Yeah, re: "the dance floor," I had toyed with idea of adding a small console & leaning post, and turning her into a Savage, but I've come to appreciate the as-is layout's roominess and flexibility. We use the cuddy cabin for storage - seems like it'd be a bit snug for an overnight for two adults?

My wife and I found the cuddy on our 20' Seafari and on our 23' Tsunami cozy and conducive to friendly athletic discussion. It was only a few months after getting our 1st Seafari as a married couple that we learned we were going to be parents!

Finally got around to doing some fuel consumption checking this morning, using the Merc Vessel View RPM, MPH & GPH data, then calculated the MPG (statute miles). Pretty light - 280 lbs of crew, 20 gallons of gas, and maybe 50-60 lbs of miscellaneous stuff onboard, bimini dropped. Seas were pretty calm, maybe averaged 1' and wind about 8 knots, mostly on the nose. I'm pretty happy with these numbers, and feel that the 150 has worked out as well or better than expected.

Great numbers! Those are very close to the performance numbers I see with my 150. Cruising 30mph @ 3.5mpg is good in any book.

Agreed, and a big thank you for trailblazing the path! For our purposes I'm real happy with the blend of weight, performance and expense. At some point we'll take her around the island or over to St. Thomas/St. John and back, and I'll collect and post some real world fuel use results.

A couple notes: the 1995 carbed, two stroke, 200 hp Yamaha that the Merc replaced only got about 1.5 mpg (plus two stroke oil) on a good day. The old gas tank was 75 gallons, foamed in, and fairly pitted on the bottom from water being trapped in there. I considered "repairing it" with JB Weld, but then it occurred to me that we were (hopefully!) going to be seeing some greatly improved fuel economy, so built/installed a new 40 gallon tank with all new hoses, and now appear to have actually increased range.

Oh yeah, at the ramp the fellas running triple 350's on 30-35 footers do look at me like I must be from another planet!

You should see the looks you get with a 90hp...

When I put a 90 Opti on my '72 Seafari 20, after taking off the b&b'd XR2, I went out with my neighbor who had a 69' SF with a '79 Evinrude 150. He laughed at my dropping from 200hp to only 90.

Took both families and both boats, we both went about 32 miles from Crystal River offshore grouper digging, rafting up and having lunch together. Traveled at the same speed: about 22 mph avg speed in calm Gulf waters with a total trip distance of about 70 miles.

We filled up at the same gas station near the boat ramp. I put in 12.5 gallons to fill my tank, he put in 33 gallons. He wasn't laughing then.

Less than a year later he re-powered to a then new 2007 115 Etec.