The 34th annual St. Petersburg Power & Sailboat Show brings four days of fun for boaters of all ages along with the only real way to compare the extensive display of marine products side-by-side all at once. The Gulf Coast’s largest boating lifestyle event introduces marine related seminars, books and entertainment and there is also a new smartphone app helping navigate show at St. Petersburg, Florida.

From Thursday, December 1-4, the Progress Energy Center for the Arts Mahaffey Theater Yacht Basin and Albert Whitted Park, nestled between the Salvador Dali Museum and the St. Petersburg Pier, will be transformed into a port of marine lifestyle activities and displays. This year’s show, comprised of twenty-five percent sailing yachts and seventy-five percent powerboats, has twenty-five percent more on-land yacht displays than the 2010 show.

In addition to the large selection of exhibits at this year’s show, there will be an extensive schedule of fun-filled and educational special events such as marine seminars and youth fishing clinics presented by the non-profit Hook The Future. For those interested in finding great marine-related books and meeting the authors face-to-face, the show offers the Author’s Corner.

Attendees also will be able to enjoy refreshments and live musical entertainment. Special events include the Latitudes & Attitudes Free Readership Appreciation Party on Saturday night featuring the Eric Stone Band, free pizza and beer and raffle drawings with part of the proceeds going to the Charles W. Morgan refit at the Mystic Seaport Museum. Event sponsors include Harken, Sailology, BoatUS, Latitudes & Attitudes and Prism Polish.

The show will feature an impressive selection of power boats and sailing yachts on display in an expansive waterfront area and on land, in addition to a 40,000-square-foot clearspan tent housing all types of marine gear. Show-goers will find hundreds of power boats and sailing yachts in the custom made-for-the-show marina set adjacent to the Albert Whitted Park and Mahaffey Theater grounds, including family cruisers, runabouts, fishing boats, sailing yachts, personal watercraft and much more.

New to this year’s St. Petersburg Power & Sailboat Show is MyBoatShow, the Show’s new smartphone app. Officially launched at the Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show® with tremendous success, the free app, available on iPhone and Android platforms, is designed to help navigate the show’s docks, land areas and tents. Attendees will be able to access show maps and search for exhibitors, manufacturers, product categories and yachts by specifications and size. The app, which will be available for all Show Management produced yacht shows, will also provide the show schedule, seminar information, show transportation schedules and maps, food and drink locations, restroom locations and emergency services.

Known for world-class boating, sailing and fishing in the Gulf of Mexico, St. Petersburg boasts a vibrant waterfront scene, wonderful weather and miles of sandy beaches.