Boat size cruising britain

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Carsten64

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Good day from the Med, after 12 years in the sun we think about going north again and explore britain, ireland and france. As we planning to move up from a 44 ft sailboat to a slow trawler where we can spent 7 month we are not sure about the max size. In the Med lenght is no issue because we anchor 99 pct or use stern mooring. But uk and france are different so i like to ask the community when the real problems start to find marina berths. Seeing the different weather anchoring is maybe not possible everywhere. Also read about mooring buoys but is it possible to use them with a heavy 50 ton boat ?
I read in many marinas that avove 15 m it gets complicate, but how are your experience. We like to see a lot of the area , normally travelling one day and spent a week in a bay or port ...,,
 
Yes 15m usually adds some minor complications, although many marinas will only take a booking above 15m so it can be easier if a little more expensive. I can’t think of many harbours you’d have a problem with. Draft can be more of an issue, especially if using any canals. The Crinan for example is limited to 2m depth and has some spots shallower than that.
At 50 ton you wouldn’t be using most visitor moorings so often limited to larger ship/commercial ones.
Above 14m you also have additional regulations to comply with such as having in date flares, liferaft and fire extinguishers but you may already choose to do those things.
 
Size will be an issue and a trawler that size will limit where you can go as marina berths to take that size are very limited. Same with mooring buoys - most are for smaller yachts.
 
Difficult .Probably talking hammerheads or linear pontoons which are premium spots in summer.
Better chance finding harbours that might fit you in but many dry.
 
It’s not a hard cutoff at 15m but definitely progressively fewer Marina berths available as you go bigger. So your choice of boat will limit where you can go to some extent but there will still be availability especially out of the busier periods. Anchorages no problem. Mooring buoys for a 50T boat very rare indeed, maybe only ships’ moorings.
 
Thats what i assumed , draft is not that problem but i was looking at a fleming 55 or selene as well as a 58 steel trawler....but marinas are the issue. So better short and high like a nordhavn but at sea i prefer lower boats.....not easy.
 
Many of the Scottish marinas have larger boats in them, traditional fishing hull conversions and their modern equivalent. Around the east coast, NE coast quite a few of the fishing harbours now see larger yachts as well. The Firth of Clyde has plenty of large yacht berths, but not all. On the West Coast it gets less but some have the space. The West Coast does have an abundance of secure anchorages.

In Scandinavia, no problems, with anchorages or marinas and harbours that will accept large yachts. In fact, in Scandinavia they have a very large traditional fishing boat fleet, comprising of renovations and new builds; beautiful boats.

I think you just need to plan, and will find that you can be accommodated relatively straightforward. Definitely worth investing in anchor gear, bower and kedge, plus understand the various methods to deploy to achieve a secure mooring. At least one member of this forum, used a large converted fishing boat for many years all over Scotland and didn’t have issues, from what I understand.

Go for it.
 
It's not all bad news.
We have owned a 19M boat with just under 3M draft for the past 15 years and we have never not been able to find somewhere, it just needs a bit more planning and a phone call a couple of days ahead. For every harbourmaster who shakes his head there is another who will go out of his way to accommodate you. We are often given priority at locks and sill opening times and it's not unusual to see a gaggle of smaller boats being asked to wait while they get us sorted out first. There are times when it's a pain (The Yealm for instance) but the downsides are often compensated for by the speed and comfort. It is certainly not the 'stopper' that many people assume.
In the Isles of Scilly we are usually given a 50 ton mooring next to the lifeboat (we are 33 ton) and you will usually get harbour staff assistance or even a RIB coming to assist if you need it. West coast Scotland is no issue of course (Crinan excepted) and if, for example, we left the Solent for Scotland then Poole, Weymouth, Dartmouth, Salcombe, Plymouth, Fowey, Falmouth, Scillies, Dale / Milford Haven, Holyhead, Belfast are all used regularly by us.
Harbour masters soon get to know you and will sort you out if you're decent to them in return.
 
thanks for your experience so it seems doable, at least with a robust boat. one really stupid development is the new reporting system above 15 m in Norway , i really hope they put; it back to 20 or 24 m because its really a bit too much for a eu couple who wants to anchor and spent time in Norway.....
kedge means stern anchor , right ? like the scandinavians using a lot. is it common to use bow and kedge in a small inlay, stream and tide changes ? this is new to me...
 
Kedge, and associated rode, is a smaller, lighter, portable anchor that can be used in various positions e.g. stern anchoring, additional bow anchor to supplement bower, running mooring, tandem, or transported in tender and dropped in deeper water to haul off a shoal if aground, or hold the boat in place as the tide rises. Last time I used one was to hold off a harbour wall which was a lee shore on a windy day, that was rigged from the beam.
 
ok thats known, i use a fortress and rope for such. i was more thinking about lying between two anchors in a confined spaces but so far i was not happy to be between two anchors esp when conditions are changing. here in the Med the powerboats mostly use land lines and two anchors, but tgey have crew......can get tricky if the wind picks up and changing......
are there any book recommendations for the whole area uk plus ireland. i use Heinkel in the Atlantic and Med
 
Well perhaps a different perspective from me. When looking for a boat for long term cruising as a couple we chose a limit of 12m LOA and 2.0m draft. Plenty of space.
Every time you go up in size you reduce the number of places you can visit and/or the number of berths available.

Sure there are many places that can fit in a handful of big boats - often only if pre booked. But there are also a lot of lovely smalller harbours where there are only finger berths (or in Baltic box berths) which don’t have space for bigger boats.

In Scotland, most moorings are sized for maximum 10 or 15 tons - and often about 12mm length max also.
There are some bully boy bigger boats which ignore the limits, but they are not welcome.

A huge 17m steel German ketch, plus bowsprit and mizzen boom out the back, picked up a 15 ton /12m max mooring at Tobermory when I was last there. I politely pointed out the mooring limits painted on the buoy but got a rude sign. In the morning the two neighbouring boats, of legal size, had been forced to move.
And another large yacht apparently picked up a private mooring in Storm Floris, and dragged the mooring away and ended calling out the RNLI.
If going for a big boat must be prepared to anchor, irrespective of the weather.

Bigger isn’t always best if you want to see the nicest places.
 
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yes that's the general question. i do have a 44 ft aluminum sailboat now and using it 6 months a year. we are active so we have dinghies, sup, wingfoil, folding bicycles etc and never use a marina , moving to a trawler with some good seabehsviour plus a 4 m rib, real bicycles , a laser etc you easy end up above 50 -55 ft esp when i like to cruise from norway to greece
 
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