Fun Side of Cruising

If cruising the Loop on the main & most popular routes, and cruising by the seasons at the recommended ‘Looper speed’, your total ‘cruising days’ will be very near 140. However, your days living on the Loop will be very near 360. This means you will have 220 days ‘not cruising’. The result is, you will need to spend about 55 days not cruising forward on route. While many of us make some short detours and side trips, most of this time is spent on shore seeing the sites. It is important to spend this time in each of the 4 geographical areas during its preferred best weather & boating season.

Think about what you will want to be doing on those days you are not making forward progress? Most of us spend those days ‘being a tourist’. We plan our stops at nearby destinations that interest us the most, and those that have the most interesting things to do. Starting in Miami, we have 25 great destinations to visit including Cape Canaveral, St Augustine, Charleston, Myrtle Beach & Wacca Wache, Morehead City, and Ocracoke Island. Then, we enter Chesapeake Bay where a boater could spend an entire year visiting such places as Washington DC, (the Smithsonian alone is worth a few days visit), then it’s on to Annapolis, Baltimore, Deltaville, Tangier & Crisfield Islands and the Solomons. From there, we’re got Cape May, Atlantic City, New York City, and who can cruise right by the Statue of Liberty and not visit Times Square, China town or Little Italy?

I don’t even have the time or space to tell you about all the incredible destinations that will tempt you off your boat to stop, shop, stay and linger in Canada. Just know that we never cruise by 26 of them without stopping, and you will want to stop at these places as well. Then, it’s back in the USA and your first destination should be Mackinac Island and the ‘Grand Hotel’. This is our #1 most favorite stop of all our favorite stops on the entire Great Loop.  Problem is, we have 13 more favorite stops to make before we even reach Chicago, and from Chicago we have 28 more before we reach Lulu’s on the Gulf ICW – just one more place we have to stop and eat at. From Lulu’s we have 28 other destinations we simply can’t pass by without stopping.

The point is. . . You may think this is an epic boat ride, but it is much more than that on shore. When you reach these destinations, believe us, you will want to stop, eat out and spend some time at these places. We promise – America’s Great Loop never tasted so good as it did on our 2023 voyage. Everyone should plan a sufficient budget for it!

New Experience: Locks, Lift Bridges, Swing Bridges and wait times, anchoring out, the Ebb & Flow of Tidal waters, strong river currents, narrow canals, long no wake zones, slow speed limits. . . For most everyone this voyage will be loaded with new experiences. It’s the reason we often downplay the need for an over abundant amount of “experience”. It’s not that experience isn’t important, it is that we know from experience, almost no one has all the experience of cruising the Loop until they’ve done it. The most important aspect of cruising the Loop is simply to be a safe boater in a safe, suitable and seaworthy boat and know the rules of the road.

New Friends:  Another ‘new experience’ of cruising the Loop is meeting & making new friends. This is often the first time ‘couples’ meet others ‘as a couple’. Most often our friends knew us first before we were married. They were classmates or people we knew from work. Cruising the Loop, other Loopers will come to know you by two things: your boat’s name, and as a couple. It’s just another reason we suggest every Looper have ‘Boat Cards’. These are the non-Business Cards of the boat world. You card should have your name, Home Port, Email, and your boat’s name, brand name & length. A phone # is optional. We exchange ‘boat cards’ with near 70 or so Loopers every voyage. In addition, it comes in handy when checking in at Marinas, as it provides the marina with your name, contact info, boat type & length.

Cruising long-distance and living on a boat is an exceptional new experience. Great in many ways, not so great in many others. It can be a wonderful experience in the right boat, or a miserable experience in the wrong boat. For sure, it requires a lot of compromises and some major changes in one’s daily habits and attitude. It’s the simple things we take for granted on shore that don’t exist on a boat. Fresh water, especially fresh ‘hot’ water is unlimited on shore. According to USGS, a couple uses near 200 gallons of water per day at home. We don’t know of a single pleasure boat under 40-feet that holds that much fresh water. Most only hold 90 gallons or less. As a result, you will be stopping more often for water than fuel. Space is also a premium. You will never have enough storage space. Boats don’t come with a basement, walk-in closet or a 2-car garage. While many first timers look for a 40′ plus size boat with 2-staterooms and 2-heads, because they are expecting guests – that in fact, almost never ever arrive – by default the extra stateroom & head becomes storage space. Nice to have, but if you put a pencil to it, it promises to be the most expensive ‘storage space’ per sq. in. you could possibly buy.

A popular Marine Store offers a “Washer/Dryer Combo” for $2,500. Installation including water and drain might cost you another $900. So, for $3,400 you can wash & dry your clothes on your boat. What a deal. . . Or is it?

Many Loopers have a washer and dryer installed on their boat. No one likes taking their dirty laundry to a laundry mat. We understand that.

