Seven Seas Sailing Association

[Tom and Maje]

Is a Seven Seas Sailing Association membership worth the price? Does anyone have any experience with them?

Maje

[rebel heart]

I was a member, not anymore. Everything I wanted I can get for free from noonsite.com, I was the youngest member by about thirty years, and there were a lot of deep pockets going on over there.

Other people love it, I'm sure they have different experiences, and I wish them the best. Certainly not a bad organization if it matches up with your style and goals.

[Hannah on 'Rita T']

I think its worth it. I like reading the bulletin, the gams are often fun, and it's not very expensive. Go for it.

[estarzinger]

we are long time members. I consider the equipment survey to be worth the membership price by itself. It's not perfect but it's about the only unbiased source of reliability data on marine gear available.

Before the internet, the SSCA bulletin was a source of pure gold - current information about destinations from real cruisers. The Internet like noonsite has provided an alternate source for some of that information (mostly the big picture, major harbour, customs and immigration, etc), but there are still few other places you can learn where the best laundry in St Johns is, or really detailed practical cruiser information.

You can definitely cruise without the SSCA and it's not on the 'must have' list, but it's pretty inexpensive and we feel they deliver way more value than it costs.

[osirissail]

As a 20 year member of SSCA I will be dropping them as soon as my subscription runs out. As estarzinger said, pre-internet they were the best source for USA cruiser/sailors and wannabe's to get solid information and inspiration to go cruising.
- - For anybody interested in finding out more about cruising the GAM's in Annapolis and Florida are top notch opportunities to get some real great information and meet long term former cruisers. They are well worth the effort to attend. Not to mention some vendors give significant discounts of stuff they sell there.
- - The bulletin has significantly degenerated over the last decade and I don't read it anymore as it contains very little information compared to what it did more than a decade ago. You can get more and better information by surfing the hundreds of cruiser Blogs and the various forum webpages.

[capt_douglas]

I'm a long time member (joined in '91) and have considered it a good investment. The Commodores Bulletin is as current as possible, the info real world, and the association well worth the yearly fee. I've taken their online seminars, gone to their GAMs and monthly pot lucks, and learned a great deal.

I've collected the bulletins in PDF format since '94 and the issues and index have proven invaluable. The association has other publications (as Evans has suggested) that contribute to the added benefit.

[ElizabethAnn]

Hello sailors, We are currently on Tenerife Island, then onto Cape Verde, and finallt the Atlantic crossing. I'm from Miami and would like to go for Christmas, except what do we do with our boat? Does anyone know of any nice marinas, secure, but not too expensive? We"d like to be able to leave it for a week.
Are there any other families on the Canaries and heading onto Cape Verde?
thanks for any ideas.


Elizabethann, San Miguel

[JusDreaming]

I am also a long time member and find it well worth the annual fees. They are also a major player for input to the state of fl. for new anchoring laws and boater's rights

[TheCruisinKitty]

I just wrote a post comparing a few of the bigger cruising associations.

They all seem to have amassed and made very accessible amazing amounts of cruising information.

I've talked to members at the Cruising Association (UK) who say you can cover the cost of membership just on the discounts you get at marinas etc if you are cruising in the Med and a CA member. Perhaps the Seven Seas Cruising Association is similar?

Here it is: The Cruising Kitty: Cruising Associations Compared

[Amapola]

We are members for a few years but probably won't renew. We get more information on the type of cruising we do from this site and MTOA.

[AnchorageGuy]

We were also long time members and finally cancel our membership. The organization seems to have lost touch with the membership. They appear to have become non responsive to request and suggestions and needed improvements.The Bulletin, which was once a big plus, has gotten outdated, the information was old, and the delivery process antiquated. The process for becoming a "Commodore" probably needs some examination and the Commodores you approve need some scrutiny. We have been in anchorages where the red burgee was flying on a boat and we were flying our blue one, this is also a bit outdated and seems class aligned, and we could never even get a wave let alone a hello or any kind of acknowledgment. We felt as if we might not be good enough for a "Commodore" to interact with a mere member and this happen to us on several occasions. Encounters with others that fly the SSCA burgee were also not what it used to be when we first joined many years ago. Perhaps in the mad dash to build the membership, inclusion and camaraderie became less of a requirement. The organization seems, in my opinion to have lost its way and can't seem to decide what it wants to be. Again, these are just my opinion and I am sure others will disagree. These are not the only reasons but some of my thoughts since you ask. It just did not seem worth the price of admission. Most if not all of what SSCA offers in the way of information can be found on line in many places for free. Chuck

[Sonosailor]

We were members for 6 years or so, and the bulletins provided a lot of great information for our early years of cruising (maybe I'm still in my early years of cruising). However, after a while, we found the bulletin/newsletter piling up without being read, so we had to give it up. The other significant thing about the org is the way you go up the ranks with your cruising. However, if you don't live on the boat year round, it doesn't count; and you remain a junior member. Not that it means much, but kind of disheartening when you may travel 3000 knotical miles each season.

Still, join, stick with it for a while, read the stuff, and see if it fits.

[osirissail]

I would heartily agree with "Waterwayguy" (post #11) as that has been my experience since joining in 1990. I also have friends "on the inside" who witnessed the deterioration of SSCA over the recent years and have left. So I also left. There has always been a, sort of, caste system in the organization between Commodores (insiders) and Associates (the riff-raft) but in recent years it has gotten out of hand in my opinion. But that is a situation that persists in almost every association/group - heck, even here in CF there are the "green boxer's" and the "rest."

- - But still for a "newbie" or anybody interested in finding out what cruising is all about - SSCA is a great initial source of information and their GAMS (get togethers) are really great places to interact and get a first hand idea of what the life style is all about.

- - After a dozen or so years actually cruising "out there" the value of being a member diminishes below the cost and getting the same or better information for specific areas of interest is easier in the world of the internet and cruising websites/blogs/forums.

[svHyLyte]

Only being able to "Cruise" incrementally, we gave up our membership in SSCA several years ago tho' I regretted it. I do find the SSCA Forum quite valuable however as, by and large, the participants are generally older, more experienced cruisers such that the BS Coefficient is quite low.

FWIW...

[Bat]

I was about to get a membership but I'm not fond of having religion shoved down my throat, or feeling unwelcome because I am not of the religious mindset at local meetings.

Sailing information would be so cool if the prayer and crap didn't go with it.