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    • SCDNR to conduct courtesy boat inspections during July Fourth Day weekend Saturday and Sunday

      It is always important to ensure you are up to date on the legally required safety equipment and your boat and motor registrations.  Consider taking advantage of SCDNR’s courtesy boat inspections during the July 4th weekend to ensure you are in compliance.   Also, see the embedded link below to South Carolina’s boating regulations.

       
      SCDNR color logo and South Carolina Department of Natural Resources in text on green background


      SCDNR to conduct courtesy boat inspections during July Fourth weekend Friday, Saturday and Sunday 

      CBI

      SCDNR officers want to do everything possible to make sure boaters have a fun yet safe July Fourth holiday. Courtesy boating inspections will be offered at public boat landings around the state on Friday, Saturday and Sunday mornings.

      In an effort to keep people and waterways safe during the Fourth of July weekend, the S.C. Department of Natural Resources (SCDNR) Law Enforcement Division will be conducting courtesy boat inspections at public boat landings around the state.

      The July Fourth weekend is one of the busiest boating times of the year for South Carolina lakes and waterways and officers want to do everything possible to keep everyone’s weekend fun and safe.

      SCDNR boating safety and enforcement officers will perform quick but thorough inspections for required safety equipment and proper boat and motor registrations. Those who are not in compliance with safety regulations or registration requirements will not be ticketed during the complimentary inspections. Instead, they will be given an opportunity to correct the problem before they launch their boat. SCDNR officers will also be available to answer questions and give boaters tips on how to stay safe on the water. The boating inspections will be conducted Friday, Saturday and Sunday, July 4-6.

      To report boating violations such as reckless operation or an intoxicated boat operator, call the SCDNR toll-free, 24-hour hotline at 1-800-922-5431 or dial #DNR on your cell phone.

      For a copy of South Carolina’s boating regulations, to find out about local boating safety courses, or to obtain a free float plan form, contact the SCDNR boating safety office at 1-800-277-4301 or visit http://www.dnr.sc.gov/education/boated.html.

      July Fourth weekend boat inspection locations (all inspections are from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m.):

      Friday, July 4:

      • Spartanburg County: Lake Bowen
      • Pickens County: Twin Lakes
      • Fairfield County: Molly Creek
      • Lexington County: Lake Murray Dam
      • Horry County: Bass Pro Shop
      • Charleston County: Wapoo Cut Landing, ICW
      • Beaufort County: Battery Creek Boat Landing

      Saturday, July 5:

      • Anderson County:  River Fork Landing, Lake Hartwell
      • Oconee County: South Cove, Lake Keowee
      • Kershaw County: Clearwater Cove, Lake Wateree
      • Clarendon County: Alex Harvin Landing, Lake Marion
      • Berkeley County: Hatchery Landing
      • Charleston County: Remley’s Point
      • Charleston County: Buck Hall

      Sunday, July 6:

      • McCormick County: Scott’s Ferry, Lake Thurmond
      • Greenwood County: Hwy. 72 Landing
      • Oconee County: Seneca Creek, Lake Hartwell
      • York County: Ebenezer Park
      • Lexington County: Lake Murray Dam
      • Beaufort County: Lemon Island Boat Ramp
      • Charleston County: Limehouse Landing
      • Georgetown County: Carroll Campbell Boat Ramp

      South Carolina Department of Natural Resources, 260 D Epting Ln, West Columbia, SC 29172

      Department Phone Numbers

       

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    • Fishermen’s Village July 4, Independence Day Celebration, Punta Gorda, FL


      Fisherman's Village Marina and Resort, Punta Gorda, FL

      There is always plenty to do around Charlotte Harbor. While berthed at Fishermen’s Village Marina, A CRUISERS NET SPONSOR, you are certain to enjoy visiting Western Florida’s beautiful Charlotte Harbor/Peace River.

      Fishermen’s Village Independence Day Holiday Celebration Announcement

       

      Kathy Burnam
      Special Events & Community Relations

      941.639.8721

      kburnam@fishermensvillage.com

      www.fishermensvillage.com

      Click Here To View the Western Florida Cruisers Net Marina Directory Listing For Fishermen’s Village

      Click Here To Open A Chart View Window Zoomed To the Location of Fishermen’s Village

       

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    • Entry Fees Distract as Bahamas Eyes the Prize, a Carbon-Credit Boondogle – Peter Swanson


      Cruisers Net publishes Loose Cannon articles with Captain Swanson’s permission in hopes that mariners with salt water in their veins will subscribe. $7 a month or $56 for the year, and you may cancel at any time.

