·

Salty Dawgs Announces Spring Rally To Cuba

Salty Dawg Logo

Jan 25, 2017

Canadians have been free to cruise to Cuba forever but now, US citizens can too. As a result the nonprofit Salty Dawg™ Sailing Association (SDSA) will launch a new cruising rally to Cuba this spring. The Rally to Cuba has been organized to comply with current US government requirements for US vessels and citizens visiting Cuba. Vessels from other countries are also welcome to participate in this unique event. Canadians frequently participate in Salty Dawgs events, so this may be a natural opportunity.

The Rally to Cuba will depart Virgin Gorda in the BVI in late March and will be in Cuba April 5 – 20, 2017. While most vessels will be cruising to Cuba from the BVI, others will cruise from the US East Coast and the Bahamas. The 14 day visit will support an educational-based, people-to-people exchange, a necessary condition for US citizens who wish to visit the island. The Rally complies with OFAC and US Coast Guard regulations.

The new Rally is a natural, downwind passage from the Caribbean back to the US, via Cuba. In order to conduct the proper research in support of this educational activity, and with the time constraint from various regulations and American insurance companies, the Rally will make landfall in Havana and conduct its research activities in Northwest Cuba. This is a large area to visit including Havana, villages and countryside on the north and south shores.

With the structured nature of the visit, in order to properly manage the activity, the Rally is being limited to 24 boats. “With the strong interest in this rally, we could have easily registered more than 75 vessels. But, we need to keep this inaugural rally manageable to comply with US regulations. All participants will be busy conducting our planned research, which will be designed to develop reference material that hopefully will be of interest to all US cruisers with future plans to visit Cuba,” said Rally to Cuba director Hank George.

The Salty Dawg Sailing Association is a non-profit educational organization that hosts several rallies, rendezvous and a series of blue water sailing seminars. Over 1,900 sailors and 480 boats have participated in Salty Dawg Rallies and over 1,300 sailors subscribe to notification of Salty Dawg events.

Membership in SDSA is available to anyone interested in blue water sailing. For more information and to join the Salty Dawg Sailing Association, visit the SDSA web site.

Salty DawgMany Canadian boats visit Havana’s Hemingway Marina

 

Related Articles

Bruce Peninsula, Ontario

Bruce Peninsula, Ontario

A rugged path strewn with rocks slices through a dense stand of cedar just beyond a red-roofed square wooden lighthouse squatting beside Georgian Bay on the furthest reaches of Ontario’s Bruce Peninsula.

You trudge along this path that meanders through forests boasting five-hundred-year-old trees; you deeply inhale the cedar aroma. Then the forest thins and you emerge onto a plain of stone and sand and shale.

Ghost Lake, Alberta

Ghost Lake, Alberta

When we (an Ontario couple) both raised sailing on the Great Lakes and Lake Simcoe,  decided to pack up and move our lives and careers to Cochrane, Alberta (minutes West of Calgary) in 2013, our rationalization banter went a bit like this: 

 

 

Video Gallery

Pursuit S268 Sport CC

By Andy Adams

The Pursuit S 268 Sport centre console is a do-it-all kind of boat with a solid sense of style. Centre console designs have been developed for the southern blue water sport fishing enthusiasts (and this boat would raise fish with the best of them) but the Pursuit S 268 Sport centre console offers far more utility and enjoyment than just fishing.

Read More

Destinations

Bayfield Marine Turns 40 with Big April Events

(l to r) Holly, Adam, Pat, Ron, Shelley

Ron and Pat Reder started out in October 1984 across the road from where they are right now on the Bayfield River in Bayfield ON. The store front was about 10 x 20 and the rest of that side of the building was a stock room, wood finishing room, then behind that was more back stock and the lunchroom. Expanding every few years for the store front, then moving over to this new building five years ago, this year with Adam, Shelley, and Holly are carrying on the business.

Read More

Lifestyle