A tarp costs forty dollars and takes an afternoon. Shrink wrap costs considerably more and you cannot do it yourself. Put like that, the tarp wins every time — which is why so many boats on Cape Cod spend the winter under one, and why so many of those boats have a worse spring than … Continue reading
Every fall the same conversation happens on the dock: one more weekend. The water is still warm, the crowds are gone, and the fishing is often better in late September than it was in July. Nobody wants to be the first boat out. The problem is that hauling out is not really a weather decision. … Continue reading
Winterizing is a bill you pay in October for a benefit you do not see until May. That is a hard sell, and it is why the corners that get cut are always the same ones: the boat gets pulled and covered, and the rest gets left for spring. It is worth being precise about … Continue reading
Sooner or later, every outboard reaches the point where you’re spending more on repairs than the engine is worth. When that day comes, repowering — dropping a fresh new outboard on a hull you already love — is one of the best investments a Cape Cod boater can make. The question we hear most at … Continue reading
The worst place to discover your engine has a problem is three miles off the Chatham Cut with the tide running and the fog rolling in. The good news: a boat engine almost always warns you first. Learn to read the signs and you can get it into the shop on your schedule — not … Continue reading
Ask ten boat owners how often they service their outboard and you’ll get ten different answers. Here on Cape Cod, where every trip out of Chatham means running in salt water, the honest answer is simpler than most people think — and skipping it is the fastest way to turn a $400 service into a … Continue reading
Cape Cod winters aren’t kind to boats. Between hard freezes, damp storage, and five or six months of sitting still, the way you put your outboard away in the fall decides what kind of spring you’ll have. Here’s the local checklist we run through in Chatham — and where it pays to hand it to … Continue reading
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