For the last two years, I’ve tried to avoid going out and spending on “want to have” items. Image-stabilized binoculars were one of them—a luxury item. I had a nice pair before, but I never used them because everything I looked at was too shaky to make out any details.
I finally broke down and bought a pair of Canon 10x42 image-stabilized binoculars. WOW! Now I use them all the time. The other night, while crossing the Gulf Stream, I spotted a large container ship about five miles away. I could clearly see its red and green navigation lights with no problem.
If you’ve ever thought about upgrading—or never use your binoculars because you can’t focus on anything—I highly recommend making the switch.
I used to have a wonderful (optically) pair of those - but - and its a big BUT - after a couple of years aboard the plastic of the case turned exceedingly sticky and couldn’t be cleaned. They were so sticky and the goo came off on our hands that we couldn’t use them.
As you say - they are expensive - so I tried to claim under the warranty but they were not interested in supporting the product. I just got passed from person to person.
I even tried to wrap them “mummy style” in tape to make them useable which helped a bit but didn’t solve the problem - eventually I just gave up.
I know life on a boat in the tropics can be hard for modern materials - BUT…