All you big boat drivers out there........

[clearwtr]

Two years ago. V. Large Cruiser. Fort Myers to Wisconsin. Fuel cost $14,000. Have fun!
Route from Wisc through great lakes to ICW. In Fl to lake Okochobee to river to the gulf.

 

[dsgobie]

Well I would be willing to just swab decks for free just to be on the trip.

So is there any real Captins out there with some real insight on what it might take?

ds

 

[Don Burke]

dsgobie once bubbled... Well I would be willing to just swab decks for free just to be on the trip.

So is there any real Captins out there with some real insight on what it might take?

ds

I'm a real captain. Take for what? You need time and money.

2500 miles at 50 miles a day would be 50 days. 2500 miles at 25 miles a day would be 100 days. Most wouldn't make 100 miles a day, although a boat delivery run could beat that.

It is likely the only people you'll find making that run are retirees and boat delivery captains. The railroads could beat the heck out of any barge runners trying to make a living that way.

For a trip that long, it would be worth looking at buying a used boat and selling it after the trip.

 

[Green Mountain]

IslandHopper once bubbled...
I'd have to look it up ... but i believe there is a way to get from the great lakes to the OhioRiver .... from there to the Mississippi... spend some time in New Orleans ... then either across the gulf or around the FL WCoast to the Keys ...

Be sure to make it out to Dry Tortugas .... really a great place.

I can never remember the name of the fort on the Dry "Turtles". Can you think of what it is?

 

[CAPT HOOK]

We (iiii & me) did this trip in 2001 on our Morgan 34. We started out in Michigan and spent the summer traveling the upper Great Lakes & the Canadian North Channel.
Arrived in Erie, Pa. the 22nd of August. The trip from there to West Palm Beach, Fl. took us until November 21. We did not push at all but took our own sweet time and stopped all along the way. Carried 2 folding bikes & a tent so we could visit some places a ways from the marinas and waterfront towns.
Well, that's the short version of what ended up as a years sailing adventure.

 

[seakdivers]

Well, here are some bits o' trivia for you....

My family owns a shipping company that goes between Seattle,WA and different ports in Alaska. A 90-125 foot tugboat pulling a fully loaded 300-400 foot barge can make it between Seattle, and Sitka, Alaska in roughly 4 days. They make approximately 8-12 knots depending on the weather, and the voyage between the two ports is approximately 1200 nm.

We brought our boat, the Corlimaness, from Seattle to Sitka as well - and since we were a mere 50 feet compared to 100, we couldn't take the weather quite as well (our antennas snapped off as we came down from being *airborne* during some nasty weather). However, our twin turbo Caterpillar diesels propelled us forward just fine, and even with our sightseeing pitstops, we made the same 1200 nm journey in about 5 days.

Now if we had nice smooth tropical waters......who knows!

 

[Seadiver5]

Well thats ambitious

good luck

Kevin

 

[SubMariner]

I can never remember the name of the fort on the Dry "Turtles". Can you think of what it is?

That would be Ft. Jefferson, if memory serves.

 

[Tractor Tom]

...while in a marina in Presque Isle in northern, Michigan. I was in my 26' amateur built, wooden sailboat, on the fourth day of a trip up the lake and back. He had just finished dumping 1500 gallons of diesel fuel in the biggest Chriscraft power boat I had ever seen (about 65' or so) and told me that he and the skipper made the trip from southern Florida to Lake Superior in Wisconsin and back every year. Took six weeks to two months to make the trip each time, depending on the weather. They had done it six years in a row, as the skipper (owner) was retired from a job where he had made a ton of money (they spent more on fuel at one stop, than I had paid for my whole boat!)

Was an interesting, unassuming fellow, who wanted to talk about my boat because it was different than all the other boats at that little marina.

Sounds to me like it would be a great adventure!