I had the pleasure of attending the Fred Hall "Fishing" show at the Long Beach Convention center with Jim Garner--the proud owner of "C Pelican" my first C Dory 22. It was great to spend time with Jim, since we have been Internet chatting for many years--at Trawlers and Trawlering before C Brats!
We spent much of the time looking at Electronics. The main focus was the Lowrance, B & G, and Simrad booth. I was very impressed with the young man who helped us there. He readily admitted, that Lowrance had a tech support issue in the past, but now has hired a number of workers to solve these issues. This young man had personally downloaded the demo down scan/side scan which was being used at the show, and had the river charts, as well as Google Earth charts of the area. They also had salt water results.
RayMarine, Garmin, and Furuno were also represented with factory booths, but none of these were as well prepared. Even better, Lowrance had a setup where over 50 users could sit down at tables, with a MDF in front of them, and take a tutorial with a live instructor. (Lots of NMEA 2000 cables in that room). But what a great way to learn how to use the units. Something that the other manufactures should use.
Lowrance claims that CHIRP works with their multi function units. I understand why they can--and the issue is how the computer in the MFD reads the return echo.
I was amazed that the line to get in at 1 PM (first day of the show) was over 100 yards long. There was a Drone, A High Lift, and a Golf Cart all filming the crowds. Inside the crowds became greater during the afternoon, and by 5 PM, some isles were difficult to make way in. There were truck campers, Air Stream trailers, Parker Pilot house, Defiant, etc. There were a number of inflatables, every piece of fishing gear you might imagine, as well as all of the well known small boats and bass type boats.
Long Beach Yacht Sales, had an almost full lineup of well over a million dollars--probably closer to over 2 million dollars worth of Ranger Tugs, and Cutwater boats. Lots of "Bling"..! I still prefer the simple C Dory agains all of those!
I would hate to see the crowds on the weekend! The economy must be coming back!
We spent much of the time looking at Electronics. The main focus was the Lowrance, B & G, and Simrad booth. I was very impressed with the young man who helped us there. He readily admitted, that Lowrance had a tech support issue in the past, but now has hired a number of workers to solve these issues. This young man had personally downloaded the demo down scan/side scan which was being used at the show, and had the river charts, as well as Google Earth charts of the area. They also had salt water results.
RayMarine, Garmin, and Furuno were also represented with factory booths, but none of these were as well prepared. Even better, Lowrance had a setup where over 50 users could sit down at tables, with a MDF in front of them, and take a tutorial with a live instructor. (Lots of NMEA 2000 cables in that room). But what a great way to learn how to use the units. Something that the other manufactures should use.
Lowrance claims that CHIRP works with their multi function units. I understand why they can--and the issue is how the computer in the MFD reads the return echo.
I was amazed that the line to get in at 1 PM (first day of the show) was over 100 yards long. There was a Drone, A High Lift, and a Golf Cart all filming the crowds. Inside the crowds became greater during the afternoon, and by 5 PM, some isles were difficult to make way in. There were truck campers, Air Stream trailers, Parker Pilot house, Defiant, etc. There were a number of inflatables, every piece of fishing gear you might imagine, as well as all of the well known small boats and bass type boats.
Long Beach Yacht Sales, had an almost full lineup of well over a million dollars--probably closer to over 2 million dollars worth of Ranger Tugs, and Cutwater boats. Lots of "Bling"..! I still prefer the simple C Dory agains all of those!
I would hate to see the crowds on the weekend! The economy must be coming back!