Cruising East Coast USA

[Kelpie]

Just kicking about some ideas for where to go next. We're currently in the Caribbean, spending the summer in the Grenada area. Would like to do something a bit different next.

I know the visa situation is a bit of a pain in the USA, but it looks an interesting cruising ground and has certain advantages- not unbearably hot, cheaper/easier flights home, some cheap boatyards and probably cheaper general costs (food, boat parts) compared to the Caribbean.

Has anybody on here cruised this coast? Any tips or advice?

 

[michael_w]

I've sailed from Florida to as far north as Newfoundland a couple of times. It is SWMBO's and my favourite cruising ground. Just so many places to go to! Avoid anywhere south of New York in the summer as it's very hot and humid. It's best in the autumn. The seasons seem to run later than on the European side of the pond. Maine is not to be missed!

 

[Kelpie]

I've sailed from Florida to as far north as Newfoundland a couple of times. It is SWMBO's and my favourite cruising ground. Just so many places to go to! Avoid anywhere south of New York in the summer as it's very hot and humid. It's best in the autumn. The seasons seem to run later than on the European side of the pond. Maine is not to be missed!

That's exactly what I wanted to hear
I'm trying to get my head around where to be and when. It's such a huge area that the 'season' is obviously different in different areas.
Tentative itinerary would be something like this:
- arr Florida as late as safe/possible (June?)
- haul out in October, possibly Virginia area (and fly home for a bit)
- return to the boat in the spring, to head north. But when? Would April be too early?

One constraint is that after a year, you have to import the boat. So we'd want to reach Canada within a year of arriving in Florida. I think it looks doable but I need to do a lot of reading about weather etc.

 

[BobnLesley]

We've done three passages along the US east coast - south as far as the dry tortugas, north as far as Maine:
Check out Deltaville for storage options; it may have changed since we were last there (2017) but that seemed the best bet in that area to haul out and it gets increasingly expensive going north from there.
Getting the B1/B2 visa is a hassle (I think it's Trinidad and maybe Nassua to get one if you're laready in the Carib?) but once you have that and your cruising permit, it's remarkably easy - we sailed from Puerto Rico to the US mainland and did nothing more than phone the Coastguard to report our arrival once we got there.
I don't know/remember the details, but I think there's a workaround on the twelve month cruising permit/licence limit if your boat's laid-up ashore for a while; I know of a couple of yachts that definitely stayed longer than that in the US.
April/May will be painfully cold once you're through Long Island Sound and the Cape Cod Canal... then again, if you've spent a while in the Caribbean, north of Cape Cod's cold even in August!
Water temperature aside, I'd concur that Maine's not to be missed, though Lesley and I agree (a rarity) that the absolute highlight was sailing up the Potomac and into Washington DC. If you want to see/do much you'll be obliged to use the ICW, which varies between wonderful and bloody awful; but if you're in a hurry go offshore.

PM me if you've any more specific questions, but bear in mind our answers will be what we found in 2013 to 2017)

 

[Kelpie]

We've done three passages along the US east coast - south as far as the dry tortugas, north as far as Maine:
Check out Deltaville for storage options; it may have changed since we were last there (2017) but that seemed the best bet in that area to haul out and it gets increasingly expensive going north from there.
Getting the B1/B2 visa is a hassle (I think it's Trinidad and maybe Nassua to get one if you're laready in the Carib?) but once you have that and your cruising permit, it's remarkably easy - we sailed from Puerto Rico to the US mainland and did nothing more than phone the Coastguard to report our arrival once we got there.
I don't know/remember the details, but I think there's a workaround on the twelve month cruising permit/licence limit if your boat's laid-up ashore for a while; I know of a couple of yachts that definitely stayed longer than that in the US.
April/May will be painfully cold once you're through Long Island Sound and the Cape Cod Canal... then again, if you've spent a while in the Caribbean, north of Cape Cod's cold even in August!
Water temperature aside, I'd concur that Maine's not to be missed, though Lesley and I agree (a rarity) that the absolute highlight was sailing up the Potomac and into Washington DC. If you want to see/do much you'll be obliged to use the ICW, which varies between wonderful and bloody awful; but if you're in a hurry go offshore.

PM me if you've any more specific questions, but bear in mind our answers will be what we found in 2013 to 2017)

That's all fantastic information, thank you.
Deltaville is where I got a quote for £1500 for a year ashore- that was for an alternative plan we were kicking around.
The 12 month limit currently seems the biggest problem, so a way of working around that would be really helpful. I guess we could import the boat, it's only 1.5% of value which isn't too painful, but there might be more to it than that and it might complicate things when we return to the UK...

 

[michael_w]

Don't forget St Pierre et Miquelon a pair of French islands off the south coast of Newfoundland. They're proper French, not French-Canadian. The last outpost of New France, the electric is 220v, Part of the EU and it's the only place in North America I saw a Peugeot. Has very cheap diesel too! A number of EU boats laid up there. Another Brexit benefit.

 

[AndrewB]

No-one has mentioned the Intra-Coastal Waterway (ICW), which I've done twice from Florida to the Chesapeake (and then on to New York, followed by the Hudson and Erie Canal to the Great Lakes). Bridge height is theoretically 65ft, but best assume max 62ft. It's not as well maintained as it used to be and some spots may have become too shallow for a yacht so you need to go outside for a bit, but once you are there current information is readily available. It offers magnificent scenery and a chance to visit fascinating towns and villages which seem stuck in time. Sailing up the coast is far less interesting.

I've not hauled out along that route (except at Chicago), but there are dozens of small marinas along the ICW where a yacht can be safely left. There are several I've used.

