Hi, I'm looking for a bareboat catamaran rental in the Exumas for a week in February. I've communicated with Moorings, although their prices are a bit higher than we were hoping to pay. I also found Sailo, but for some reason although their listings say Exumas, the owner actually says that's not where the boats are. If we can't find anything within our budget (goal to keep the boat cost under $10-12k for the week), we may have to pivot to BVIs but wanted to explore all options in the Exumas first. Anywhere else I should look?

Check Navtours. Like the Moorings, their boats are based in Nassau (in their case, at Palm Cay Marina). That's the way to get to the Exumas. In the past, for an extra fee you could drop-off/pick-up at Staniel Cay and Emerald Bay in the Exumas, but I don't know if that's the case anymore. While it saves time, it makes it significantly more expensive. Nassau has the benefit of offering better provisioning and many more flight options. In your planning, just know that you'll spend the better part of your first day getting to the Exumas, and your last day getting back to Nassau.

As far as I'm concerned, the Exumas are worth every bit of effort. But you have to like seclusion and self-sufficiency. You will be anchoring almost all of the time (no moorings, minimal marinas), and there are few places to provision or obtain water/ice.

Let me know if you want more info.

Eva, this is super helpful, thank you! Navtours was on my list and it seems like they are the most reputable/reasonable out of the options I've found. We had wanted to pick up/drop off in the Exumas but I'm finding exactly what you said, that we'll need to start/finish in Nassau. I'm guessing Navtours has good support in case we were to have any issues with the boat etc? Several in our group have lived in the Bahamas previously and are familiar with the Exumas so we are comfortable with the seclusion. Will have to get creative with the water/ice situation! I appreciate any other tips or tricks but I anticipate we'll go with Navtours and just suck it up for the long sail to/from the Exumas - I'm a little worried about seasickness but will have to make it work!

I have trip reports from my two charters on my blog -- here are the links: 2019 Charter and 2017 Charter. Like your friends, we'd spent months in the Exumas on our own boat, so chartering there was like coming home.

Navtours has decent support, but prepare to be self-sufficient. The boat we sailed last time was pretty clapped out, and we had to do a lot of improvising. Nothing catastrophic went wrong, but they turn the boats around quickly, so the little niggling things don't always get taken care of. But heck, it's a BOAT!

As for seasickness, whether it happens on the crossing depends on the conditions and you. Be prepared!