YachtPath Update

I finally got through to Dennis Cummings, the owner of YachtPath. The purpose of my call was to determine if the November sailing was going to really happen or whether it could get cancelled at the last minute as did the October sailing. Dennis stated that although the October 18th sailing did not happen because the boat was redirected to go around the bottom of South America, he said that he is working on another October sailing for later in the month.

I leaned a couple of things. This marine shipping business is very ad hoc, and subject to many factors of which no one seems to have any control. Changes in destinations and load factors can determine whether your boat goes or not. In order to get from Florida to Canada, you need a boat that is going to Japan. Victoria is “one the way” to Japan, so I need my boat to get onto a transport headed to Japan.

Dennis says that he has two barges that he needs to get to Japan (reading between the lines, the two barges represent enough cargo for him to commit to a transport ship and my boat is able to tag along). Friday is apparently the day when the ship brokers and transport brokers, like YachtPath, close their deals. Hopefully we will have more info after Friday as to whether a late October sailing is going to happen.

I did get Dennis to state that the November 25th sailing would definitely happen. In the meantime, I’m contacting other options. We’ll keep our expectations low and our hopes high.