Successor to ActiveCaptain?

[EmeraldCoastSailor]

Originally Posted by Mike OReilly

There's this one:

https://www.waterwayguide.com/


It's a hybrid between crowd source and professional source. Doesn't have as much data as the old AC, but what's there has been verified (on some level) by actual cruising editors.


Disclosure: I am (or was) one of these Cruising Editors.

Thanks for this. I had heard of it but never checked it out. Now I have two sources of info and two ways to contribute.

[BobMc]

Cruisers.net is a long-standing online resource for everything Atlantic ICW and west coast of Florida. Back in the day, when Claiborne Young started it, he limited its scope to the waters south of Norfolk because he was basing everything on his own cruising experience (which was extensive). After Claiborne's tragic death (motorcycle rammed by inattentive drive) the site floundered for a while, but then was taken over and now maintained by former employees who do a great job.

You can get older as well as new review of marinas and anchorages. It's not as extensive as the FORMER Active Captain, but it's better than the current AC operated by Garmin which chose to delete many old posts and have a limited following now.

When we were actively cruising, we tried to contribute equally to AC (the original), Cruisersnet.net, and Waterway Guide.

Now that Sanderling is for sale (see mvsanderling.net) we enjoy reading some of the reviews on cruisersnet.net and Waterway Guide of various places we've enjoyed, but find AC by Garmin less than appealing.

Originally Posted by gma4

For an excellent report on current fuel prices on the east coast, the Cruiser's Net is a valuable resource. Click on the link below, and look for the "Fuel Prices" tab.
The site also has a ton of valuable other information, sorted by region, as well as Local Notices to Mariners.
Cruisers Net is an under-appreciated resource. I have no affiliation with them, but I have submitted reports and articles to them over the years.

-Greg Allard

https://cruisersnet.net/

[GoodFolkes]

I am still an AC guy. AC provides good info and and its much better when people leave reviews...I still do!

[Cbcruiser]

I tried a post and was rejected by the PC police because I called a bartender Bitchy. Have not posted since.

[pcmm]

I’ll be honest, from my perspective, I think the biggest issue with AC was the transition period to Garmin. It was rough to say the least. Add to that Garmin abandoning their Blue chart App (which for me was a right piss off as I just downloaded it and purchased $200 worth of charts when they announced it was being bandonded a few weeks after I purchased and offered no way to migrate my freshly purchased charts to the new app which didn’t exist for a few months yet). Then they changed the integration method and left all the third party chart plotters out in the cold until they could adapt. They did this with virtually no notice. Then add the personality behind AC seemed to be on the warpath with anyone who had a negative comment.

I think there is also a loss of “feel” for the effort when it shifts from “one guy with a cool idea helping the community” to a corporate entity

I don’t blame him for selling, I would too. That really the end goal of most software projects

[VeinDocFL]

After tapping “edit” under reviews in AC a box appears that supposedly we are to use to create an account, but when I finish putting my name etc in and hit create account nothing happens. I’d like to be posting as we are cruising. Using an iPad. Anywhere else I can try creating a profile?

[Nicholson58]

Zulu has just improved their product. Available off line and a lot of metadata. When it firs started we were cooling off for hurricane season so I had time to add a few hundred entries to the eastern Caribbean.

Following the Garmen take over I was never able to get back in. I followed all instructions for recovering my password but no joy.

[Sailingveterinarian]

When I am traveling, and whenever I will be able to travel again, I still refer to ActiveCaptain and routinely update posts. It has been very helpful for years. Hate to see it go.

[svfinlandia]

Originally Posted by CarlF

I still think AC is by far the best resource available. As with any crowd sourced data, you have to make your own judgements about the reliability of a review. But that's been true since the beginning.

I particularly don't think old dated posts indicate an AC problem -- in most cases nothing has changed to require a new post.

My first AC post was in 2010 about the sandbar on the southern tip of Bassetts Island in Buzzards Bay. I grew up around here and know for a fact that bar has been there for 55 years - and boats have been grounding on the same spot every summer weekend. In 1968 before SeaTow as a 12 year old I would make $5 pulling them off with my 13ft whaler and Evinrude 18hp engine.

If Garmin wanted to improve AC, they would bring back Jeff's hats.

I make new posts but many fewer than in the first few years because there's almost always good posts already in place.

But two good examples the the AC community is still active are the dozen or so posts in 2018-2020 about the moved ICW channel just south of the St. John's River. A little farther south in St. Augustine the Marker 8 marina opened in 2018 and received 8 detailed reviews over the next two years.

Or my most recent post last August for Birch Point anchorage in Isle Au Haut Maine. Because of Covid we haven't been cruising in 2020 to add any new ones.

