Summer Cruise From Fl To Ca

[Seafarer]

I've been thinking about moving this summer. I'm currently in the Tampa Bay area of FL, and was thinking about heading down to the Miami / Ft. Lauderdale area. With 180gallon of fuel capacity I could motor the whole way if the typically light summer winds never picked up enough to sail.

Lately, however, I've been considering other, more distant locations. Like CA. Other than sailing, I am big into rock-climbing and mountain biking. FL terrain does not exactly cater to this, and even though the waters are great this area has pretty lousy wind for moving about anything but my catamaran.

I would have to leave in the summer- early June to be exact, so I would have three months of paychecks coming in while I sail (I work for a school). If I treated this like a delivery run instead of a leisurely cruise, how long do you think it would take? What sort of weather should I expect in these areas at that time of year?

I am aware it's the start of the hurricane season...

[redbopeep]

Given your hobby interests, I'd suggest you sail up the Eastern Seaboard to partake of them before you consider leaving the East Coast for the West Coast USA. Also, there are lots of places internationally for you to go and explore your hobbies rather than making the long slog around and up to California (CA) which is what I suppose you mean by "CA". If you've not sailed upwind for more than a day or two at a time, I suggest you get that experience in place before decided to leave Florida for California. It's a long upwind slog from Panama to California.

[JeanneP]

I would say that you would spend more than 6 weeks just traveling from Florida to California, and that's if things go quickly in the Panama Canal. Hard work, and then either leaving it there or spending another 6 weeks coming back - during hurricane season, and even harder work - I would say that the Panama to Florida is one of the really tough trips you can make by sail.

If, instead, you mean Canada and East Coast, you could sail there from Miami in maybe two weeks. June might be the start of hurricane season, but it's a rare season when there are hurricanes in FL in June. Still, you need to keep an eye on the weather.

For Eastern US, cold water with some thick fog would be one of the most notable features of June sailing up there. Rocks and very big tides.

[redbopeep]

We have a friend who ended up taking 49 days to get from Panama to So. Cal in one long offshore leg. Crazy long leg. All of it upwind. I personally didn't realize how long it could/would take.