To all our Bareboat Chartering Friends

[robert sailor]

Where ever an incident arrives where the individual completely screws up but yet holds everyone else accountable the country USA seems to rise to the top.

[BandB]

Originally Posted by robert sailor

Where ever an incident arrives where the individual completely screws up but yet holds everyone else accountable the country USA seems to rise to the top.

I don't think by any means we have that market cornered. We may have more extensive news coverage. Unfortunately, human nature to see the missteps of others better than our own. In business it's always things like the competition or my absolutely favorite is to hear it all blamed on "the weather."

[DoubleWhisky]

I think it is no way country related
It is just about how nice to have somebody for sharing the blame with

[Cavalier]

Originally Posted by BandB

Actually some of the flotilla charters in the PNW (to Alaska) are to very experienced boaters who happen to live in other parts of the country. A couple of the companies I'm aware of are very careful regarding experience and if they find it lacking will require a captain. I'm sure in other areas this may not be true at all..

So, next month we're driving to St.Petersburg to rent a bareboat for a week. We have a 10day opportunity and (with a 3y/o and 1y/o) we really don't want to spend 9 of those 10 days sailing our own boat back and forth from Texas to W.Coast Florida. Especially as the section between Galveston and NOLA is so unthrilling :/

We'd rather spend those 10days exploring Florida's anchorages rather than a tiring passage where the off-watch person has to also be a baby-sitter - so chartering it is!



If we had more time, things would be different, but at this moment in time we didn't so it was either Florida BB Charter or Galveston/Matagorda (again).



Chartering was also a very common occurrence when we lived in Norway. Many of the sailors we knew there were also experienced boat owners, yet would bb charter in the med during longer holidays. Getting your boat from Norway down to the med and back is just not doable in the couple of weeks which many folk have.



You'd never be at one with the boat as you simply didn't have enough time with it - that didn't mean to say that you couldn't sail with prudence and a small modicum of good seamanship!



I would say, however, that some of the most awful damage I've seen and hair-raising maneuvers have been at the hands of other charterers in the med. Not a holiday would go by without us baring witness to some bizarre incident or other...

We'd have to proffer up a complete sailor's CV, ICC and SRC just to qualify - I always wondered what the 'transgressors of seamanship' presented!?

[Cavalier]

Originally Posted by robert sailor

Where ever an incident arrives where the individual completely screws up but yet holds everyone else accountable the country USA seems to rise to the top.

SAFETY NOTICE: This boat is known to the State of California to cause damage during a collision.

[nautical62]

I've owned 3 cruising cruising boats not in charter, I've owned a boat in charter, I've traded time on other charter managed boats and I've chartered.

So it's been very interesting for me to see those discussions. While a new boat is always less familiar, my overall sailing knowledge doesn't change just because the boat I'm on has a Moorings emblem on it.

Certainly, some who charter have little experience, and on top of that are rusty from not having sailed since their last charter a year ago. They stick out and and are the basis on which anyone in a charter boat is judged. Such stereotyping is not unique to chartering.

[BandB]

Originally Posted by Cavalier

SAFETY NOTICE: This boat is known to the State of California to cause damage during a collision.

Even worse is letting others use your boat. A guy on the lake was traveling for a month so his business partner agreed to watch his place. He also told the friend it was fine to take the boat out occasionally and run it. Partner had two teenage daughters, let them take it out. Teenage daughters met boys while out. One of them drove it up on a few rocks. Now the boy tried to say it was the girls' fault for letting them drive. The girls said it was their dad's fault for letting them take it out. The father told the owner that he'd given him permission. And the owner's wife told him he was an idiot.

Partnership disbanded four months later.

[Cavalier]

Originally Posted by BandB

the owner's wife told him he was an idiot..

In a world of chaos, it's good to know that there are some Universal constants!

[CHM]

My friend has a 100 ton Coast Guard certification and works in St Thomas. He is very critical if bareboat charters due to safety issues and overall negligence. Liquor is often involved. He sees quite a bit if damage to both the boats and the reef. Of course, it's crucial to their economy so he has to be tolerant.

