The family and I are looking forward to a bare boat power cat charter in the BVI's this summer and looking for some feedback. I've been boating for many years and have reasonable experience running larger twin engine inboard boats but rarely large power cats like the one we have chartered this summer. I use to own a 31' Bertram for running offshore fishing and have a number of hours on a 33' Sea Ray but have never owned a large catamaran. I have chartered similar power cats in the past but at this point it has been about 8 years since the last time and I had additional adults to assist with departing and arriving at port for which I won't have for this upcoming trip. It will be my wife and two sons that are 9yr and 13yrs old. I happen to live near the Chesapeake bay so my first question is does anyone have recommendations for a 1 or 2 day power cat charter with a captain on the Chesapeake that I could hire to work off some of the dust off prior to my trip? I can't imagine that a couple hours over 1 or 2 days wouldn't get me back to full proficiency and confidence.
My second question is around additional support departing and arriving back to charter base. We will be on the water for 8 days and will be using strictly mooring balls for overnight and no plans to put into a slip. Is it strange to request the charter company to assist with getting the boat out of port and back in at the end of the charter? I'm not concerned necessarily about pulling up to T Pier of fuel dock but I'm less confident about pulling into small slip and similar with such a large beam. Overall not terribly huge at 43' long but still harder then a sea ray and I'm not expecting much support from the family to fend off obstacles. Not that you have much luck with that on a boat this size but it helps to put the fenders in the right spot.