         
       
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      When all else fails, try journalism.


      Like crypto currency, the carbon-exchange market is something oft mentioned but little understood, including by me. This story assumes the concept is not just a figment of our collective imagination.

        

      A seagrass meadow: Where the moorings aren’t.

      Stand by for Bahamas Moorings II. The sequel appears likely. The key to understanding the “insane” and ultimately unsuccessful first attempt to establish rental moorings in the Exumas appears to have been something as mundane as seagrass.

      Not the actual turtle food: Seagrass, the idea.

      The Bahamas are sitting on a “blue carbon” treasure trove whose jewels are seagrasses, salt marshes and mangroves. According to DBG, a player in the carbon-offset industry, the Bahamas has $50 billion-worth ready to sell.

      So what did the Bahamas government do?

      On January 23, it leased the seagrass component of said trove to a private company in exchange for a promise of three pennies for every future dollar earned from mooring rentals—an unknowable revenue-stream.

      Bahamian leaders certainly must have known end of free anchoring would have been unpopular in its target market, foreign cruisers. Would we be willing to pay? That question is back again as cruising community reacts to the outrage of the day—a quintupling of entry fees.

      Stench

      The odor of corruption around that $2.5 million deal was so strong, that the same government that had secretly approved the project soon ordered that it “cease and desist” and that all moorings be removed. That was on February 23, and…goshdarnit… The moorings are still in place. Free, at least temporarily.

      Creating a mooring monopoly “doesn’t even make sense,” Peter Maury told The Tribune newspaper of Nassau as it followed up after Loose Cannon broke the story back in February. Maury is president of the Association of Bahamas Marinas, whose members, like most Bahamians, were blindsided by the sudden appearance of barges installing helix anchors and floating balls. “Insane,” one of Maury’s colleagues quipped.

        

      The moorings are still in place. Waiting for new management?

      The lease assigning control of more than 4,000 acres of seabed to a single company granted Bahamas Moorings Ltd. the right to provide mooring services “in the Exuma and elsewhere in the country.” Would the Abacos and Eleuthera have been next?

      As it happens, the Bahamas are home to an astounding 40 percent of the world’s seagrass beds, which sequester huge amounts of carbon on the seafloor, according to scientists. The moorings appeared to have been cover to exercise control over a carbon offset to be sold to industries unable to reduce their carbon footprint on their own.


       Without Warning, Moorings Going In Throughout the Exumas 

      Mooring fields at popular Normans Cay.


      Boaters Blamed

      In response to Loose Cannon’s back-to-back articles on the moorings controversy (but before the project was canceled), the Bahamas government issued a news release, which said the quiet part out loud: “This initiative is also a key component of the Bahamas Blue Carbon Project, which aims to generate funding through carbon credit sales linked to the protection of seagrass beds and marine sediment—critical natural carbon sinks.”

      The same release blamed you, the cruising public, for damaging seagrass beds:

      For years, unregulated anchoring has significantly damaged coral reefs and seagrass beds—critical marine habitats supporting biodiversity and carbon sequestration. Recent research by Beneath the Waves, a leading marine science organisation, has documented a 20-30 percent decline in seagrass coverage in parts of the Exuma Cays over the past decade, underscoring the urgent need for action. Installing these moorings will help preserve marine ecosystems while enhancing navigational safety by reducing anchor-related destruction and minimising seabed disturbance.

      Final Version Statement From The Governm…
      126KB ∙ PDF file
      Download

      But experts contradicted the government, saying many, if not most of the planned mooring fields have sandy bottoms entirely without reefs or grasses. A prime example—where mooring installation was underway until the cease and desist order—is the anchorage at Big Major Cay, famous for good holding and swimming pigs.

      “The initial mooring balls in Normans Cay, Big Majors and Black Point are installed in some of the best holding clear sand in Exuma. There are bits of grass around, but nothing that even remotely resembles a nursery environment,” said Addison Chan, author of the Bahamas Land & Sea app and its corresponding Facebook group.