[BandB]

Originally Posted by CHM

My friend has a 100 ton Coast Guard certification and works in St Thomas. He is very critical if bareboat charters due to safety issues and overall negligence. Liquor is often involved. He sees quite a bit if damage to both the boats and the reef. Of course, it's crucial to their economy so he has to be tolerant.

There are two very distinct groups of charterers. One is experienced, knowledgeable, diligent operators who just prefer chartering to owning, either because they like to try different areas or they just don't have the available time to justify owning.

The other group is what I'd call the "party group." These are the same types who rent ski boats or pontoons on a lake for the day. With this group it seems liquor is involved more than just often, almost always. They aren't boaters or sailors but partiers who want to do it on a boat. They lack experience, lack knowledge, lack diligence, and often are too intoxicated to know what they're doing. But they pay so, therefore, they're rented to. Some only once.

The party group should have a professional captain or entire crew. But that costs. Motor yachts over 60 or 70' that are chartered get excellent care and are operated well because almost always they are required to have a professional captain. Ski boats get abused. Sail boats under a certain size get abused. Oddly enough trawlers chartered get excellent care as it's generally older more mature people. The charter companies should require more than they do or their insurers should. Either experience and knowledge or hire someone who has it. At least a brief lesson or test. Anything.

But it's not likely to happen and so we will have the "party group" of charterers. Unfortunately, this reflects on the others who have knowledge and experience and handle the boats well.

As a boat owner I would never charter my boat barefoot if I was going to charter.

[Jammer Six]

Last year I took my favorite boat out quite a bit more than the owner did.

We are constantly alert for owners whose sole claim to our seat at the helm is enough money for a down payment on a boat. Many of them don't know anything about sailing, the water or the weather.

You can hear them every nice weekend on the VHF.

[Ex-Calif]

I own a boat and I charter.

I charter to sail in places I haven't been and on boats I haven't sailed but am interested in.

- Distance - I always overestimate how "far" we will roam in a 3 or 5 day charter. No big deal. Float plans can adapt.
- I have always had a checkout the first time at a place (probably insurance driven) even though I have sent my sailing resume (with pictures of me skippering) in advance. Checkouts have always been 1 1/2 or so and include undocking, 3 types of u-turns (3-point, u turn and prop walk pirouette), hoisting tacking and gybing, reefing and docking. Sometimes they ask about crossing and passing situation, "Is that guy on port or starboard, who has "right of way" etc. Plus a check out on systems including gas bottles.
- I try to stay away from "tight" situations. The crew is often inexperienced, the line layout unfamiliar, boat performance unfamiliar, rigging unknown (don't push it to the limit)
- waters are unknown - local knowledge of tides, submerged hazards and wind behaviors (due to shore terrain) is not known.

Now if you sail your waters you probably know the charter boats and can spot me. I don't know who is chartering and who is not.

I just presume everyone is a threat, local sailors can be idiots too, and stay out of people's way.

My last charter was in SFO. On our return to Sausolito we were beating out channel between angel island and the mainland. The "fleet" (from berkely?) was having a race and we beat in against 30 boats under spinnaker heading up channel towards Berkeley.

I can tell you there was a lot of variation in experience in that fleet. I started the engine and left it in idle.

This was a precaution against someone doing something stupid and me needing to take evasive action.

Don't always presume the charter skipper is the idiot.

[jonarck]

I agree with BandB, and we're planning to buy a new Lipari or Leopard 39 and put her into a captained charter service only (bad experiences with a boat in bareboat charter).

It's too bad that the Jones Act prohibits me from captaining my own boat (50 Ton Master with Sailing Endorsement (foreign-built boats must be 3+ years old to qualify for a waiver).

If only there was an affordable American-built cat that we could consider (not Gemini or Alpha).

[Pelagic]

If you could compare the average amount of booze consumed by a BVI Charterer in one week to what the average cruiser consumes...... It will tell you a lot!

[Blue Skye]

Originally Posted by Pelagic

If you could compare the average amount of booze consumed by a BVI Charterer in one week to what the average cruiser consumes...... It will tell you a lot!

Hey, I resemble that remark, errrr resent that remark