Best Time(s) of Year to Sail to Caribbean?

[SailingChance]

Hey all, we are sailing from NY to the Bahamas en route to Colombia. Our plan at present to leave Thanksgiving day. The thinking is we'll miss the last of the huricanes and slip out before the Nor'Easters.

We plan to do a straight shot down to Carolinas, recharge our proverbial batteries and then take our time down to the Bahamas. (anchoring at night, etc.)

Interested to hear your thoughts/advice on our timing plan.

Thanks!

[svpattyd]

Thanksgiving may be too cold.

[skipmac]

Problem is that hurricanes and Nor'easters don't follow an exact schedule. There have been hurricanes just in the last few years as late as January in 2006 and Nor'easters can easily happen in Oct or even earlier. Remember the Perfect Storm? Happened the end of October.

All that being said, late fall is the best time for the trip, as long as you realize that there are still risks of bad weather.

I would try to leave a little earlier but November is probably OK, but like svpattyd said, might be a bit cold. Whenever you leave just be very sure to check the weather carefully, be prepared for heavy weather and I would personally stay close enough to the coast to take refuge just in case until I was further south.

[SailingChance]

Skipmac - thanks! We're expecting there to be some weather surprises that may alter our plans a bit. We just needed to pick a "date" to set our sights on. We're hoping that if we b-line it south for 5-6 days we'll get out of the real cold and into moderate temps. (5 days of hell for many months of heaven so to speak). Then again... an indian summer wouldnt hurt.

[Katiusha]

Times we sailed south we timed it to be around Beaufort,NC by beginning of November. This way the risk of Nor'easters and hurricanes is more or less balanced. This timing worked well for us:

From Bold Island to Cape May, wait 2-5 days for good weather at Cape May, then to Norfolk, wait for good weather there (or go through ICW) for 2-7 days then to Beaufort.

So don't forget to add weather waiting into your scheduling.

[chuckr]

sailing chance -- so how are you going to get the wx on your way down? the run from bahamas to colombia can be a great run in the proper wx - a lot of boats did it last year but one made a boo boo and ran when the wx was a bit ugly and rolled his boat - he made it to cartagena by the way

just our thoughts
chuck patty and svsoulmates
in trinidad for hurricane season

[skipmac]

Originally Posted by Katiusha

Times we sailed south we timed it to be around Beaufort,NC by beginning of November. This way the risk of Nor'easters and hurricanes is more or less balanced. This timing worked well for us:

I think this is a great way to phrase it, balance the risk. Too many boaters seem to think that proper timing eliminates the risk.

[belizesailor]

This past year we did not leave the Western Carib until April, because the cold fronts were still fairly frequent into March.