Browsing: water toys

Cruising Life
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New Yamaha Seascooter: How To Have Fun Under the Water

There are still plenty of summer weekends left to enjoy your boat and all the toys you keep there. Here’s one that looks like a lot of fun, particularly if you have anybody who loves to dive or snorkel on your crew: The Yamaha RDS250 Seascooter, an electric-powered scooter that adds a new level of enjoyment to your time on – or under – the water. The RDS250 costs $545 and it can run at speeds up to 2.5 mph for about two hours. (It tops out at 2.8 mph.) It’s rated for 100 feet, so you can explore all…

Cruising Life
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New 20-foot Bay Breeze Boat: An Inflatable Party Float

The new Six-Person Inflatable Bay Breeze Boat isn’t exactly the typical blue-water cruising boat we usually write about, but it does seem like a hoot. And you certainly won’t have to worry about the fuel and maintenance costs. The new inflatable is about 20 feet long with a 10-foot beam and it weighs 62 pounds when it’s not inflated. It comes from Sun Pleasure Inflatable, the same people who build those unicorn and pink flamingo floats you may have seen recently. The Bay Breeze is built to resemble a real boat; it has a swim platform, comfortable U-shaped seating in…

Cruising Life
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Yanmar’s Stand-Up Wheeebo: A Totally New, 3-Knot Electric Watertoy

Here’s something truly new from Yanmar: The Wheeebo, and it looks like fun. Usually when we think of Yanmar we think of diesel engines. Not the Wheeebo. It’s a stand-on circular board that’s powered by a nickel-hydrogen battery with a top speed of three knots. And it definitely will give you, and your kids or grandkids, something to do when you drop the hook in that secluded cove at the end of the day. You control the Wheeebo by leaning in the direction you want to go. Onboard sensors detect the change in weight distribution and engage the board’s motor…

Cruising Life
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New Towable NautBoard Water Toy: Swim Like a Dolphin

The new towable NautBoard water toy just looks like fun. It’s easy to use – you basically just hang on – and then a boat or jet ski tows you through, or under, the water, at speeds from 2 to 5 knots. The company says that NautBoard’s patented design lets you swim like a dolphin – and we all know how much fun they are. The board is shaped something like a bird in flight. Its wave-like design limits the gravitational pull on your body so you can swim behind it easily. And anyone can use it. The NautBoard is…

Cruising Life
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Best Water Toys of the Year – On, In and Under the Water

Here’s a best-of-the-year list that’s fun, and that can give you some ideas about what to put under the tree in a few weeks or to add to your boat for the next cruising system. It’s a list of the best water toys of the year from New Atlas, and it covers some “toys” that we’ve already written about (the Aston-Martin/Triton personal submarine, for example) and many that are brand new: Take a look at the Scubalec wearable jet drive that you strap to your wrist, pictured above left, to give some extra boost to your next underwater experience. The…

Cruising Life
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New Upscale SUP from Designers of $25,000 Kayak

Now, from the same people who brought you an over-the-top $25,000 one-person, carbon-fiber kayak with gold-plated fittings, comes a totally upscale stand-up paddleboard built to the same standards. Five years ago, New Zealand designers McLellan Jacobs (Jamie McLellan and Andy Jacobs, who both happen to be boaters) introduced Kayak 1, with the gold, carbon fiber and teak, at the Monaco yacht show. It was 12’10” long with a 2’7” beam and weighed only 40 pounds. Kayak 1, with its singular good looks, was an instant hit with the superyacht set. Some people ordered them with wooden inlays in the teak…

Gear
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SEABOB: Swim Like a Fish, Over and Under the Water

Take a look at the new SEABOB, which I just saw in action at the Fort Lauderdale show. It’s not complicated, it’s not salty, it’s simply fun. SEABOB basically is an electric-powered, jet-propelled water sled or scooter that lets you glide on top of the waves at up to nine mph or dive underwater like a fish. The basic SEABOB, the F5, is easy to handle; you steer by shifting your weight. It has two control grips and you just squeeze the trigger to keep going. This SEABOB weighs only 64 pounds and you pick it up with a…