Driving a big boat is easy; docking it is not. Till now.

That was the question asked in an email sent to me with the subject line: “Giz Wiz on the Hudson River”. Although I’m already on the Hudson, it’s in a 22’ & and a 24’ foot boat, nothing like a brand new SeaRay 43’ Sundancer. The big selling point for me to go drive this boat was its joystick piloting! This boat is the first Sea Ray to come standard with Zeus, CMD's innovative pod drive system. (CMD is the company that combines the strengths of two legendary names in marine propulsion: Cummins Diesel and Mercury Marine.) Pod drives are what big ships, including the huge Queen Mary2, use. What makes pod drives amazing is the ability to use them with joystick control at slow speeds. Of course I jumped at the chance to try out joystick piloting. The joystick controls the drive-by-wire steering, throttle and shifting via an onboard computer. I was given a 30 second demo and told to move the boat from the marina out into the Hudson. The most difficult part of piloting a boat is leaving the dock, and docking the boat at the end of the trip. With wind, tides and currents, it can be a real task. But with joystick driving simple hand movements are translated into complex boat maneuvers that were once impossible for all but the most experienced captain. I put my hand on the joystick and started moving the boat away from the dock. I kept wanting to touch the steering wheel, but was told all I needed was the one hand on the joystick for all the maneuvers. It was great. I moved the 43’ Sundancer past docked boats on one side & rotted pilings on the other. Not a scratch! It’s even possible to spin the boat 360 degrees within it’s own length! Out on the Hudson I got a demo of another amazing technology: Skyhook. Engage Skyhook and it maintains the boat’s position and heading taking into account tide, wind, and current! The boat I was on retails for about $700,000. You are correct; it is not an impulse buy, but if you are in the market for a boat, this is definitely one to check out. Sea Ray offers boats with this amazing technology that start at about $170,000. It takes away the biggest fear of new boaters: crashing into things at the dock!

Here’s a video demo of Zeus from Sea Ray: http://search.aol.com/aol/search?&query=Sea+Ray+Zeus&invocationType=tb50TB50CL

Hear this Netcast: www.twit.tv/dgw873