From my experience as you age having A/C is a real benefit.
My wife and I hail from the UK where weather is moderate and temperature never too high (my famous last words I suppose).
We've lived in the USA a long time and spent time/lived in Georgia, Virginia, Connecticut and now in the PNW for past 41 years.
The heat/humidity in Georgia/Virginia/Connecticut was stifling for us and in Georgia when we first went there I lost 20 lbs within months because I simply had lost my appetite due to the heat situation. Going outside when in Georgia I can recall lifting my little finger and sweat started pouring off my body..... yuck/horrid. I never ever regained weight until we started our journey north to Connecticut.
So, we grew up with A/C for all the years we lived on the east side of the USA. It simply became a necessity for us.
The funny thing about Georgia was that we arrived there on Nov 26 (Thanksgiving) and it was absolutely down pouring with rain. The next morning we woke to several inches of snow.... for heaven's sake, what the heck.... this is the tropical south right ?
When we arrived in PNW 41 years ago (we drove cross country from Connecticut to Seattle taking a very weird route to see many of the great/wonderful sights over a period of several weeks), on an early Aug day the temperatures were hovering in the 90s. In fact when reaching Yakima it was over 100ºF and my wonderful Peugeot 504 wagon started overheating as we were towing a small MG Midget car behind us. Of course, the 95ºF temps we had in Seattle at this time caught us by surprise (much like the snow in Georgia had) as we thought we were traveling to the cool North West..... The high temps in Seattle continued for at least 3 weeks when we first arrived.
After living in the PNW now for 41 years we've found these high temperatures are rare enough that we decided to forego A/C in our house. We do however, have A/C in our car. :lol: About 10 years ago we changed our minds and had central A/C installed in our house as we had aged and the rare hot days/weeks were bothersome for us. About 7 years ago we downsized to a smaller house which did not have A/C (many houses in PNW do not have central A/C). The first thing we spent money on was for installing central A/C for the house. IMO, it was money well spent. Hot days/weeks in the PNW can be intolerable for us. We don't like the sun at all and are creatures of a moderate climate, and we welcome cloudy days.
WARNING -- Surprise.... Surprise.... The PNW is probably an area with the highest humidity in the USA ... See "Seattle really one of the most humid cities in the U.S.? You bet!" -
http://komonews.com/weather/scotts-...ost-humid-cities-in-the-us-you-bet-12-20-2015 dated Dec 20, 2015.... "Seattle ranks 7th nationally among major cities, even a tick ahead of Miami and just a few tenths of a percent behind other big Florida cities." ... "The catch is there is a big difference between relative humidity and another measure of moisture content: the dew point. "
So do you need A/C in the PNW ? I would say YES for some rare periods in the Aug timeframe each year. These rare periods could be for a few days and as long as a few weeks. I say YES as we have aged and are far less tolerant of high heat than we used to be.
Would I install A/C on my boat ? NO I would not, but that's because we don't spend weeks on board. If we were to spend weeks on board and especially during the months of July/Aug/Sep I would for sure. In fact I did consider A/C for our new 2018 R-27 which is being delivered to us tomorrow. However, to tell you the truth the extra expense of around $15K and the subsequent reduced storage space, noise of a Genset, extra weight and extra maintenance forced me to say "NO... way" to this option. For a larger boat and ignoring cost I would say "YES".... and consider it a luxury item.
In the meantime, we would purchase something like the IcyBreeze Portable Air Conditioner and Cooler if and when we really wanted some cooling on our smallish boat.
🙂
If heat/humidity is bothersome for you then yes, get A/C.