      “I haven’t studied every chart in detail, but my sense is the leases cover the best anchorages in the Bahamas, which tend to be areas that are currently free of grass. Take for example the areas around Compass Cay, an area that is difficult to anchor because of shallow water and grassy flats, the leased lands cover the viable areas of clear sand. In fact, the area that falls within Pipe Creek appears to be shaped by the clear sand area.”

      Loose Cannon interviewed a Bahamian naturalist who asked not to be named for fear of retribution. Familiar with the cays in question, this person confirmed that many of the anchorages are entirely sand. “Grass ain’t everywhere they claim, so they ain’t saving no seagrass,” the naturalist said, rebutting to the government’s defense of the project.

      As far as potential for moorings to aid in seagrass restoration, it would likely happen only in places where grass beds had been historically. “Just putting moorings in pure sand doesn’t generate growth of seagrass, if it wasn’t there before,” the person said.

        
        

      Sand not grass. This is a photo of the large central mooring area noted on the Big Major chart. The bottom is nearly all sand, as anyone who has visited the swimming pigs can attest.

      And what about the proposal that cruisers could choose to anchor as long as they were willing to pay 55 cents or $1.10 per foot, depending on LOA? Critics back in February said that if saving the seabeed were really the motivation, anchoring would be banned altogether. Today, the new fee structure monetizes the practice by charging cruisers who wish to avoid marinas a $300 anchoring fee.

      A bill of lading obtained by Loose Cannon described the Bahamas Moorings order for Chinese-made helical screw anchors as being accompanied by 38 and 25mm open-link chain. While moorings employ significantly less scope than anchoring, an all-rope mooring rode would be even less damaging than a rope-chain setup that this document suggests.

      A photo taken by a cruiser shows one new mooring attached not to a helical screw but a big conventional anchor and chain.

        

      Big anchor, not a helical screw. Oddly, this sketchy set-up was intended for bigger yachts.

      Greenwashing

      So, how did the question of seagrass fit in the moorings/blue carbon narrative? The government says moorings will protect seagrass. Experts say there tends not to be seagrass where moorings were actually placed.

      Maybe, what was being sold is just the belief that mooring fields will protect Bahamas seagrass. The term for this is greenwashing.

      Cohn, Cohn & Colapinto, a U.S. law firm that specializes in defending whistleblowers, notes that carbon-offset scams often share the following characteristics:

      • Overstated impact: some projects may exaggerate the amount of carbon they can offset, leading to misleading claims.
      • Lack of transparency: scammers may avoid providing clear information about their projects, making it difficult to verify their claims.
      • Weak verification processes: some projects may rely on inadequate verification processes, allowing for fraudulent activities to go undetected.
      • Greenwashing: the use of misleading marketing tactics a company uses to portray themselves as environmentally responsible, even if their carbon offset claims are unfounded.

      Will Cruisers Quit Coming?

      The Tribune reporter also quoted Eric Carey, the ex-Bahamas National Trust (BNT) executive director, who worried that having to pay for moorings and/or anchoring may create a tipping point in the cruising community. What he said might well apply to today’s entry-fee controversy:

      A very careful assessment needs to be done of the carrying capacity of what boaters are willing to pay before boaters abandon The Bahamas because of what they can’t afford. It can’t be a licence to print money and boaters say, we’ll abandon The Bahamas. I’ve spoken to people at Black Point, Staniel Cay who have restaurants. They say that if those boats abandon us because they’re forced out, they’ll be severely impacted.

      What Carey may have been too polite to say is that cruisers as a whole are a parsimonious lot. Groceries, liquor and fuel are already 30 percent higher in the Bahamas compared to the U.S. Dockage is very expensive, too. Recently, Bahamian officials have been enforcing immigration rules in capricious and arbitrary ways, stressing out many mom-and-pop cruisers.

      Free anchoring has been the spoonful of sugar that helped the medicine go down. Without it, the Bahamas marine industry fears the worst. Surely, the principals of Bahamas Moorings and their eco-affiliates had to have been aware that their overt business might have failed simply because cruisers wouldn’t participate.

      Maybe, that new $300 anchoring fee is intended as an incentive to use those leftover moorings once a new administrative structure is in place.

