relaxing light-tackle session or equally
welcome for young ’uns to jump off
and enjoy the water.
Access to the bow is great and once
up on the side decks handholds are
easily found, while the bow is well laid-
out with non-slip surfaces and bow
rails at a good height.
IN OR OUT?
The 800 Weekend can be had with
outboards or a choice of petrol or diesel
sterndrives. The outboard is likely to be
the cheapest but most thirsty option,
with the petrol sterndrive playing
piggy-in-the-middle.
Our boat had a Mercury QSD
220, a 220hp, 2.8-litre, common-rail
injection turbo diesel with Bravo-3 leg.
This is probably the most expensive
powertrain option but the reasons to
spring for it are plentiful. Firstly you
get economy, which means fewer trips
to and less time at the bowser. You also
get an open portofino platform over the
leg, which is great to fish from or relax
at on warm days, and finally you get
a fuel source for the Webasto heater/
demister and the Wallas stove in the
galley – one fuel type, filled through
one filler for the complete package of
comfort, cruising and dining.
The QSD 220 was ample for the
boat. With the on-water weight of
the hull alone at around 2500kg, I
wasn’t expecting particularly vigorous
performance but the low-down torque
was plenty to push the boat onto the
plane and once the turbo was spooled
up and near the 3800rpm redline,
the combo worked well, maintaining
almost 30kt.IN THE ROUGH
We spent a good couple of hours
shooting the bulk of our video inside
the sheltered confines of Martha Cove,
Safety Beach, one of Victoria’s fastest-
growing marina-based communities.
This gave me the opportunity to test
the boat’s low-speed handling. I have
always been a fan of bow thrusters onboats over 8m long, especially with
single outboards. Although this boat
isn’t much over 8m and has a super-
responsive and grippy Bravo-3 leg,
I would recommend the thruster to
anyone with a tight berth, a windy
spot or those fairly new to boating as it
makes life much easier.
Heading over the road and out of
the marina – if you haven’t been to
Martha Cove, it’s worth a visit just to
check out the clever engineering where
the road goes under the seaway – we
struck boat-testing gold in the form
of a solid 1m swell with half-metre
wind-blown chop. Put that confusion
in close, where it’s normally calm, and
I was happy; the photographer and
videographer not so much.
Winding the engine out to a fast
cruise was going to be hard but I
managed more than I expected, with
20kt heading into it. Trimming was a
touch sensitive with a bit of prop blow-
out happening earlier in the trim range
than anticipated but I still managedThe boat you want is easier to find tradeboats.com.au^35
Parker 800 Weekend