Marinas near New Bern N.C.

We are looking to keep our 34' Marine Trader near Bern N.C. Dry from May through Oct and wet April and November. And cruise to Jacksonville Florida area December through March. We want to live aboard while wet and prefer a dry storage that permits working on our boat.

I have a buddy who lives aboard at the New Bern Grand Marina. It is right in the heart of town so you can get to bars and restaurants on foot. The other one is the Bridge Point Marina across the trent about 1/4 miles. Galley Stores Marina is right on the Neuse but also downtown, but can be a bit rolly even inside the breakwater.

There are a couple of boat yards on the other side of the Neuse: Bridgeton Boat Works and Duck Creek.

Active Captain has reviews and contact info on all of them.

David

That is a complicated question. Not a lot of people use yards for dry storage around here. They are either in the yard working, or are not ;-) Still, there are so many option down here, it just depends on what you want. Near town? Better rates? Near facilities for boaters (like Oriental)? Better people? Nearer to anchorages?

There are no marinas that I am aware of that disallow doing your own work. We are at Northwest Creek for $6.75/ft. The other boaters and live aboards are great and it’s not too far from town. More than one or two more Marine Traders here too.

I can give you a full rundown if you like, but Bess wants to walk the dock before it gets dark. Feel free to PM me and I can get on a call with you and give you all the options.

New Bern Grand and Galley Stores are both convenient to town. We prefer Grand, but Galley Stores is a nice small marina. Bridge Point is nice but across the river from town. Bridgeton Harbor is also inconvenience to town. None of these to my knowledge have haul-out facilities. Also a marina at Fairfield Harbors which is the most protected marina in the area.

Duck Creek and Bridgeton Boatworks, both across the river, have 35 ton lifts. Duck Creek also has docks.

We've stayed at Grand and Galley so don't have first hand experience at the others and no haul outs. Most larger boats go to Oriental or Beaufort for haul outs.

The New Bern Grand Marina would be a great place to live on your boat but it's strictly wet slips, no dry storage. There are boat yards between Oriental and Beaufort. I don't know if you can work on your own boat or live on a boat out of the water though.

Get on Active Captain, find places that might suit you and give them a phone call for details.

Most of the boatyards here allow you to work on your own boat. But why store on the hard May through November? That is prime boating season here.

We lived aboard for awhile at the Galley Store for a few months before transferring to Morehead City. Having stayed at both Bridgepointe and what is now called the Grand, we much preferred it. In the nicest part of town with a great little store on site and good restaurant, fule dock and in the larger slips in-slip pumpout. Much nicer docks and better electrical than the Grand in particular, with much better views. Our second choice would be the newly refurbished Bridgepointe for quality of docks, a short walk into town via the bridge.

But , like others, I don't get the OP's in-out-in strategy at all. My first reaction is, why not take the boat to New York and the primo cruising grounds attached thereto? We looked forward to our northern summer journeys more than our southern winter ones (personal preferences, I know). Or at the very least somewhere on the Chesapeake where it can be cruised indefinitely all summer. We live in new Bern now, and have owned property there since 2005, and it would never occur to me again to keep a cruising boat there for any length of time.

Secondly, when we stopped full time cruising, we soon relocated to Morehead City, with better access to the fabulous beaches and the best "stay awhile" anchorage on the East Coast, Cape Lookout Bight. Also very accessible to the cruising grounds on Pamlico and Albemarle sounds, and points south via the Atlantic Ocean and ICW. So if there is some unusual reason that the boat can't go north for the prime months, I'd look at that area myself without a moment's hesitancy. Some marinas require the boat leave during a named storm, but there are plenty of captain services and boat yards that can help with that through prior arrangement.