South for the winter

[hsagman]

We are from Connecticut. Thinking of bringing our 34' Albin down to North or South Carolina for next winter. Any suggestions on good marinas for a 6 month stay?

 

[psneeld]

Absolutely sure that's as far south as you want to go? Still pretty chilly and possible freezes in those states.

Myrtle Beach Yacht Club in Little River, SC is where I have stayed for 5 months. Be careful with the 6 month issue as in SC you run into taxation issues.

Georgetown, SC would be a decent place too....as would Wrightsville Beach, NC.

Moorehead City, NC is a favorite for sportfish guys (at least it used to be) and has some nice marinas... but still pretty far north for some to winter over temp wise.

 

[hsagman]

Thanks! Good info.

 

[ranger58sb]

We are from Connecticut. Thinking of bringing our 34' Albin down to North or South Carolina for next winter. Any suggestions on good marinas for a 6 month stay?

We've stopped in Belhaven, Oriental, River Dunes, Beaufort, Wrightsville Beach, Southport, MBYC, Osprey Marina, Georgetown, Isle of Palms, Charleston, Beaufort, and Port Royal... and various places/marinas have their pros/cons.

You might hum a few bars about whether you'll have a car (or bike, or Uber or whatever), what kind of things you like to do, etc. Stay on board all that time? Or come back and forth for shorter-term visits? And have a look at some of those various population centers, see what might appeal. Six months on a boat in Belhaven, for instance, would be much different from 6 months on a boat in Charleston.

FWIW, we did a temp comparison in advance, and all of those are usually at least 10° warmer than HERE almost all the time... and we could deal with that easily enough. Winter in Charleston was not as warm as the winter we spent in Jacksonville... in turn not as warm as when we lived near Ft. Lauderdale... but compared to now, any place where we don't have to winterize the boat is probably good enough. For us.

-Chris

 

[hsagman]

We've stopped in Belhaven, Oriental, River Dunes, Beaufort, Wrightsville Beach, Southport, MBYC, Osprey Marina, Georgetown, Isle of Palms, Charleston, Beaufort, and Port Royal... and various places/marinas have their pros/cons.

You might hum a few bars about whether you'll have a car (or bike, or Uber or whatever), what kind of things you like to do, etc. Stay on board all that time? Or come back and forth for shorter-term visits? And have a look at some of those various population centers, see what might appeal. Six months on a boat in Belhaven, for instance, would be much different from 6 months on a boat in Charleston.

FWIW, we did a temp comparison in advance, and all of those are usually at least 10° warmer than HERE almost all the time... and we could deal with that easily enough. Winter in Charleston was not as warm as the winter we spent in Jacksonville... in turn not as warm as when we lived near Ft. Lauderdale... but compared to now, any place where we don't have to winterize the boat is probably good enough. For us.

-Chris

Thanks! We're looking to leave the boat down there and either drive, or fly down a few times during the winter and stay on the boat for a few days at a time. Would like to be relatively near some metro area to go out to dinners, etc.

 

[ranger58sb]

Maybe check airports first, then.

Charleston, of course. We spent last winter at Safe Harbor Charleston City; their not-inexpensive special 4-month deal got us a year-long membership with transient and fuel perks. OTOH, we were on the inside of the original "megadock", which turned out to still be too much exposed to weather, and was a looooonnngggg walk to shore. OTOOH, they've just added a new "megadock" and they're re-doing all the other slips, so maybe a better accommodation further inside could be available for next year. They start dealing with transient requests along about June, but you'd want to get an application in there sooner than that. We started asking in Feb of the previous year.

Probably Wilmington (haven't stayed there) which would also serve Southport and Wrightsville Beach. I know Myrtle Beach has a smaller airport (not far from Osprey Marina, which is in the boonies) and there are other marinas in Myrtle.

You might do some research on taxes. South Carolina imposes a property tax after 6 months.

Transient in South Carolina

Does anyone know what if any the maximum length of stay is in south Carolina for a vessel documented in Florida?

www.trawlerforum.com

Haven't pinned down how North Carolina deals with it, but a quick web search yesterday suggests being in North Carolina on Dec 31 or Jan 1 could get you a tax bill. Which will be a PITA for us, since we've been considering one of the several NC options for winter 2025.

-Chris

 

[oguidry]

The above post discusses the benefits of Charleston and some of the drawbacks of Safe Harbor Charleston City. Safe Harbor also runs another marina just up the Ashley River from Charleston City - Bristol Marina with equally nice facilities and good service..

Bristol is much smaller and has very little transient traffic because of the Hwy 17 bridges that have 14 feet vertical clearance when closed and they do not open for boats going to Bristol Marina. Bristol is much smaller hence mush shorter walks. Less boat traffic than around City so fewer wakes. Directly across the street is a new and large Publix grocery store.

If you are considering Charleston, check out Bristol.

 

[ranger58sb]

Our air draft makes Bristol off-limits, but we stayed one winter (2017-2018) in Ashley Marina, just next door north from SHCM. We were well inside, much better protected from weather, much closer walk to shore, nice place at the time, ideally still decent.

-Chris

 

[oguidry]

Ashley Marina is doing well and is in the process of gradually replacing their docks.

 

[hsagman]

Maybe check airports first, then.

Charleston, of course. We spent last winter at Safe Harbor Charleston City; their not-inexpensive special 4-month deal got us a year-long membership with transient and fuel perks. OTOH, we were on the inside of the original "megadock", which turned out to still be too much exposed to weather, and was a looooonnngggg walk to shore. OTOOH, they've just added a new "megadock" and they're re-doing all the other slips, so maybe a better accommodation further inside could be available for next year. They start dealing with transient requests along about June, but you'd want to get an application in there sooner than that. We started asking in Feb of the previous year.

Probably Wilmington (haven't stayed there) which would also serve Southport and Wrightsville Beach. I know Myrtle Beach has a smaller airport (not far from Osprey Marina, which is in the boonies) and there are other marinas in Myrtle.

You might do some research on taxes. South Carolina imposes a property tax after 6 months.

Transient in South Carolina

Does anyone know what if any the maximum length of stay is in south Carolina for a vessel documented in Florida?

www.trawlerforum.com

Haven't pinned down how North Carolina deals with it, but a quick web search yesterday suggests being in North Carolina on Dec 31 or Jan 1 could get you a tax bill. Which will be a PITA for us, since we've been considering one of the several NC options for winter 2025.

-Chris

Thanks again! We're Safe Harbor members, so will definitely look into that one.

 

[Captain_Michael]

This issue has been discussed pretty thoroughy on several previous posts. Suggest doing some research. It can be difficult to find a slip in the Charleston area, and what you do find will not be cheap. Charleston offers plenty of things to do. The tax authorities are growing more aggressive every year.