Monday, January 17, 2011

Toronto Boat Show

Speaking at the Toronto Boat Show
Greg Nicoll from Sail-World.com

Brian Chapman from UK Halsey's Toronto Loft

I arrived in Toronto on Thursday after a 4 hour flight over from LA. As we were coming in for the landing, I could see the whole city was covered in snow - a bit different than the 80 degree weather I had boarded the plane with in LA. A quick cab ride through the frozen streets of Toronto and I arrived at the hotel.

Now I turned 19 recently and seeing the the drinking age in Candida is 19, I was looking forward to hitting up the hotel bar. Unfortunately, the bar was closed by the time I made it down. Also, the girl at the desk told me that the price of a beer at their bar was about $12 US!

The next morning was an early one and with the 3 hour time difference, waking up at 6am turned to 3am California time. I woke up quickly though and went outside into the below freezing weather. The boat show was huge and all inside which was awesome. I can't see how anyone would want to be outside in the freezing city.

Got to the show and did a few interviews and then downtown for a couple in-studio things with CBC, then back to the show for a speech at 4:00. By the time I got back to the show, it was packed with 15,000 to 20,000 people.

Met up with the coordinator of the show, Ken and we got all my slideshow equipment set up. We barely got it going in time. It turns out that my computer was on the edge of crashing with some virus but managed to get it together just in time and the room filled up.

I was introduced by Greg Nicoll from Sail-World.com ( http://sail-world.com/index.cfm?Nid=79225&refre=y&ntid=0&rid=4 article by sailworld.com on my speech) and gave my speech.

It went over well. I managed to keep the crowd laughing and interested through the whole thing. That evening I went out with my friends/sponsors from Quickline (http://www.quickline.us) We have known Randy Boelsem and his family from way back when I was a kid on the beach at Emerald Bay, Catalina Island. I think I used to throw rocks at Randy's daughter! Randy's company, Quickline, sponsored my new technology, light-weight anchor and some other equipment. We hit the town that evening and had great time.

The next day it was off to the show for a speech. It had snowed during the night and all the traffic was slowed. It was Saturday and the show was packed. I did my speech and there was standing room only. After the speech I had to rush over to the airport to catch my flight which ended up getting delayed 3 hours.
Back home in California now and prepping for the Chicago Boat Show January 12-16th and more snow.

Cheers,
Zac

7 Comments:

Blogger Tray (The Expert) said...

Good to see you're still around!

Any word on Part 2?

Tray M.

January 19, 2011 at 6:36 PM  
Blogger Becky said...

Sounds like you enjoyed 'chillin'in Toronto! :-)

February 8, 2011 at 12:07 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hey Zac,
Great blog on your Toronto Boat Show talk. Too bad about that beer!

I was curious if your family knows the couple who've been taken hostage by the Somali pirates. What a scary time for them, for sure. My family and I were in MDR Saturday night having dinner and I looked over at the MDR Yacht Club and thought of them. I hope they will stay safe and that our government can affect some sort of rescue soon. I was in the country of Oman 4 years ago and the people there are really lovely---they are very pro-U.S. It's too bad the Adams didn't make it there. They would have been safe there.

Anyway, so glad to hear from you again. I hope the Chicago Boat Show went well. Geez, when do you get to go a boat show in a warm climate??
--Sue McGah
Laguna Niguel, CA
--Sue McGah

February 21, 2011 at 4:12 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hey Zac
Think its realy cool you
sailed round he world
you was aawa from your familefor so long.
hope you do clime mount everast
Sara

April 6, 2011 at 3:28 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hi Zac, we are year 6 children from England and we are studying you at school. We are really interested in your achivements at the moment.
We really like your blogs and would like to keep update with them. Your life is so much more interesting than ours.
What is your most favourite type of boat?
from Amy and Charlotte

April 6, 2011 at 3:29 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

hi zac,
i am a 11 year old pupil of a school in england and we're learning about you!! in the topic survival. have you climbed mount everest yet? i hope you get a record for it!
i hope you reply
from River

April 6, 2011 at 3:32 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hi Zack,i am a year six student.I am in a school in England we are studying survival.So we have been doing..I just read your blog and I know how hard it to travel around the world it sounds like you are really busy and i really like snowboarding it is so fun.I can only imagine all the work you all put into it.Whats your next mission.

April 6, 2011 at 3:34 AM  

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