When reading an AC review I always look at the date. If there's a newer review that disagree's with the older, I'll assume the newer is the more correct. But if there are no newer reviews, I assume it's still accurate - or at least more accurate than no review at all (except for things such as missing buoys which I assume are replaced).

But I do encourage everyone to keep contributing even if it's only a handful of reviews per year. This will keep us all comfortable that the 10 years of AC information is useful (or as useful as crowd sourced data can be)

CARLF - I agree with all of the above. Bringing back the ActiveCaptain hat program might help some, but I think that so many people got so soured on ActiveCaptain when Jeff sold it to Garmin that they just quit using it. I was one of them. Garmin had it so screwed up that it was almost impossible to log into and use for a while.
It looks like they have finally sorted out all the bugs and it is now easy to use again, and even though I have no love for Garmin I am starting to use it again and would encourage everyone to use it.

Al, S/V Finlandia

[Staylorc5]

I did an update in Navionics the other day, is that the same as AC?

[SuW]

Originally Posted by CaptTom

...

So, go through your logs and photos and pick a few places you've been this year which you can update. I'll do the same, and even try to do some real-time updates whenever I find a decent data connection.

This really is a case of "use it or lose it."

Post back here with a summary of how many updates you've made. High score wins something. Not sure what yet. I'd offer the ActiveCaptain hat I earned back when Jeff started it, but he neglected to ever send it to me.

Well as you and I've discussed in the recent past, I've been making updates to ActiveCaptain and ZuluWaterways but only in the 1000 Islands area of the St. Lawrence. Local knowledge etc. etc. I can only add what I know.

I've tried to add in tips about transiting the Seaway Locks, but on AC my markers on the locks' small craft docks got nuked, for some reason. I had to add words about their locations to the single descriptor of the overall lock (located in he middle of the lock chamber). Not ideal.

I haven't been anywhere else this year, what with one thing and another.

[happydog]

Agree with SailorBoy, we "actively" add comments all the time and update AC, and still find very recent, current posts on marinas and other cruising conditions, such as bridges on the ICW. We support continuing the platform

[Jeff Foulk]

One of the forum members alerted me to the post regarding AC and mention of Argo. One thread back in early June and this one. I released Argo in September on both the App and Play Stores so it is fairly new. I'm a local boater from Havre de Grace Maryland and the app was something I had been thinking and talking about developing for years but I finally decided to jump in about year and a half ago. The plan was to test it out on the Chesapeake Bay and see where it goes from there, but it has starting to get some recognition nationally. I am open to ideas and looking for feedback from the boating community.

I just joined the cruisers forum. Not sure why I did not join earlier, I have been a member of AGLCA for years. I don't disagree with a lot of the comments on the thread ... both on Argo as well as the other options out there. I really want to do what is best for the community. We are still small but hoping to offer the same sort of info as AC, plus more features. A web platform is certainly easy to add too. Making user input open-source is also possible.

We are now nearing 10,000 downloads and we have only really been marketing here in the Chesapeake Bay region. The app still has a ways to go (it's far from done), but I think even in its early stages has some really useful features. I know there needs to be a level of trust, particularly what happened with AC, but the key is to hear from boaters like yourself so we can tailor it to suit what boaters want.

Happy to answer any questions you might have about me or Argo.

Jeff Foulk
Argo Founder
jeff@argonav.io

[torrmundi]

Originally Posted by sailorboy1

Well that's funny as I bet I alone have made way more than 20 since 2018 for up/down the east coats, west coast of Florida and over to Gulfport MS. I probably did 6 or so just this year in the Bahamas.

But I don't think you can add them via AquaMap anymore. You have to go online to the AC/Garmin site and do it. When was last time you updated your AquaMap.

You can add markers, but it’s extremely convoluted (almost useless). You should complain to Garmin, since they broke it. Here are the steps:

I selected an existing marker (that's a stupid approach, right at the start, since you are trying to make a NEW marker), then the More hamburger icon, then Edit.

That opens a blank browser page within the app, that eventually leads the AC Community page from the web. Scroll down the page to find the VIEW MAP hyperlink enclosed in a rectangle. This leads to the online map (completely different appearance than the app's native map theme). This map has the ">" tab at upper left side, which pulls out and contains the Add Marker hyperlink.

[torrmundi]

Originally Posted by hpeer

Maybe the updates don’t appear on AquaMap?

Make sure you have Active Captain updates turned ON:
Settings>Active Captain>Settings>Data Download = Enabled
You can force an update of the AC data:
Settings>Active Captain>Settings>Update Now