Most every single marina along the way will have a coin-operated laundry room for you to wash your clothes. All it takes is a handful of quarters and detergent. If you put a pencil to buying and installing a washer/dryer, on a 300-day voyage around the Loop, if you do a load of laundry every weekend, it will cost you $80.00 a load, plus the cost of your detergent. If you’re wearing mostly Shorts & T-shirts as we do, it would be cheaper to just throw your dirty clothes away and buy new ones. But the REAL issue is the problems these unnecessary amenities on your boat create. At almost every marina we stop at, there is usually a boater waiting and trying to get something repaired – that in fact, shouldn’t have been on his/her boat in the first place. For the most carefree, stress-free, trouble-free voyage, Keep It Simple Sailor! That goes for everything on and attached to your vessel.

While we believe this voyage can be affordable for most anyone, nothing about this voyage is cheap!

There are tons of ‘inexpensive’ good used boats on the used market. There are also ‘cheap’ boats on the market. We’re not talking ‘cheap’. You can find good quality boats, built by a company with a solid reputation for quality, and save thousands. There are lots of them that were built in the 60s, 70s, & 80s that are still going strong. Unlike cars, on average most of these vessels (according to USCG stats), have been used less than 100 hours a year. That means there are 30-year-old ‘true trawlers’ with diesel engines out there with 97,000 fewer hours on their engine than those of a typical commercial fishing trawler being used today.

While most 1st time Loopers concentrate their entire Looping Budget on the boat, fuel and marina expenses; most fail at anticipating all the ‘fun’ on shore expenses they may or may not feel they need at first but will certainly want and wish they had when they get there.

‘Fun Money’ is our #1 biggest Looping expense. It is very reason for my “More Fun than Fuel” Looping philosophy. This is what allows us to spend more money on ourselves having fun, eating out and being a tourist, vs having to pour the bulk of our Cruising Kitty down our fuel tank and giving another Lion’s share of it to the marinas.

This voyage will take you to over a hundred incredible destinations. Most every single one of them will tempt you off your boat to stop, shop, eat out, linger longer, and of course, that cost money.

Yes, there are tons of amazing ‘FREE THINGS’ to do on this voyage, but even the ‘free things’ have a way of costing money. We buy a souvenir, maybe a T-shirt or Ball cap, an ice cream, a soft drink, a cup of coffee, and probably stop for lunch or dinner. . . There are enough free things to do cruising the Great Loop – one could go bankrupt doing them all.

Fact is, the #1 most frequently mentioned ‘regret’ expressed by previous Loopers is that they failed to anticipate, and therefore budget, for all the fun things they wanted to do on shore at destinations all along the way.

Many Loopers spend $20,000 or more just on fuel; and another $20,000 in Marina fees. From all the Looper’s reporting to us, the average cost of cruising America’s Great Loop seems to be very near $50,000. That of course, doesn’t include the price of their boat. Obviously, a solo Looper in a most frugal & fuel-efficient could possibly cruise it on $25,000 or less, while those in large more flamboyant vessels might spend as much or more than $75,000. It all depends on one’s lifestyle, boat type, size & speed, as well as how often they stay the night in marinas.

When cruising the Loop by the recommended seasons, ‘time’ will be

your best friend. It will in fact, prove to be your most enjoyable and most indulgent luxury.

We encourage everyone to go ‘Looper Slow’ and not worry about getting anywhere fast. Cruising at Looper speed, which is near 8mph, the average voyage will be 140 days averaging very near 40-miles per day. That’s slow! That’s also the very safest way to go. Take your time both on the water and on land. Don’t rush, don’t get in a hurry – everything will still be there when you are! ‘Not taking more time’ is one of the most frequently mentioned regrets by previous Loopers.

While this voyage only requires 140 ‘actual cruising days, we time our voyage to remain near 3 months in each geographical area. This gives us an average mid-70s summer temperature in the North as well as an average mid-70s winter temperature in the South.  With this method, we are not only cruising the entire way in the best of weather, but we also avoid the peak Atlantic Hurricane Season as well as the peak Tornado Season in Tornado Alley. It also puts us cruising down the Inland Rivers during the peak Fall Foliage.

If you follow Capt. John’s recommended routes and directions as detailed in “The Looper’s Companion Guide”: You will only have 1 day you must you cruise a distance of 78-miles or 178-miles (your option) on open water crossing the Gulf. Only on 10 days will your voyage exceed 60-miles. On 23 days will your voyage exceed 50-miles, and on 106 days, you will be cruising a distance of 40-miles or less. The safest aspect of Capt. John’s route is that it leaves you at a safe anchorage or marina every single evening in time to get settled in safely before dark.

Cruising 140 days at ‘Looper Speed’ is a very safe indeed.
* Depending on your route, you may only be required to anchor out in 10 locations. We budget our Marina stays, so we anchor out 165 nights.
* You will need a minimum fuel range of 208-miles. We recommend a very safe fuel range of 275-miles.
* Only once, (crossing the Gulf), will you need to depart one destination before daylight to arrive at your next safe destination before dark.