Heading south...but when?

[MarkJ]

Originally Posted by Cheechako

: Cape Lookout Shoals extend what..10-20 miles offshore?.

A long way. Its actually only 10nms but that's to the point. To Beaufort, I.e. where there's real land, is 20nms.

And Diamond Shoals too stick put more than Pinoccios nose.
Last year I did it in a benign 20 knots which mean 25 to 30 from the South so the whole friggin thing, about 70nms from Diamond Shoals to Cape Lookout Shoals marker is all a lee coast.
No wonder there's so many wrecks there. One mistake...

Each time I have been around Hatteras its been interesting in weather, navigation, seastate, currents. One never forgets it.

Oh, and a final funny thing when I was crossing the Gulf Stream off Cape Lookout last November heading to the Caribbean: the air was fuzzy! Clear day, everything looked crystal clear, but I was looking at a ship w my brand new Steiner binoculars and the huge name was fuzzy. Thought the binos were bung. But it was just the Gulf Stream & Hatteras letting you know that even on a good day its waiting to be bad.


Mark



Sent from a stupid phone that replaces words with weird stuff.

[Cheechako]

Originally Posted by MarkJ

A long way. Its actually only 10nms but that's to the point. To Beaufort, I.e. where there's real land, is 20nms.

And Diamond Shoals too stick put more than Pinoccios nose.
Last year I did it in a benign 20 knots which mean 25 to 30 from the South so the whole friggin thing, about 70nms from Diamond Shoals to Cape Lookout Shoals marker is all a lee coast.
No wonder there's so many wrecks there. One mistake...

Each time I have been around Hatteras its been interesting in weather, navigation, seastate, currents. One never forgets it.

Oh, and a final funny thing when I was crossing the Gulf Stream off Cape Lookout last November heading to the Caribbean: the air was fuzzy! Clear day, everything looked crystal clear, but I was looking at a ship w my brand new Steiner binoculars and the huge name was fuzzy. Thought the binos were bung. But it was just the Gulf Stream & Hatteras letting you know that even on a good day its waiting to be bad.


Mark



Sent from a stupid phone that replaces words with weird stuff.

Yeah, after I rounded Hatteras I was thinking: "what a beautiful sunny morning, wind blowing from aft, knotmeter says 8.5 knots, and the occasional water coming aboard is really warm!" ...then reality hit! Such is sailing!

[caradow]

Maybe the only way to go past Hatteras is North bound unless you are East of the GS.
I honestly thought in my ignorance that the meander we hit was an anomaly but maybe not? Certainly the free stuff on the net did not predict the stream being so close to shore when we went around. Yet sometimes it does. Guess I will pay better attention next time. No wind when we last went south, 3-4 knots SOG in a boat that can motor over 7 in flat water was no fun. At dawn that morning we had finally rounded by going into shallow water then it started blowing 30 out of the NW and we had a very fast sleigh ride to Wilmington for about 100 miles but we were very lucky it didn't start blowing sooner.
Anyone care to comment on just how frequent this occurs?

[frozenhawaiian]

Originally Posted by MarkJ

*I haven't read the other replies before writing this*

I have come down from New York twice and I think its good to leave BY by mid-September.
Once south of Cape Hatteras you have great choices of day hopping down the coast or icw, anytime, or doing the easy direct to Bahamas route in early November.
Obviously you have a month somewhere to kill, but as long as you are south of Hatteras its fine.

Heading direct to the Bahamas, or the Caribbean from Norfolk or Beaufort North Carolina is pretty easy. We don't know what the hurricane season is likely to be yet... early should be quiet but its too far out to see if it will finish in early November or late November.

I think those that sail down from NY, Newport etc in November are nuts. Truly nuts. Getting a Norther for a week against the Gulf Stream is just silly and doubly so because its avoidable




Mark

Sent from a stupid phone that replaces words with weird stuff.

would you believe me if I told you the most pleasant trip around hatteras I ever had was this past december? I know, I have a hard time believing it myself and I was there. had the best weather window in history, I was bracing for the worst delivery of my life. anyhow, I digress.

as for the OP's question. first of all coming out of boston don't bother sailing around cape cod and dealing with nantucket shoals, especially in the fall. there's kind of 2 schools of thought on the issue of making the passage south.

on the one hand you have the people who go from new england and run to bermuda to refuel, re-provision and rest then sail from there down into the caribbean, this gives you a better angle to sail into the caribbean, more or less due south but for sailing to the bahamas you do end up back tracking west a bit if you go this route. the other advantage of going this route is that you cross the gulfstream once, further north and you're well offshore from the gulfstream and shallow waters that can make the seas so miserable when going around hatteras.

the other school of thought is stay closer to shore and basically sail in the corridor between the eastern seaboard and the stream. the advantage here is that if there's a nasty weather system rolling up the coast you're never too far from a place to tuck in and hide. the other advantage is that depending on what the stream is doing sometimes you can get into a back eddie whish will actually help give you a push south. the disadvantage is that you don't have a whole lot of real estate to play with in this relatively narrow corridor between the shore and the stream and if the stream has swung far inshore sometimes it just simply isn't enough room.

bear in mind too that if you're shallow enough/short enough there's nothing wrong with hopping into the ICW. you can pick it up in norfolk and hop in and out as you please (well not exactly but you get the idea) even just hopping into the ICW to get past hatteras can save yourself a lot of time/discomfort. don't be to rigidly fixed on a plan written down in a book, gotta be flexible. oh also, while a late season delivery can be miserably cold it can be done safely. you just have to be VERY careful with your weather window.