MTI Bahamas Trek A True Family Affair

The owners of an MTI-V 42 luxury performance center console, Bill and Traci Goshen live in Brea, Calif., but keep the boat, along with their eight-seat MTI 390X catamaran, in Lake Havasu City, Ariz. The couple has four children and six grandchildren and they cherish their time with them.

So when the entire Goshen clan decides to take a boat ride, as it did earlier this month for the MTI Owners Run to The Bahamas, the spacious and seaworthy center console comes in handy.

A sporty transit between South Florida and Bimini and a little weather wasn’t enough to keep the MTI Bahamas Owners Run families from finding paradise. Photos courtesy/copyright MTI

Yet they weren’t the only family on the trek with kids or grandkids, or both, on the trip. Of the eight families that participated in the MTI-organized event, four brought children.

That’s not unusual for an MTI owners trip. “A lot of people bring children to our events,” said Taylor Scism, the vice president of the company.

Nor is sticking together as a fleet when the water gets sporty, as it did during the crossing from South Florida to Bimini.

The Goshen family arrived in their 42-foot center console from MTI—and had a ball.

“Going across was pretty crazy,” said Goshen, who hired a professional skipper to help him during the trip. “Miami got something like 15 inches of rain that week, and there was a lot of swell between Miami and The Bahamas.”

Water conditions improved when the group reached Grand Bahama and their Atlantis Resort home-base. But overcast skies and strong winds stuck around for the first couple of days.

The Atlantis Resort was home base for the group.

Scism and her parents, Randy and Cherell, her husband, Shaun Peters, and the company’s Milton Calafel and Tom Stuart took it all in stride. It wasn’t their first time leading a group to The Bahamas. So they adjusted the destinations and schedules based on each day’s conditions.

“We had some weather come through early on in the trip,” Taylor Scism said. “But then it cleared out and we were able to have a wonderful event with a lot of excursions spent exploring.”

From the Atlantis venue, the MTI group cruise to South Exuma, Spanish Wells and Rose Island during the week. The Rose Island excursion was particularly popular.

Family portraits, family hijinks and more.

“That was a great audible,” Goshen said.

The Bahamas run was Goshen’s second MTI-organized-and-led event—his first MTI outing was the company’s March trip to Hawks Cay Resort in the Middle Florida Keys.

“They honestly do first-class events,” Goshen said. “They take care of you. They make sure everything is good with you and your boat.

“I was blown away by the treatment,” he added.

A formidable MTI line-up.

For the return leg of the trip, calm gentle weather and water conditions prevailed all the way to the mainland. Goshen said he ran “55 mph all the way back.”

Though the 42-footer provided plenty of space for all 12 members of the Goshen tribe on the trip, they’ll have even more room to move in a couple of years.

“They talked me into buying a 50 center console on the trip,” the senior Goshen said, then chuckled. “We are going to order it in a couple of weeks.”