Fuel Cost Estimate

On my previous charterers, fuel cost was built into the total charter cost. This time we are chartering a Helia 44 through Dream Yachts and have to fuel up before turn in. Our 10 day charter will be counter clockwise and going to Anegada with primarily sailing and only motoring as needed. I have no idea what to budget for fuel cost. Any ball park estimates?

Well I can give you my experiences. Out of our past 10 years going to the BVI only two charters didn't include fuel in the up front costs.
Neither boat had air conditioning or a Genset. We try to only use the engine first thing in the morning and before we go to bed, and in
and out of the mooring field. One year we spent $38 and the other year it was $25. Hope this helps

Here's my fuel consumption on my Saba 50 for a recent 10 day trip in the BVIs (I excluded any motoring time to/from STT to the BVIs).

We had good sailing winds but still managed to put about 15 hrs on each Volvo D2-75 engine. We burn ~1.3 gal/hr per engine at 2000 rpm cruise. This gives us 7.4 kts with both engines running. So I estimate 39 gallons total on the engines. The Helia 44 has a smaller engine, but fuel burn will be comparable if you push the rpms to get to this speed.

We ran the generator for 60 hrs, or average of 6.7 hrs/day while off the dock. We have an icemaker and you can figure on at least 2 hrs of charging time per day just to replenish the amps used by the icemaker. We only ran the generator once overnight. With ~50% of the AC units on and some watermaker load, it burns about 0.5 gal/hr on average. So I estimate 30 gallons on the generator.

Total fuel burn ~70 gallons. On March 6th, diesel was $4.02/gal at Crown Bay Marina, St Thomas, and had been trending upwards since last year.

$300 is probably a reasonable ball park estimate depending on BVI fuel prices. You can easily double the generator fuel estimate if you run the AC all night long, and double the engine fuel estimate if you're skunked with no wind.

We did 10 days in a 474 Powercat. Fuel cost was just over $300 including generator use.

Fuel is the cheapest cost of any charter IMO.

We have a Leopard 42. Pre Irma, we never used more than 8 gallons per engine for a week of sailing, including days we never used sails. . That included engine running to charge batteries. After Irma, power motoring for a week at a time the highest fuel bill was $175 My understanding is power cats would double the cost.

Baard is right on with the fuel estimate. In a similar boat with the same setup you have we typical burn of 50 to 60 gallons a week depending on wind. That’s sailing when able and running the gen set about 10 hours each night. Normally we will have a night on the dock where we don’t use the genset. Take that out to 10 days and 70 to 80 gallons is reasonable.