Cruising Guides - Need Advice

Benny · Oct 20, 2010

Some areas are just not popular enough to get a cruising guide. The overwhelming majority will cruise the Bay and the rest will opt for offshore passages.

Ross · Oct 20, 2010

There is a harbor at Oyster, VA. The charts show the channel as requiring care. I think that i would drive it this winter and do some land cruising with the best road maps that I could find.

Bill Roosa · Oct 21, 2010

Crusing the Chesapeake, a gunkholers guide

by William Schelenbecker (sp?)
While Bill focuses on the Bay he also has a section on the coast from the mouth of the Chesapeake to the mouth of the Delaware Bay
Kiptopeak is not that great an anchorage BTW. The old concrete ships are interesting to look at and there are showers and water but the anchorage is loaded with crab pots and the wave action reflecting off the ships makes for a choppy sea. Pretty strong reversing current too.
The passage between the two bays is not that popular due to the difficulty in getting by the bars at the entrances. They have strong currents that constantly change the channel and once you get in it is devoid of facilities. Great if you have bug screens (summer) and are looking for isolation though.

Snotter · Oct 21, 2010

ActiveCaptain.com is very popular. They use crowd sourcing for most of their entries.

Ross · Oct 21, 2010

With good maps you can find all of the local roads that lead you to the water. The book maps are published for almost every county in Maryland and Virginia.

Chuckbear · Oct 21, 2010

Waterway Guide, my employer, has a pretty good section on the entire Delmarva coast and Peninsula in our 2011 Chesapeake Bay Guide. If you have a West Marine nearby you can go by and take a look and see if it will give you the coverage you are looking for. Chuck

Ross · Oct 21, 2010

Try this site: http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/f19/delmarva-peninsula-circumnavigation-advice-18533.html

Ron20324 · Oct 21, 2010

rgranger said:
Hey Y'all, It has a cruising guides for both Virginia and Maryland coasts with charts etc. Only $29.99 each. I ordered the VA one. I'll let you know if it is any good.r

Looks like the ones you can get at West?

catsailor · Oct 22, 2010

rgranger said:
Hello All

Well it is cold and raining outside :cry:
So I've been thinking about what I want to do next sailing season.

Most of my sailing experience has been in lakes but I've been branching out to coastal cruising. So far I have done three trips in the Albemarle and a few day sails out of Kiptopeake (Tip of Chesapeake Bay).

For this coming summer I would like to take a trip from Kiptopeake to Chincoteague Is. For those unfamiliar with the area...Chincotteague is about half-way up the DelMarVA peninsula. So far I have only been there by land.

I have already acquired the requisite charts but I would love to find a cruising guide.

While in the Albemarle I relied heavily on the N.C. cruising guide by Young and would feel a lot more secure if I had a similar quality guide with good anchorages etc. for this stretch of the Atlantic coast in case the weather turns sour or I just want to go ashore and buy a cheeseburger.

I have been looking... but so far I can only find guides for Chesapeake to Florida and New England south to CT. It seems the stretch of the Atlantic along the DelMarVA is less popular.

If you know of something please let me know.

Fair winds,

r

Of course there is a guide, just not the major ones. They are only interested in the mass market, not in small boat adventures.

The area is not popular and that is the very best reason for going. Your boat would be good for the task, able to run outside on nice days and inside on other days. The Anchor Inn in chicoteague will even give you a free slip if you stay there (I assume your boat is a centerboard boat with a shallow draft)!

Is there a guide? Yes. I've made the trip many times and had to write my own, since published information at the time was so thin. It has been a 5 year labor of love. I've been along that coast many times in boats of differing sizes.

Try my blog:
http://sail-delmarva.blogspot.com/

If you read the side bars and click on "guide revisions" and "trip reports" there will be a good bit of free information. The guide has far more, if you like what you see. Enjoy.

catsailor · Oct 22, 2010

rgranger said:
I found a few moments and looked at your site. I think I had run across your story on another webpage before. It looked very familiar. Anyway, I ordered a copy of your book. Thanks for putting the time into it.

Fair winds,

r

I will tell you this, and my daughter will agree; the year we did most of the passage by the inside route was the most memorable. Gotta love shallow draft. Of course, the sailing is not good inside since you are following markers most of the time. But it's worth it.

Enjoy shallow draft while you can, before you do something dumb like trade up to a bigger boat. I did and I miss my old boat for this sort of trip.

dscribner · Oct 24, 2010

R,

We own a Lancer 25. I think it's about as big as you want to trailer, so I can relate. We've got it down to about 30 minutes from the time that I stop the truck to the time that my wife pulls the trailer out from under the boat, often leaving me thigh (or worse) deep in 45 degree water. This is Maine, after all. We get NONE of the gulf stream.

We found a slightly dated cruising guide on Amazon.com. We use it to get good ideas then hone those ideas with online help. The used guide was $9. The new guide is around $70. But, I figure the Maine coastline hasn't changed too much in 30 years.