Great Loop Cruising Guides

There are a lot of cruising guides and books available on the Great Loop trip. We found these to be the most useful during our trip. 

•Skipper Bob – http://skipperbob.home.att.net/publications.htm
  • Invaluable - especially for navigation notes and anchorages
  • A bit hard to find – can be mail ordered
  • Books everyone should get: 
    • Great Circle Route Planning Guide - Provides an overview of the trip, including considerations of the routes available based on a vessels air and water draft.  We found this to be most useful BEFORE we left on the trip. 
    • Anchorages Along the Intracoastal Waterway - If you get no other book, get this one.  It has definitely been the most used book of the trip.  It provides invaluable mile by mile information on anchorages as well as navigation notes for the entire eastern cost from Key West to the Hudson.
    • Marinas Along the Intracoastal Waterway - Provides price and amenity comparisons of marinas along the way. The prices are always a year out of date, but did provide a good basis for comparison.
    • Cruising the New York Canal Systems - Provides information on the Erie , Oswego , Cayuga-Seneca, and Champlain Canals .  Regardless of the route you choose, you will need to do some combination of these canals.
    • Cruising Lake Michigan - Provides information on anchorages and towns on both sides of the lake.
    • Cruising from Chicago to Mobile - Provides mile by mile information including navigation notes, marinas, anchorages along rivers. 
    • Cruising the Gulf Coast - provides mile by mile information on the Gulf Intracoastal waterway.
  • Additional books to get if you are going that way: 
    • Cruising the Rideau and Richelieu Canals -
    • Cruising the Trent - Severn Canal , Georgian Bay and North Channel 
    • Cruising Lake Ontario
    • Bahamas Bound
  • For those doing the trip with a valid Military ID
    • Military Marinas on the Great Circle Route  
•Fred Myers – http://www.cruisingguide.com – click on Fred Myers link
  • Tenn-Tom Nitty-Gritty - Everyone doing the trip and going down the Tenn-Tom route (versus the Mississippi river route) should have this book.
  • Cumberland River - Optional side trip.  We didn't take the time to go up the Cumberland - but heard from those that did that it is wonderful.  If you go that way, get this book.
  • Note that these may soon be out of print as Fred is retiring and will no longer publish updates. 
••Waterway Guide  http://www.waterwayguide.com 
  • These guides provides excellent maps of all marinas and also provides interesting write-ups of cities and towns along the way.
  • Southern, Mid-Atlantic, Great Lakes guides cover most of the Great Loop route.
  • The only areas on the Great Loop trip that are not covered by the above three guides are Delaware Bay and New Jersey.  These areas (along with the the entire Northeastern US) is covered in the Northern guide. We did not use this guide during our trip, but instead depended solely on our Skipper Bob book for this area. 
••Ports Guides (Canada) http://portsbooks.com 
  • Similar to Waterway guides, but for Canadian waters
••“A Well-Favored Passage” – http://www.seafevergear.com 
  • –We LOVED this book.  It is a wonderful cruising guide to Canada’s North Channel.  The book was originally written by Marjorie Cahn Brazer, but was recently updated by Pixie Haughwout and Ralph Folsom.
••Road Atlas 
  • Useful  for seeing surrounding towns.
  • Invaluable when renting a car

 Janet Crane. AT34 - #48  “Tardis”