2017 Waggoner Cruising Guide
The Waggoner Cruising Guide is often called “….the Bible for Northwest Cruising”. Each year it is extensively updated to provide the latest information covering each cruising area along with detailed listings of moorage and fuel facilities. There’s text on anchorages, Local Knowledge, the “flavor” of each area, some history, and list on things to see and do. Lots of maps and photos, too. (The Waggoner contains 150 maps and 375 photos.)
The Waggoner’s maps, showing the coverage of each chapter, the harbors, and individual marinas, are one of its most popular features. They show approach routes and facilities, and take much of the anxiety out of entering a harbor for the first time. Maps of individual marinas detail the entrances and markers, shoal areas, dock layout, and location of the guest moorage and key facilities.
The Waggoner is an easy reference to use. To find the page you need, turn to the index, table of contents, or the locator maps in the front of the book. Charts for each area are listed right up front in the chapters. The Waggoner’s detailed listings of marine facilities are logically organized and updated each year by Editor Mark Bunzel, coorespondents, and the Waggoner staff.
More than a catalog of listings and maps, the Waggoner is praised as a “good read.” The Waggoner is full of navigation tips, weather lore, anchoring ideas, and local knowledge. Serious sidebar features and descriptions explain tide-rips, reversing tidal rapids, stern-tie lines, shellfish toxins, and more. Lighter pieces and descriptions include the “lost-in-the-’50s” flavor of downtown Olympia; the proper attitude while waiting at the Ballard Locks (“it takes as long as it takes, and that’s how it is”); and the discovery of a genuine, fur-bearing trout (very rare) in Prince Rupert. These stories are intended to entertain but also instruct, giving an “insider’s look” at hazards, joys, and just plain facts of Northwest boating. Things change. Don’t get caught without the latest cruising information for 2017.
- Annually updated information on all marinas and major anchorages from Olympia to Ketchikan, including the West Coast of Vancouver Island and Haida Gwaii
- 448 pages
- 150+ marina and area diagrams
- Large format
Ports and Passes 2017
Ports and Passes is the most complete reference guide for tide and current information along our beautiful coastline. The book is easy to use and includes the majority of the primary and secondary tide and current data stations. The guide is adjusted for daylight savings time, a convenience over the Canadian Government publications. It includes tide and current prediction table coverage for the coastal area from Olympia, WA to Prince Rupert BC. Ports and Passes also includes information on local knowledge and other information useful to the cruising mariner.
Waggoner Tables 2017
The annual companion book for the Canadian Hydrographic’s Current Atlas makes it easy to use – just look up the month, day and the hour, and you will be given the appropriate page in the Atlas. The Tables list every hour of every day and are corrected for Daylight Savings Time. Waggoner Tables and Canadian Hydrographic’s Current Atlas (can be purchased here) help you to understand the details of the currents around the San Juan and Gulf Islands and up the Strait of Georgia as far as Campbell River. With these two books you can judge what the currents will be for your cruise and adjust accordingly.