      The lead story in the May 1 Guardian newspaper described how the prime minister was “pushing ahead with its efforts to monetize blue carbon credits through a new agreement with a Chicago based company.” A government news release described how Carbon Management Limited (CML), a Bahamian-controlled public-private partnership, will turn seaweed into cash:

      Using Laconic’s innovative Sovereign Carbon Security, which does not require a sovereign guarantee, the program will see verified, additional and real carbon removals generated by the CML’s scientific management of up to 150,000 square kilometers of the nation’s seagrass ecosystems monetized over the next five years in full compliance with Article 6.2 of the Paris Agreement,

      The question is: How might this lucrative scheme be related to the new fee structure? The timing, of course, could be nothing more than coincidence. Come forward, Bahamas sources, and enlighten us. Tell us about those “real carbon removals.”

      Stand by for more reporting on the fees, moorings and other shennanigans happening in our favorite island nation. Maybe tomorrow. Maybe the next day.

      LOOSE CANNON covers hard news, technical issues and nautical history. Every so often he tries to be funny. Subscribe for free to support the work. If you’ve been reading for a while—and you like it—consider upgrading to paid.

       

       

       
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      411 Walnut St. No. 1944, Green Cove Springs, FL 32043
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    • I Grew Up by the ‘Jaws’ Location. Never Saw a Shark, But Now…Wow! – Peter Swanson

      Cruisers Net publishes Loose Cannon articles with Captain Swanson’s permission in hopes that mariners with salt water in their veins will subscribe. $7 a month or $56 for the year, and you may cancel at any time.

         
       
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      When all else fails, try journalism.


      I Grew Up by the ‘Jaws’ Location. Never Saw a Shark, But Now…Wow!

      ‘Shark, Shark, Shark! Get People Out of the Water!’

        

      The 50th anniversary of the movie Jaws is being widely commemorated because of the film’s cinematic, cultural and social influence. It is being marked by television specials and multiple events around where the movie was filmed, which is also where the fictional events were to have happened.

      I was 20 when “Jaws” came to the Buzzards Bay Theater in 1975. My hometown of Wareham was just around the corner from the island of Martha’s Vineyard where Jaws was filmed.¹ I had spent the past dozen years swimming in local waters and sailing our Cape Dory sailboats²—almost daily all summer long.

      Wareham has more miles of beachfront than any other town in Massachusetts—54 miles compared to about 125 for the entire island of Marthas Vineyard.

      I never, ever saw a single shark off any beach. Not a single shark while underway on Buzzards Bay or Cape Cod Bay. I never saw a shark when I sailed to “the Vineyard.” I never heard talk about anyone seeing one either.

      The closest thing were the dogfish we’d catch while fishing offshore for cod. When we were stupid enough not to throw them overboard, the darn things would give birth to live little sharks as they lay dying in the cockpit of a cabin cruiser. ³

      Point being: Jaws may have been a scary monster movie, but it was as remote as Godzilla from actual experience in our corner of New England. Sharks were not a thing back then, but the movie took a psychological toll nonetheless.

        
      Our connection to Hollywood.

      My uncle Jack Carlson had been an early adopter of SCUBA diving during the 1950s and 60s, when they were still developing the technology we use today. Uncle Jack was good at it. He got regular calls from police asking him to retrieve the corpses of folks who had fallen through pond ice and drowned.

      He also had a recreational license to dive for lobster in Massachusetts waters. At some point, he did a 90-foot free-dive at a drop-off near Provincetown after reading about Polynesian pearl divers doing so.

      Share

      Jack was as lean and fit as ever when I asked him how the diving was going. “I quit,” he said. “Ever since Jaws, I couldn’t enjoy it anymore.”

      A great white shark was swimming inside Jack’s brain—dun-dun, dun-dun—even though the animals themselves were absent. Galeophobia is the clinical term for a fear of sharks, and my uncle was exhibiting the symptoms.

      Origins

      The Jaws story, as written in the Peter Benchley novel, had its origins in a series of 1916 shark attacks in New Jersey and a real-life shark-murdering guy named Frank Mundus who fished out of Montauk on Long Island. Mundus is widely believed to have inspired the Quint character in the novel and movie.

        

      Four swimmers were killed and another critically hurt in the Jersey Shore attacks, though it is just as likely that a bull shark was responsible, not a great white.⁴

      Food Source

      Just 18 years before the New Jersey attacks, Massachusetts and Maine had begun encouraging the killing of seals, through a bounty system. Fishermen argued that seals were stealing their livelihood, which was true in a way. Lobstermen were even convinced that seals were opening their traps to eat the bait and catch.

