Great Loop

V

voyager638

New member
Have plans for cruising in 2016? The "Last Hoorah" will be leaving St. Marks, Florida on the first mostly calm couple days at the last of January to do the "
Great Loop". The plan is to make the 5,500 to 6,000 mile cruise in seven months. Hope to hear from anyone who might want to flotilla along for a part or all of the journey. A major leg of the trip is the Erie Canal. I have planned the trip to begin the canal in mid-May and cruise along its length for two weeks.
 
Voyager,

What do you expect to be your average cruising speed, and number of hours averaged per day?

Harvey
SleepyC :moon

HH_Cal_09_07_Jul.thumb.jpg
 
We spent 2 years doing the East Coast with Our Journey, a sailboat. The trip went fron Mobile, Alabama to Waukigean, Il. Judy wrote about it: Great Loop Trip. And, we didn't do the river part (down the Miss, up the Ohio, etc.)

So the message is: the longer you take, the more you see. If one isn't from the East Coast, you are going to learn a lot, and speed isn't going to help that.

Boris
 
A great cruise awaits you. As others have said, take your time. Leave at a marina on the hard for winter, if it gets cold, and come back the following year to finish the cruise of a lifetime. Bon voyage. El and Bill
 
I am hardly never in a hurry any more. I plan to cruise at around 9-10mph for a great deal of the trip. That might be too slow for some; but stretches the fuel considerably. Most days have been planned to be between 5-8 hrs. That gives plenty of time to get coffee in the morning, cruise and mess around in the afternoon before dark. Dark down here is around 5:30 this time of the year. Further up north it is about an hour earlier. There will be some days when I will stay put to do the tourist thing. A highlight of the trip will be the Erie Canal. If you do only 25 miles per day, it takes about 2 weeks to make it to the Niagra River.

I figure that I will take about a month to make my way from St. Marks, my home port, to Jacksonville, Florida. The first 300 miles is open Gulf of Mexico. The remainder in Florida is in protected waters. Due to no wake and manatee zones in the intracoastal, I understand that I might be lucky to make even the 9-19 mph. One suggestion has been to just get about 1/4 mile behind a big cruiser and enjoy the trip.
 
As regards the length of time for the trip, I would love to take a year doing it. However, my daughter is getting married in October and if I am not here for that event, I am in deep manure. Hence seven months and I get to start planning my next trip.
 
voyager638":x90chtop said:
I am hardly never in a hurry any more. I plan to cruise at around 9-10mph for a great deal of the trip. That might be too slow for some; but stretches the fuel considerably.
Click to expand...

I don't know about the 25, but I think my 22 would not be in "fuel stretching" mode at that speed. If I remember correctly the best fuel usage is either at hull speed (5 knots or less) or at a higher speed (can't remember exact figures right now, but more like 14+ knots I'd think). Speaking in terms of "MPG" here, not time on the water or etc.

Maybe other 25 folks can comment with better specifics (or maybe you already know for a fact your boat is most efficient at 9-10 knots).
 
I have a Yamaha 150 4 stroke and have paid close attention to fuel consumption. Everyone has a little different experience. At 2,000 rpm, the motor consumes approximately 1.9-2 gal./hr. and I am getting approx. 9mph. Tide and wind make a difference, but I feel that I can get at least 400 mi. per tank, maybe a bit more. This boat has a 100 gal. tank. Last weekend I was feeling a little need for speed. At 3800 rpm, the motor consumes approx. 6.8 gal/hr. and pushes 21-22 mph. This is approximately 3 mpg. I might be wrong and a bit biased, but think this is not a shoddy performance.
 
As a further thought, I, too, can get better than 5mpg if I throttle down to 1500 rpm. At 1200 rpm I am doing about about 6 mph at about 1-1.2 gph. Again, it is slower going if working against a tide or strong wind.
 
I don't know about a 25, but I would say that at 9-19 mph you are going to be trowing a pretty good sized wake. My 22 at 9 is about the largest wake I can make. The space between 7-9 has to be the largest, and therefore the least fuel efficient.

On the time frame, park the boat for the wedding then go back and finish the loop.

Harvey
SleepyC :moon

JC_Lately_SleepyC_Flat_Blue_070.thumb.jpg
 
Sleepy C: Parking and coming back to finish the loop sounds great. I have other considerations, however. The height of the hurricane season in these parts is from August through mid-November. I need to be available in case a storm comes this way. Luckily, we are in a part of the state where most of the storms move either west of us or south and east of us.

I note that you are in Washington. I was born and lived a good bit of my early life in Morton on the SW slopes of Mt. R.
 
Nine mph is 7.8 knots, which is not terrible but not nearly as economical as 6 knots, which 6.9 mph. We have become 6 knot cruisers, and would probably want to do the Great Loop about that speed!
 
Yes, you may get near 400 miles (maybe including reserve-- 10% is the bare minimum. Also you may not have 100 gallons usable in the tank--often there is another 5 to 10% loss there. ) The Boat Test.com (which most feel) is extremely optimistic, because the boats are extremely light, partial fuel, no gear, minimal water). With 150 hp Honda on the test boat (The Yamaha would be very close, within a few %.)

At 2500 RPM 8.8 mph 7.7 knots 1.9 gal/hour 4.6 Miles per gal 4.0 nautical m/g 446 statute miles range 388 nautical miles range.

At 1500 RPM 5.9 mph 5.1 knots 0.9 gal/hour 6.6 miles per gallon and 631 statute miles range. Once you get less than a gallon an hour any of the flow meters become inaccurate. The only way to get really accurate use rate is to use measured fuel, rather than a flow transducer.

