorn & Soda: $40; a day on the lake with family: Priceless!!

I don't plan on spending any less time out at all. I may spend more time cruising and swimming than tubing.

Same here. In 2008 when gas was $4 and up, the marina manager said we were out more than just about anyone else. Ya gotta pay to play, just maybe not as much...

Like most of you, I don't see the higher gas prices having much effect on our 'water" time. First of all my wife recently changed jobs.. she used to drive her gas hungry Toyota 4 Runner about 40 miles a day round trip to and from work. She now drives a total of 40 miles A MONTH. ( 1 mile to work, 1 mile home per day ). So right there we're saving quite a bit on fuel cost.. a side note... when I was at the boat dealership a couple of weeks back, I asked a friend of mine who is one of the salesman there if higher gas prices had impacted their business. His reply was something to the effect that people who go out and spend anywhere from 25K to 50K or more for a boat, aren't going to worry about an extra 20 or 30 dollars per weekend for gas. Guess he's right because everytime I've been to the launch this spring, damn things full of trailers...

I rarely burn more than a tank a year too. About the only time we run at high RPM's is heading in at the end of the day. A good day is with both anchors down in a nice cove, stereo and bbq on, refreshing beverage in hand and good friends on board. (and hopefully not some dumb ass at the launch when we get ready to leave )

chill'nthemost wrote:I rarely burn more than a tank a year too. About the only time we run at high RPM's is heading in at the end of the day. A good day is with both anchors down in a nice cove, stereo and bbq on, refreshing beverage in hand and good friends on board. (and hopefully not some dumb ass at the launch when we get ready to leave )

Now you are asking too much... There is ALWAYS a dumbass at the launch!!