Let me preface this by saying I have never even set foot in an inboard boat before yesterday. I have owned two I/Os and loved them to say them least.

So yesterday I headed up to Land O Lakes Marine and met up with the owner, Dave. Tossed out Moombadaze's name and he instantly told me that now he would have to tack on an extra $10K to the price of the boat. Just Kidding Stacy, Dave said he knew you very well and yeah 4 boats sounds about right...

There are salesmen who know their product and could not care less about it, and then there are salesmen who know their product and are excited to talk about it, answer questions, and help in any way possible. Dave most definitely falls into the latter group of salesmen! He is a an awesome guy and answered every single question I had very thoroughly and then some! He also took the time to tell me about things I wasn't asking about. Simply put, I can't wait to hand this guy my money for the boat, and that is they you should feel on a large purchase like this. To top that off, it is a family owned business and even in today's economy he assured me, that they were here to STAY!

So on to the ride... Hooked up the tractor and towed the boat off the showroom floor down to the dock just outside the shop. Funny that all 3 of us checked the plug too. Back her in and Dave immediately starts telling me how inboards don't back up straight and how to compensate for this. This was something I had absolutely no clue about before he told me. He even walked me through pulling up to a dock or another boat. Of course he did it perfect and told me it would take me about a day on the lake to get used to the idiosyncracies of driving an inboard.

Get her out on open water and open it up and goes through the cruise control, really nice feature too! I hop in the helm and take the controls. First thing I notice, and I had read all about it, was the very minimal bowrise and just how fast it got on plane. Really amazing to me having spent years with I/Os and losing sight of the horizon for 4 or 5 seconds out of the hole. I was a bit tentative with the throttle and the wheel but I drove around for a good 10 mins taking a few sharp turns and checking out the wake at certain speeds.

Dave jumps over and says hold on...Here comes the FUN! He opens it up and turns the wheel and I felt like I was in my Stage III Roush doing laps at Sebring. I should have had a video camera on me because I know the smile on my face was EAR TO FREAKING EAR!

Needless to say, but I am sold on the Moomba OBV for us! I only wish I did not have to wait 3 or 4 months to get it, but until then you guys will have to put up with my incessant drooling and questions.