      The solution was a shotgun loaded with deer slugs. At town hall, you could trade a sliced-off seal snout for ten bucks. (By comparison, crows’ feet only got you a nickle.)

      According to researchers, 135,000 harbor and grey seals had been killed under the bounty system by the end of the 1960s. Then, the federal Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972 outlawed seal killing altogether. The seals gradually repopulated.

      By the 1990s I was using a long lens and a tripod to try to get photos for my newspaper showing small seal colonies sunning themselves on rocks at the mouth of the Merrimack River.

        

      The mechanical great white in Jaws was all alone in 1975 because real sharks stayed away. There were no seals to eat. When the seals did come back—New England now has an estimated 100,000 harbor and grey seals—so did the great whites.

      There’s irony in that. Scientists have estimated that there have been up to 800 individual great whites in Cape Cod waters over a recent four-year period.

      If the great white shark were as malevolent as Benchley and Jaws diretor Steven Spielberg had portrayed, the species would be chowing down on tourists like they were shrimp in a wedding buffet.

        
      The mechanical shark was scary enough, but didn’t work very well, so director Spielberg relied on the soundtrack to create tension: “dun-dun, dun-dun.”

      Jaws Moments

      In 2018, Massachusetts finally had a couple events right out of the Jaws script. Two great white attacks happened in Cape Cod waters, one of which was fatal. Arthur Medici died while surfing off Wellfleet on the “Outer Cape.”

      Writing in a May 14, 2019 story for Boston magazine, writer Casey Sherman described the event in gruesome detail:

      Fellow surfers saw a giant eruption of water, followed by the sight of a shark thrashing and whipping its tail back and forth around Medici’s body. Before Rocha could think, his arms and legs began churning furiously toward Medici, closing the distance with each stroke. “Arthur! Come to me, come to me!” he shouted, swallowing and spitting out mouthfuls of bloody saltwater. “You’ll be fine. You’ll be fine.”

      Medici did not respond, floating motionless atop a small wave. When Rocha finally reached him, Medici was unconscious with his head face-down in the water. The Everett High student and commander of his school’s junior ROTC class instantly remembered his rescue training, getting behind Medici, placing both hands under Medici’s armpits, and swimming several more yards until his feet touched the sand. Rocha used his remaining strength to drag his friend onto the beach.

      “Shark! Shark! Shark!” he gasped. “Get people out of the water!”

      Predictably, there were some calls to kill sharks or kill seals, or both, to save Cape Cod’s all-important tourist industry. Calls for “lethal management”⁵ of sharks has its own sociology term. It’s called the “Jaws Effect.”

        
        
      Besides Jaws’ own sequels, Hollywood made copycat films such as Barracuda and Orca. Both creatures were a lot bigger than the real thing.

      In Massachusetts, however, the official response to shark attacks was very un-Jaws-like. Public attitudes toward sharks had evolved quite a bit over the past four decades. Even shark tournaments down in Montauk are catch-and-release now. Lethal shark-fishing contests, which had thrived post-Jaws in the spirit of revenge,⁶ have come under increasing fire by the ecology-minded and animal-rights crowds.

      Retiring the Man-Eater Myth
       

      Retiring the Man-Eater Myth

      11:14 AM
      Read full story

      As for killing seals, well, they are just too darned cute. (Unless you fish for a living, then they are not cute at all.)⁷ Here’s what the 2021 study “Human Dimensions of Rebounding Seal and Shark Populations on Cape Cod” said:

      Voters and especially tourists view seals favorably. They hope to see them on Cape Cod. They largely perceive seals as beneficial, positive and enjoyable. They believe that seals are an important part of the marine ecosystem and a sign of a healthy environment. Commercial fishers hold different views and are more negative in their perceptions of seals and their ecological, economic and fishery impacts. Commercial fishers blame seals for reducing and suppressing fish stocks, hurting the economy and creating public safety risks by attracting sharks to the area.

      Sharks are scary but also get a pass, according to the study:

      While sharks generate fear and are viewed as a threat to people by the majority of voters, tourists and commercial fishers, the perceived benefits of sharks appear to outweigh the risks. Respondents in all three stakeholder groups view sharks as important to the marine ecosystem. By large margins, respondents in all groups agree with the statement, “I am willing to accept some inconvenience and risk in order to have oceans where marine wildlife can thrive.”

