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On this page we will publish details of any VHF, SSB or other type of 'net' you care to inform us of. We will also use space here as a kind of 'text-net' as, and when, information comes in which should be disseminated. 

Complaints and compliments about the behaviour of cruisers can be aired here. Some of the individuals who let the cruising community down may be genuinely unaware of the bad effect their behaviour has on the reputation of cruisers as a whole. Cruisers can use this space to voice opinions on good and bad behaviour amongst the cruising community in general. 

You can use this page to thank fellow cruisers for help or kindness or to ask for help.

If you're planning a voyage and you'd like to sail in company with a few other yachts, you can use this page to ask if anyone else would like to join your group. It can bring economic benefits in many places if you all provision for a trip together, for example, asking for bulk discounts on buying by the case and then splitting the goods up amongst the group.

You can also share your news of visits to places which you are seeing through the eyes of a visiting cruiser, the better to prepare those of us who are traveling in your wake for what we will find...that news we will publish on our Cruising Folk page in the Sailors section.

Meanwhile we bring you a few snippets to start us off:

Cruiser's Net - Chaguaramas, Trinidad, West Indies. 

VHF Channel 68 at 0800hrs daily.

This is a very well- run 'net' running for between 15 and 20 minutes daily. 
Features include Treasures of The Bilge, where cruisers can offer their unwanted possessions to other cruisers ( exchange, trade or barter only) Help and Services Needed, where cruisers can ask where to find parts or someone to do a particular kind of work and Flat Stamped Mail where cruisers who are flying home offer to carry letters bearing the stamps of the country to which they are flying for other cruisers.

New Arrivals are invited to announce themselves, stating their boat name, crew names and home port and given a warm welcome, which can be particularly cheering after a long trip but is always pleasant.
Departing Yachts are invited to say their farewells to all those whom they may not have had time to see in person and to the community at large. Social Announcements alert the community to events they might otherwise have missed and so on.

Each day, a different yachtie runs the net, working to a script which has been developed by the' net controllers', as they are called, themselves, and which is reviewed by the current group of controllers from time to time.

If you are planning to spend a season in Chaguaramas and would enjoy being a net controller one day a week, or would be happy, if the need arose, to stand-in for a yachtie who is the usual controller, by all means contact any of the net controllers you hear each morning (they always announce themselves at the start of the net by saying "This is 'so and so' aboard the 'such and such' bringing you the Trinidad Cruiser's net").

If a net controller is needed you will be given a copy of the current script so you don't have to remember the order of events.

Cruisers Net  - Sint Maarten/St. Martin, Leeward Islands

VHF Channel 14 at 0730 hrs Mondays to Saturdays.

Passing through St. Martin, in June 2000, we found the 7.30am Cruiser's Net on VHF Channel 14 excellent - very similar to the Trinidad Net although without the restrictions on selling that exist there, which was nice as we needed to offload some heavy items to speed us across the Atlantic and offload items that would be better not carried across the ocean. We couldn't afford to just give the goods away or dump them. 

We got a swift and good response when we announced that we were selling a laptop and printer at rock-bottom prices and needed to get going, and a windlass went quite quickly too.  The net is run by Tom Higginbotham, a Louisiana Baptist missionary, Caribbean head of the International Mission Board,  with an adorable accent (and everything like that...*) and, if you visit St.Martin/Sint Maarten, you could do worse than to tune in, enjoy the net, 'meet' Tom and participate. 

* Tom has a charming way of adding "...and everything like that" to statements he makes, including ones for which there can be no other 'anything like that'! In some people, such a tendency might be irritating. In his case we, and everyone we spoke to, found it totally endearing. We missed hearing him in the mornings when our visit was over!

Bermuda Harbour Radio, St. George's, Bermuda

Although there is no 'Cruiser's Net' as such in Bermuda, the officers at Bermuda Harbour Radio not only guide yachts into the harbour and out again but also provide an excellent weather service, broadcasting on channel 27 of the VHF. 

The officers will also try and help one to locate appropriate sources of information if the excellent information leaflets handed out by Customs and Immigration don't cover it.

The Island Water Ministries, under the auspices of Phil and Shelley Mitterhauser, a Canadian missionary couple, and the pastor - Rev.Dr. Wilbur Lowe Jr., of the Richard Allen A.M.E. church in St. George's, also help cruisers to take care of any problems which may arise, to the best of their abilities.