As you go on a cruise--especially one such as the "great loop", the conditions are going to be anything but ideal. Most likely the boat will have more than minimal gear. Even boat wakes will decrease your mileage, there are currents, head winds, seas, etc.

I have done over half of the Loop--and at a very slow pace. One who really absorbs the trip, gains an in depth view into "Americana"--far from being a tourist. It is the people, the customs, the small diner, the 4th of July Parade in a small town in the Carolinas. Since the Loop is most likely a once in the lifetime event--make the most of it. It is more than a bucket list item. There are many safe places to leave the boat and then you can resume the trip.

I live on the Water in Pensacola, and hurricanes can come as early as June, although they are most likely in Sept. We don't hesitate to be gone, with the knowledge that from almost anywhere in the US we can get back to our home, or have some put up the hurricane shutters.

In any case, enjoy the trip--The C Dory 25 is a great boat for the trip!
 
Bob, this is on my "bucket list." Patty is not so sure, it is the grandkids you know! I tell her we can leave the boat and fly home, she just is not convinced! But you are so right, it is every stop that is to be savored, not the miles you make!
 
I don't have grandkids, and of course everyone is different - but when I had grandparents I always really enjoyed seeing the one who did lots of traveling and had adventures. She'd send me postcards and bring me surprises and always seemed so full of life and eager to see (and then tell me about) new things.

Not that I didn't also love and appreciate the "nearby" grandparents - they were wonderful too. But there was something very nifty about the "out doing things" grandmother. I guess I could sense her zest for things.
 
I've been doing the Loop for 3 years now. My first three summers have been at 6 kts in a diesel trawler getting 11 smpg. Now, I'm resuming my cruise in Hilton Head on the new to me 23 Venture.
I'll start up in May and take my time up the East coast, averaging 4-5 smpg.

I cruise in the summer and fly home between legs, and have the boat hauled and shrink wrapped or rack stored in the winter.
Trip of a lifetime, plan to take another 2-3 years to finish it.
Still working, two kids in high school. Memories they'll never forget!
Enjoy!
 
Hi Voyager638.

We've found that boating for more than a month is quite different than shorter trips. When we do a two or three week cruise we have several “targets” = places to visit, things to do, and we focus on meeting them. Rest and relaxation may be on that list but are secondary goals. We've now completed three -three month long trips while living on the boat in the water and on the trailer. To live on the boat that long you need a different perspective than on shorter “camping” style trips.

When we go a month or longer we find that maintaining a good attitude, being flexible and not set in a schedule to be important. On longer trips you must expect things to go wrong. One of the ways to measure the success of the trip is how you handled those unexpected barriers. On our last trip of 3 months we each got sick a week apart. Just colds, but the weather was lousy, raining & cold in the fall. We holed up 3 days for one, and a week later for four days for the other. The non-sickie went for lots of long walks. We had 6 weeks of battery problems before we figured it out. That created a lot of stress which needed to be ignored because we had other things happening all around us. One time we were scheduled to meet another C-Brat at a town marina, to spend the night there and have dinner at their home. Just as we arrived at the lock above their town it was filled by a commercial tow. The tow had problems and it took more than 4 hours to clear the lock while we wandered in circles waiting. With all of that, had we been on a schedule things would have been grim We chilled out in several places for a day or two and those are our best memories.

We find that our longer trips are a journey, not a trip to be checked off a bucket list. The whole psychology of managing your selves and your crew is much different that on a shorter trip. When you get home and its all over you will remember the little things. People you met, a kindness offered by strangers, the unexpected things that make great stories back home. Things that happen because you were not in a rush and not some Captain who has to make things happen just so. We've also found that when you get away from home things are done differently that what we are used to dealing with at home. It takes lots of mental adjustments, and those adjustments can be exhausting.

I'd suggest you spend lots of time on the Eire Canal, the Trent-Severn Canal and on Georgian Bay and plan to be on the Illinois River by late September, park the boat, go home and enjoy the wedding. Return in late October and complete the loop. Due to hurricane insurance restrictions, many larger boats will hole up on the Tennessee and Cumberland Rivers waiting until November 1 or 15 (depending on the carrier) before they head down the Tom-Bigby. We traversed the “Grand Canyon of the Tennessee (just below Chattanooga) in great fall colors one Halloween week which is one of our really good memories.

Chuck
 
Just wanted to add my two cents to all the comments about slowing down and taking time. This is great advice for someone that has the time. But there is nothing wrong with a quick trip to see something, if that's all the time you have. I have seen a lot in my short time on earth, and many times at somewhat of a fast pace. I appreciate the memories I have of every place I've been, and hope I can always return to somewhere in particular if I desire to see more. But to have even a limited view of somewhere, is better than no view at all! Below is a photo of a map I kept track of our Motorhome travels on in earlier years. Most these trips were anywhere from 1 week to 3 weeks long. (The one to Alaska was just over 9000 miles in 4 weeks. A lot of driving in a short time, but we still saw more on that one trip than most will see in a lifetime! Please don't deny yourself the opportunity to see something, even if for a short time, because others say you need much more time to see somewhere!)

SmithTravelsLate1990sEarly2000s.jpg
 
Excellent post by 2 Bears. As a boater of any time--you have to have plan A, plus Plan, B, C , D etc. Flexibility is key for an enjoyable trip.
es
It is clear that voyager638 has more than a few weeks. For only a few weeks in a C Dory, it is always best to focus on one area, rather than whizzing along. Much different than in an RV--where it is possible to make 700 miles in a day (if you are young). We have been showing my grandkids the "West"--we would position the RV at some place, flying the grandkids to where we were, and then do the traveling on the weeks they had, but taking enough time to savor where we visited. In any case, it is great to be able to visit all the places you dream about.
 
Back
Top