Bar Hopping
Written by Mark TildenOne of Alfred, Lord Tennyson's more well-known poems uses a bar crossing as a metaphor for the process of dying-passing fromone world to another. Tennyson's choice of comparisons in "Crossing the Bar" is fitting, because transiting a bar between an ocean and a river or harbor can be one of the most intimidating experiences a boater faces. More than a few boaters, myself included, have seen the steep seas on a bar and wondered if this might be the end.
- Navigation
- Cruising
- PMM
- passagemaker
- NOAA
- swells
- shallow water
- Tilden
- nature
- sand
- ocean mouth
- columbia river bar
- the graveyard of the pacific
- danger
- tides
- powerful current
- seaworthy vessel
- crossing
- ebb tide
- diurnal tides
- semidiurnal tides
- river bards
- Weather Radio Broadcasts
- main channel
- water hazards
One of my favorite cruising grounds is the 218-mile length of the Intracoastal Waterway stretching from Charleston, South Carolina, to Fernandina Beach, Florida. The last time I made this trip, I was heading south on a new single-stateroom model of the Sabre 42 Hard Top Express with Bentley Collins, vice president of sales and marketing for Sabre Yachts. Collins and I, and two of his dealers, made the trek in early February to deliver the Downeast-style cruiser south for the Miami International Boat Show, with occasional overnight stopovers ashore to sample the winter golf and excellent restaurants along the way.