      Survey Results, Sharks & Seals

        

      Unlike the folks of fictional Amity, hardly anyone nowadays is blaming the shark. Only a small percentage of people in the three groups surveyed said they thought shark bites were intentional. About 90 percent said sharks bite people by accident.

      So, instead of recruiting a 2025 version of Quint, Bay State authorities are relying on signage, lifeguard training, beach patrols, shark-alert systems and public education. (For example, don’t hang out in the water with a bunch of seals, no matter how cute they may be.)

      What else helps keep casualties down: 46 percent of tourists surveyed said they won’t go in the water. What’s that word again?

      Galeophobia. (Dun-dun, dun-dun.)

        

      LOOSE CANNON covers hard news, technical issues and nautical history. Every so often he tries to be funny. Subscribe for free to support the work. If you’ve been reading for a while—and you like it—consider upgrading to paid.

      1

      The movie was filmed in Vineyard Haven, Menemsha, Chilmark and Edgartown, but mostly in Edgartown. So fictional Amity is most likely based on Edgartown.

      2

      I’m talking about the earliest Cape Dories, the actual 10 and 12-footers and the 16-foot Handi-Cat, a beefed up version of the traditional Beetle Cat design.

      3

      In the 1980s, an industry was established that sent frozen filets of dogfish (aka sand sharks, perhaps incorrectly) over to Britain for fish and chips. But we had no notion of how to make them edible ourselves.

      4

      Researchers say warm-water shark species such as bulls are expanding their range northward because of warming ocean temperatures. They are expected to join their great white cousins in New England waters in the near future.

      5

      Think “humanely euthanized.” For example, tickling your target to death.

      6

      Jaws Director Steven Spielberg, 78, has expressed remorse over Jaws—even though it established his status as a talented director, while he was still in his 20s. “I regret the decimation of the shark population because of the book and film,” he told the BBC in 2022. “I truly and to this day regret that.”

      7

      Back in the day, I had always attributed the notion of seals breaking into traps as typical lobsterman bluster, but sure enough contemporary accounts and even a YouTube video make the case pretty convincingly.

       

      You’re currently a free subscriber to LOOSE CANNON. For the full experience, upgrade your subscription.

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    • Tropical Storm Andrea forms – SunSentinel

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    • Firework Display Safety Zones – July 4 – Charleston, SC


      D07-SMB-SECTORCHASN-WWM

      Good day All,

      Please see attached MSIB 11-25 regarding safety zones for annual Independence Day fireworks displays within the Charleston port area.

      Very Respectfully,

      MST1 Thomas (TJ) Welker
      USCG Sector Charleston
      Waterways Management Division
      (843) 740-3180 Ext 3339
      charlestonwaterways@uscg.mil

      MSIB 11-25_Fireworks Display Safety Zones Charleston Area

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    • Why boat handling skills require constant learning – PassageMaker

      Passagemaker is an excellent resource for cruisers. 

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    • Proposed Anchoring Limitations – St. Lucie County Meeting Notice – July 22


      Anchorage limitations continue to be considered/expanded in various important Florida cruising areas.  St. Lucie County is considering establishing two areas and conducting a public hearing on July 22 at 9am.

      FWC default banner

      (Having trouble viewing this email? View it as a Web page.)

      Public Notice

      The Board of County Commissioners of St. Lucie County, Florida, announces a public meeting to which all persons are invited.

      DATE AND TIME: July 22, 2025, at 9 a.m. or as soon thereafter as possible to receive all testimony and evidence to consider and act upon the adoption of proposed Ordinance 2025-012.

      PLACE: County Commissioner Chambers of Roger Poitras Administration Annex located at 2300 Virginia Ave., Fort Pierce, FL 34982 (3rd Floor).

      GENERAL SUBJECT MATTER TO BE CONSIDERED: The Board of County Commissioners of St. Lucie County, FL is conducting a public hearing to introduce an ordinance to establish two (2) Anchoring Limitation Areas in St. Lucie County and amendments to Chapter 50-Waterways of the St. Lucie Code.

