I recently got a copy of Mark and Dianna Doyle’s two volume guide to ICW anchorages from Norfolk to Miami. These are the only such guides produced by people who actually go out and verify the information themselves. The guides have a great presentation in which the actual depths recorded on their survey are indicated on the GPS track along with tidal data to help you compute the likely depth at the time you are entering.
http://www.onthewaterchartguides.com/
One of the best things about these guides is that Mark and Dianna have poked into many areas shown as just blue with no soundings on the standard charts. Most cruisers, and certainly myself, would bypass these places at the end of a long and tiring day when the last thing you want to deal with is a grounding. Unless you are adventurous, you will only know about these spots through the guides.
Remember reading about this long day? (See last half of post.)
http://forums.sbo.sailboatowners.com/showthread.php?t=138717&#post897242
The guides would have saved me their cost right there twice over as well as hours of anxious running at the end of an already very long day. I found an anchorage shown on my chart silted in and ran for hours without finding another, finally ending up paying for dockage at a marina. Mark and Dianna’s guide shows a good anchorage just the other side of the bridge but it didn’t look good at the time, right after just barely escaping the first with the use of full power and help of a strong tailwind.
I’m so excited about these guides that, having some time on my hand while waiting for suitable weather to head south, I decided to enter all of the locations into a file I can import into my chartplotter with the page numbers as the waypoint names. When planning, and especially when making on the fly plan changes, I can see the anchorage waypoint and immediately turn to the proper page in the guide without leafing back and forth in the book. I more often then not am cruising alone so it is well worth investing some shore time in this kind of workload saving.
A dozen pages into this project, I realized that it was going to be a lot of work. It seemed to me that this “Table of Contents” to the guides would be such a good thing for the authors to put on their website that it I would feel silly if it appeared after hours of work. I emailed them to ask if anything like that was in the works and to offer them my .gpx (importable into almost any GPS or charting program) file.
I got back an email from Mark imploring me to abandon the project. His feeling was that, if the file existed, it eventually get out on the Internet. I would give a friend a copy “just for his use”. The friend would do the same. Eventually, it would end up in the hands of someone who would post it on a website.
This led to an exchange of emails in which I got an illuminating picture into the world of trying to produce valuable information like this for the cruising community. The guides have only been out for a couple of weeks and people are busy translating its information into free online sites such as Active Captain and scanners and copy machines are busy all over the cruising world. Many of these anchorages would not be accessible without Mark and Dianna going out and running their boat into un-surveyed places. Just the locations are valuable information.
These guides are produced by just a couple working on their boat. They are not getting rich selling them. It is as much a contribution to the cruising lifestyle as it is a business. Anyone interested in supporting the concept of this kind of comprehensive information being available should do two things. One, buy the guides. Two, don’t copy and give them to friends.
I, personally, think that making my file, which only shows locations and corresponding page numbers, would increase sales of the guides. However, Mark knows the business far, far better than I do so I am going to respect is request not to give a copy of my work to anyone. So, please don’t ask but please do buy these excellent guides which I expect to make my trips south much easier this year.
http://www.onthewaterchartguides.com/
One of the best things about these guides is that Mark and Dianna have poked into many areas shown as just blue with no soundings on the standard charts. Most cruisers, and certainly myself, would bypass these places at the end of a long and tiring day when the last thing you want to deal with is a grounding. Unless you are adventurous, you will only know about these spots through the guides.
Remember reading about this long day? (See last half of post.)
http://forums.sbo.sailboatowners.com/showthread.php?t=138717&#post897242
The guides would have saved me their cost right there twice over as well as hours of anxious running at the end of an already very long day. I found an anchorage shown on my chart silted in and ran for hours without finding another, finally ending up paying for dockage at a marina. Mark and Dianna’s guide shows a good anchorage just the other side of the bridge but it didn’t look good at the time, right after just barely escaping the first with the use of full power and help of a strong tailwind.
I’m so excited about these guides that, having some time on my hand while waiting for suitable weather to head south, I decided to enter all of the locations into a file I can import into my chartplotter with the page numbers as the waypoint names. When planning, and especially when making on the fly plan changes, I can see the anchorage waypoint and immediately turn to the proper page in the guide without leafing back and forth in the book. I more often then not am cruising alone so it is well worth investing some shore time in this kind of workload saving.
A dozen pages into this project, I realized that it was going to be a lot of work. It seemed to me that this “Table of Contents” to the guides would be such a good thing for the authors to put on their website that it I would feel silly if it appeared after hours of work. I emailed them to ask if anything like that was in the works and to offer them my .gpx (importable into almost any GPS or charting program) file.
I got back an email from Mark imploring me to abandon the project. His feeling was that, if the file existed, it eventually get out on the Internet. I would give a friend a copy “just for his use”. The friend would do the same. Eventually, it would end up in the hands of someone who would post it on a website.
This led to an exchange of emails in which I got an illuminating picture into the world of trying to produce valuable information like this for the cruising community. The guides have only been out for a couple of weeks and people are busy translating its information into free online sites such as Active Captain and scanners and copy machines are busy all over the cruising world. Many of these anchorages would not be accessible without Mark and Dianna going out and running their boat into un-surveyed places. Just the locations are valuable information.
These guides are produced by just a couple working on their boat. They are not getting rich selling them. It is as much a contribution to the cruising lifestyle as it is a business. Anyone interested in supporting the concept of this kind of comprehensive information being available should do two things. One, buy the guides. Two, don’t copy and give them to friends.
I, personally, think that making my file, which only shows locations and corresponding page numbers, would increase sales of the guides. However, Mark knows the business far, far better than I do so I am going to respect is request not to give a copy of my work to anyone. So, please don’t ask but please do buy these excellent guides which I expect to make my trips south much easier this year.
My thinking was "Without the mirror you wouldn't know if you have wrinkles". 