Don't forget that hurricanes reaching Florida often then turn northwards along the coast. Best to be north of the Carolinas by late July. However, marinas further south are generally well prepared.

 

[michael_w]

Here's some suggestions for you. I wrote this list for a friend a few years ago.

Places to go in Maine:

Portland (suggest Di Millo’s Marina, good restaurant)
Potts Harbor
Jewel Island
Tenants Harbor
Maple Juice Cove
Wiscasset
Boothbay (Bit touristy)
Damariscotta River
South Bristol/Christmas Cove
Camden (Wayfarer Marine)
Buck’s Harbor
Sail down Eggimoggin Reach
South West Harbor (Mount Desert Island)
Muscle Ridge Channel
Penobscot Bay
Fox Island Thorofare
Isle a Haut

Lobster traps are no problem. The boat will push them out of the way, though a prop cutter is a comfort! Traps at their worst in Penobscot Bay

Places to go in Massachusetts south of Cape Cod Canal:
Marion aka Sippican Harbor (Beverley Yacht Club)
Mattapoisett Harbor (not if wind S or SE)

If pinned down by weather the whaling museum in New Bedford, check berthing as New Bedford is a very big fishing port.

Places to go in Rhode Island.
Block Island
Newport
Bristol (Herreschoff Museum)
Dutch Harbor

Places to go in Connecticut
Mystic Seaport Museum. Fascinating for boaters. Expensive, but you have the place to yourself after they turf the plebs out in the evening!
Essex

Places to go in New York State
Greenport/Shelter Island/Dering Harbor (Greenport good for provisioning)
Port Jefferson (bit twee)
Oyster Bay (Gold Coast, Great Gatsby etc.)
Port Washington (Commuter trains to New York City)
City Island (mix of boats and bohemia, easy bus and tube to NYC)
79th Street Boat Basin, on the Hudson River and 2 blocks from Broadway and handy for Central Park

Chesapeake suggestions
Baltimore
Annapolis
Oxford
Solomons Island
Horseshoe Cove, St Mary’s River (lovely anchorage and a good place to start your trip up the Potomac River to
Washington DC Do stay at the Capital Yacht Club. ¾ mile from the White House. 10mins walk from the Smithsonian and the Mall.
Deltaville/ Fishing Bay
Norfolk (home of the US Navy) Go and see the USS Wisconsin, a battleship with 4 acres of teak decks!

Suggest that whilst in the USA you take out membership of Boat US. Insurance for towing, plus discounts on dockage and fuel. Not expensive, and well worth it. Our friends who go stuck in Georgia ended up with a $1600 bill when they went the wrong side of a buoy!

Embassy Cruising Guides are good. We also had a very old copy of The Cruising Guide to the New England Coast: Including the Hudson River, Long Island Sound and the Coast of New Brunswick by Duncan and Fenn. Excellent pilot and very funny to boot.​

Other places not to miss include Charleson SC, Pamlico Sound,

Enjoy!

 

[michael_w]

I should have added when coming from the south Atlantic Highlands NJ by Sandy Point is a good place to gather your wits before the hurly-burly of New York harbor. One of the two places on an Atlantic Circuit my anchor dragged. It got hooked up on the remains of a telly.

 

[capnsensible]

This might bring back some memories for you chaps who have been there. Old fashioned but a bit of fun. If you root around on youtube afterwards you can find the second part.

 

[BobnLesley]

Here's some suggestions for you.

Suggest that whilst in the USA you take out membership of Boat US. Insurance for towing, plus discounts on dockage and fuel. Not expensive, and well worth it. Our friends who go stuck in Georgia ended up with a $1600 bill when they went the wrong side of a buoy!

​

Defintely that one. It cost about £100/year when we were there, but towing fee charges reflected the fact that 95% of folk carried the insurance so didn't care how much was charged:
We needed to move our boat from one berth to another in a Jacksonberg marina and had intended to simply warp it across/around; no biggie, it would've perhaps taken half an hour even with just the two of us. However, as we were Tow-boat members and the local tow-boat US rib was in the marina doing another job anyway, we got him to move it round before he left (ten minutes tops). A week or two later we got a nice email from Tow-Boat US advising that they hoped that our boat had now been repaired and that the $600+ towing bill had been settled by them at no cost to ourselves - (minimum 1 hour to attend, minimum 1 hour for the job, minimum 1 hour to return to their berth; nice work if you can get it.

 

[BobnLesley]

This might bring back some memories for you chaps who have been there. Old fashioned but a bit of fun. If you root around on youtube afterwards you can find the second part.

Thanks for that, would you mind some Pm'd questions about the paperwork/reistration details? I'm considering a re-visit by doing similar.
Your title 'Sailing the ICW' did recall a favoured memory from our jaunts up and down the ICW: Foreign flagged vessels perhaps accounted for 5% of the yachts we saw on the ICW, but if you saw a yacht other than ourselves purely under sail, there was a 50/50 chance of it being foreign flagged and offshore it was even more marked, with the exception of Cape May to NY (where there wasn't a choice) of the few yachts that we encountered >80% non-US boats.

 

[capnsensible]

Thanks for that, would you mind some Pm'd questions about the paperwork/reistration details? I'm considering a re-visit by doing similar.
Your title 'Sailing the ICW' did recall a favoured memory from our jaunts up and down the ICW: Foreign flagged vessels perhaps accounted for 5% of the yachts we saw on the ICW, but if you saw a yacht other than ourselves purely under sail, there was a 50/50 chance of it being foreign flagged and offshore it was even more marked, with the exception of Cape May to NY (where there wasn't a choice) of the few yachts that we encountered >80% non-US boats.

It wasn't me.

But what a fab thing to do.