What to Bring on a Chatham Seal Cruise

Short answer: sunglasses, sunscreen, and your phone. That’s genuinely most of it. The trip is about an hour inside Chatham Harbor, so conditions are close to whatever the weather is doing in town — this isn’t an offshore run that needs special gear.

People sometimes turn up braced for an expedition. You don’t need to. Here’s the honest list.

What are conditions actually like?

Much like Chatham itself.

We stay inside the harbor — protected water, no open ocean — so you’re not dealing with the temperature drop or the chop people expect from a boat trip. If it’s pleasant in the parking lot, it’s pleasant on the boat.

There’s usually a bit of breeze once you’re moving, which most people find welcome on a hot afternoon. If you run cold, a light layer is nice to have. It’s a comfort call, not a precaution.

Sun is the one that catches people

You get sun off the water as well as from the sky, and on a clear day that’s plenty to burn in an hour.

Sunscreen — put it on before you board rather than while underway.
Sunglasses, polarized if you own them. This is the one item that genuinely changes what you see: polarized lenses cut the glare so you can pick out animals in the water, not just the ones on the sand.
A hat — with a strap, or one you’re willing to lose. Hats go overboard on every boat on this coast, every day.

Shoes

Flat and closed, with some grip. Sneakers, boat shoes, or sandals with a back strap are all fine. Decks get wet.

Skip heels and anything that slides off your foot. That’s the whole rule.

Cameras

Your phone is genuinely fine. The animals are closer than people expect, and most of the photos that come back from our trips are phone photos.

If you’re bringing a real camera, a mid-range zoom beats a long one — you’ll want the whole haul-out in frame more often than one animal’s face. Bring a strap and use it.

Binoculars are a nice extra, not a necessity. Federal rules keep boats a set distance off the animals, and binoculars help you pick out detail — pups, scarring, the difference between gray seals and harbor seals — without needing to be closer.

Bringing kids

Seal trips are one of the better things on the Cape with children. An hour is about the right attention span, and a sandbar covered in hundreds of animals is a genuinely startling sight for a six-year-old.

Aim for a departure near low tide if you can — that’s when the most seals are hauled out where you can see them. See the best time to see seals in Chatham for how the tide drives it.
Protected harbor water means it’s about as gentle as boating gets, which matters if you’ve got a nervous first-timer.
If sharks come up on the drive over: we stay inside the harbor, where white sharks don’t go. Nothing to see and nothing to worry about — the fuller answer is here.

What not to bring

Anything loose that can blow away — loose paper, light scarves, unsecured hats.
Glass. Please.
A drone. Flying near a marine mammal haul-out is a disturbance and it’s prohibited.
Food for the seals. Feeding marine mammals is a federal offense under the Marine Mammal Protection Act, and it draws them toward boats in ways that hurt them long-term.

May and October

We run seal cruises May through October, and the trips at either end of that are worth doing — fewer people, and better light on the water.

They’re also the ones where clothing actually matters. Bring a real jacket and something for your head. A cool, breezy morning in early May is a different experience from a July afternoon, and it’s the one time we’d tell you to think about what you’re wearing.

One thing you don’t have to bring: a parking strategy

Parking in Chatham in August is its own sport. Most visitors budget as much stress for finding a space as for the activity itself, and plenty of boat trips on the Cape leave you circling a public lot and then walking a half mile with a cooler and two kids.

We’re the only seal cruise on the Cape with its own onsite parking — your spot is guaranteed, and it’s steps from the boat. You pull in, you walk down, you get on. That’s the whole arrival.

It sounds like a small thing until you’ve done the alternative on a Saturday in July.

Practical details

Arrive about fifteen minutes early. With parking sorted, that’s genuinely enough.
Restrooms are available onsite before you board.
Child-size life jackets are aboard — ask when you board.
Weather cancellations happen and they’re the right call — we’d rather reschedule you than run a bad trip.

The very short version

Sunglasses, sunscreen, your phone, flat shoes. Add a jacket early or late in the season. Everything else is optional.

Book a Chatham seal cruise — about an hour, $45 adults and $40 children, departing from the closest harbor to the colony.