I installed a fishfinder on my 185. wasn't too hard. for more help on that, i'd post in the electronics section.
as far as ramps, i used to go to safety harbor because it was close to my house. the bad thing was it is forever to get anywhere, and the tide gets real low.
in your boat, you can go tubing or skiing on lake tarpon at chestnut park, up east lake road. lake tarpon is the second largest lake in florida. on summer afternoons, go around 4, and you have the lake to yourself until dusk. on weekends, it's more crowded, but not nearly as crowded as any gulf-access ramp.
the best ramps that were accessible were clearwater and dunedin. clwtr is bigger and easier to negotiate by water.
again, on weekdays, neither is too bad. on weekends, they are an absolute zoo.
caladesi island is about a 20 minute ride from the clwtr ramp by water, and it's all intracoastal. all you need is a paper chart and a compass to get there. there are some other islands around, like 3 rooker bar (north caladesi by anclote key), and anclote key that you can get to in your boat. again, get a paper chart. approach depths can get shallow, but with your draft, stick to the charts and you're fine.
these are all 20-30 minute intracoastal rides to some of the most beautiful beaches in florida (in the case of caladesi, #2 in the country!).
ps - go to the customer appreciation event at caladesi on may 18-20. come out on sunday, anchor on the gulf side, and have a great day. they have beach olympics and a bar-b-q lunch. if you have a slip reserved with MM, you can overnight fri and sat, but they are probably full by now. you can also walk the docks and check out boats (one of my favorite things to do), and they usually have some cool company-owned boats to tour.
as far as ramps, i used to go to safety harbor because it was close to my house. the bad thing was it is forever to get anywhere, and the tide gets real low.
in your boat, you can go tubing or skiing on lake tarpon at chestnut park, up east lake road. lake tarpon is the second largest lake in florida. on summer afternoons, go around 4, and you have the lake to yourself until dusk. on weekends, it's more crowded, but not nearly as crowded as any gulf-access ramp.
the best ramps that were accessible were clearwater and dunedin. clwtr is bigger and easier to negotiate by water.
again, on weekdays, neither is too bad. on weekends, they are an absolute zoo.
caladesi island is about a 20 minute ride from the clwtr ramp by water, and it's all intracoastal. all you need is a paper chart and a compass to get there. there are some other islands around, like 3 rooker bar (north caladesi by anclote key), and anclote key that you can get to in your boat. again, get a paper chart. approach depths can get shallow, but with your draft, stick to the charts and you're fine.
these are all 20-30 minute intracoastal rides to some of the most beautiful beaches in florida (in the case of caladesi, #2 in the country!).
ps - go to the customer appreciation event at caladesi on may 18-20. come out on sunday, anchor on the gulf side, and have a great day. they have beach olympics and a bar-b-q lunch. if you have a slip reserved with MM, you can overnight fri and sat, but they are probably full by now. you can also walk the docks and check out boats (one of my favorite things to do), and they usually have some cool company-owned boats to tour.
but in my mind the right way to do it would be to run a new power and ground up to the console from the battery/fuse block using either an open spot not in use or adding an additional fuse block then hooking the unit up to that. But then do I need the inline fuse as well at the unit? Also I have no clue if there are places to run the wires where they would be hidden because I'll need to run the GPS attenna to the port side above the head from the console/unit on helm (starboard side) so I've not really looked to see if there are places to run the wire.