      Pursuant to the provisions of the Americans with Disabilities Act, any person requiring special accommodations to participate in this meeting is asked to advise the County at least 48 hours before the meeting by contacting: St. Lucie County Human Resources Department:

      For more information, contact Joshua Revord:


      This email was sent to Curtis.Hoff@CruisersNet.net using GovDelivery Communications Cloud on behalf of: Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission · 620 S. Meridian Street · Tallahassee, FL 32399-1600 · (850) 488-4676

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    • Bahamas Backs Off (a Little) After Pushback on Fees – Peter Swanson


      Cruisers Net publishes Loose Cannon articles with Captain Swanson’s permission in hopes that mariners with salt water in their veins will subscribe. $7 a month or $56 for the year, and you may cancel at any time.

      Forwarded this email? Subscribe here for more

      When all else fails, try journalism.


      Bahamas Backs Off (a Little) After Pushback on Fees

      Average Cruising Craft Get a $500 Break

        
      Bahamas tourism industry pushes back.

      Bahamian legislators have amended proposed cruising fee increases to go easier on the average visiting sailboat and trawler. Instead of $1,650, a cruiser who fishes and anchors would pay $1,150.

      Lawmakers have done this by adjusting the catagories. Previously there were three catagories: up to 34 feet, 35 to 100 feet and over 100 feet. Now the catagories are up to 50 feet, over 50 to 100 feet and over 100 feet.

      So instead of paying $1,000 for entry on your average 44-foot sailboat, the cruising permit will cost $500 feet. The proposed anchoring fee remains at $200 or $350, depending on whether up to or over 34 feet. The proposed fishing permit also remains at $200 or $350 depending of whether up to or over 34 feet. The fishing permit is valid for two entries within 30 days.

      The anchoring fees for vessels over 100 feet is $1,500.

      Share

      Facebook has been ablaze with indignation ever since the foreign cruising community learned about the bill. The center-console crowd was also angered, but they too got some relief in the latest version.

      The frequent digital cruising card (FDCC), which caters to the long-weekend visitors boating over from South Florida, now costs $1,500 for vessels up to 50 feet and is good for two years of unlimited travel. Boats over 50 and up to 100 feet will cost $2,500 and those over 100 will cost $8,000.

      Echoing the Bahamas Prime Minister’s own anti-American boater rhetoric, much of the Bahamian response on social media was a collective “good ridance, you cheapskates,” accusing foreigners of taking their fish, polluting their waters with sewage and messing up the seabed with our anchors.

      But those sentiments were not shared by people in the marine industry such as Stephen Kappeler of the Bimini Big Game Club Resort and Marina, who told a reporter from the Tribune newspaper of Nassau that he had fielded 12 cancelations that day and expected the trend to continue. Kappeler said:

      Remember, when we cancel a booking, this is money that somebody’s already paid, a deposit they’ve already paid. When you book a room and you book a slip with us, that’s somewhere in the area of $500 in business just the first night deposit. And guests are coming in for two, three, four nights.

      So you could multiply and extend that out to understand what the value of a cancellation is. And they’re looking for the refund of their money. I can tell you, there were a dozen alone today. We’re a 50-room resort. So if this continues at a pace of a dozen a day… I’m sure not everybody’s got the news or got the message. So this thing is going to be exponential.

      That was yesterday. The Tribune tends to be less friendly to the ruling party than the Bahamas other major newspaper, and today it published another story on the issue that began with this:

      The Bahamian tourism industry and its three main promotion boards have untied to urge the Prime Minister to “pause” new and increased boating fees that “could not have come at a worse time.”

      In their joint letter to the PM, The Bahamas Hotel and Tourism Association, the Bahamas Out Islands Promotions Board, the Nassau/Paradise Island Promotions Board and the Grand Bahama Island Promotion Board described a “high spending, buoyant, seafaring visitor market. who contribute significantly to a vast number of tourism business owners…throughout the archipelago.”

      The promotion boards cited reports of numerous marina cancellations. They noted that the nation’s tourism industry was facing uncertain times and that while the cruise-ship sector appeared to have a solid footing, the rest of the industry “faces far less predictable, precarious headwinds.”

      There has been no pause—at least not yet—but Attorney General Ryan Pinder spoke to the Bahamas Senate Tuesday, arguing that the new version of the bill strikes “an appropriate balance” that raises fees but also extends the duration of a cruising permit from three months to a year.

      LOOSE CANNON covers hard news, technical issues and nautical history. Every so often he tries to be funny. Subscribe for free to support the work. If you’ve been reading for a while—and you like it—consider upgrading to paid.

       

       

       

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