LONDON - Clearly I saw how the 1 percent lives today. We went to Canary Wharf because we'd heard about the scene on the River Thames and wanted to check it out for ourselves. I'm not a maritime expert by any means, but I know yachts can be expensive. Still, nothing could've prepared me for some of the boating monstrosities I witnessed today docked along the wharf.
These are not just yachts. They are brash displays of how much excess is accumulated by uber-billionaires.
We saw yachts that can be best described as mini cruise lines. The Octopus, the Ilona, and the Seanna stood out as the most garish of the bunch. These boats, which frankly are ships, are owned by business tycoons, celebrities, and the mega-rich who cruise around in these garish vessels of luxury.
The Octopus owned by software giant Paul Allen has two helipads, submarines, and five decks of who knows what else. The Seanna is a yacht chartered by George Clooney. The Ilona docked while we were there and had a crew of about fifty or so, owned by some Australian shopping center magnate.
Bill Gates has one here too, which we couldn't see. They were all jaw dropping and ultra enormous.
Suffice to say we were unsuccessful in our futile attempt to board any of them to take video. Security surrounding them might as well have been run by the Secret Service.
Still, cool to gawk at and a fun distraction from our day to day of covering all the sports smorgasbord we've normally immersed ourselves in.
perkout
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