[sailingdog]

From my experience, the Porta-bote makes a great dinghy for longer term cruising. I have both a small (<9') inflatable and the 12' 6" porta-bote. The porta-bote gets up on plane with the same 3.5 HP motor that I use on the inflatable. It is pretty close to indestructible, although I am planning on re-building the plastic seats out of plywood and glassing it over. I'm also glassing over the plwood transom I have, to give it some additional protection from the elements and abuse. Given the rocky shores in my cruising area... and that some of the docks are less than inflatable friendly, I'm glad I have both. BTW, the porta-bote has greater carrying capacity and a much drier ride than the inflatable—and takes pretty close to the same amount of time to setup.

As for Waterrat's idea....that's not a really bright idea. trying to get the bottom to seal properly would be a nightmare, since the high-density polypropylene the porta-bote is made of is really slick and most adhesives just slide right off of it. Also, that would destroy the ability of the boat to fold.... which kind of defeats the whole purpose for having one.