dangerous boat shows

As usual, the Boat Show was a dangerous affair.... The day started with an early rise, a drive down to central London, confusion over whether congestion charges apply on Saturdays, and the worlds thickest shop assistant in Sainsburys who didn't have enough words in his vocabulary to explain whether we needed to pay the charge or not.... We parked up in an NCP in the West end, waited for T25 to arrive, and then jumped on the river taxi at Embankment.... great fun down the river to Canary Wharf, and then a short hop on the bus down to Excel.... The boat show itself was very busy, laying to rest the grumbles that the show is dying being based at Excel... and we fought our way through the crowds to take a quick whizz round..... and ended up as usual, on various boats ohhing and arring about their finer and less fine qualities... Of the 4 boats we paid a bit more attention to, the Jeanneau, Beneteau, Bavaria and Elan, I have to say, against popular trends, I thought the Bavaria was the better boat. It was the only one to have solid wood furniture below, was well thought out accomodation wise, and benefitted from intelligent design.... for example, the access to the engine was streets ahead of its competition...... I know that many like to detract from these boats, but I just don't get it.... Anyway... Its a good job that we didn't go to the Guinness stand before viewing the boats. Boat Shows are dangerous.... we started having those frightening conversations.... "its only £300 a month more than......", "the savings on the marina fees if we went down a metre in size would...." I shiver with hindsight.... it was only the need for a slightly more substantial deposit than we could immediately lay our hands on that saved our skins...... So we retired to the Guinness stand, and met a few forumites, who instantly recognised the gleam in our eyes, and smiled knowingly at us..... By 16h30, we were wilting, so took the reverse journey back..... going up the Thames at night was fabulous.... especially Tower Bridge, all lit up, and looking like the world famous attraction it is... and then met a few folks in the hotel reception, drank a few drinks, got dressed up, and went partying... We'd been invited to the forum party of the year, the TCM bash, and after we'd found his flat (although penthouse mega apartment might be a better description) at 22h00, we enjoyed the company of many old and a goodly number of new acquaintances..... but having the kids along with us, we were dragged sadly away at midnight when M was in full flight of being educated in the finer arts of ice cube handling by TCM....... So, a great weekend.... a little jaded on Sunday.... and a scary boatshow.... SWMBO was reading Yachting Monthly in bed last night, and I noticed that she was looking at the manufacturers adverts again, instead of the brokers...... gulp..... better get this house sold sharpish....