Caribbean Chartering Off-Season

More and more charter yachts are starting to stick around the Caribbean for the summer. Yes, that means during hurricane season, which starts June 1 and lasts through November 30, but we all know that hurricanes come and go just like blizzards. They are sporadic, and the days and weeks between them often include weather that is downright wonderful.

I once spent a week aboard the 132-foot Amels Monte Carlo in and around St. Lucia during the month of July. The Caribbean looked like a ghost town compared to visits I’ve taken in January and February, with open mooring balls scattered around the harbors like bags of strewn marbles. The weather, too, was a refreshing change from cruising in the Caribbean during those winter months, when I’m usually being battered by powerful Christmas winds. During my visit mid-summer, I enjoyed gentle breezes and air temperatures around 85 degrees—which at the time was about 15 degrees more comfortable than a scorching heat wave blanketing my home near New York City.
It’s impossible, of course, to gauge in advance whether your summer charter dates will coincide with a Caribbean hurricane, or if you’ll enjoy the type of weather that I experienced. The best thing to do when booking during hurricane season is to purchase travel insurance, sometimes known as trip insurance. Three companies favored by yacht charter brokers include Travelguard, CSA Travel Protection, and Travelex. All charge around $1,500 to $2,000 for coverage of charters costing about $40,000 to $50,000.
The fine print of your travel insurance policy will tell you what has to happen weather-wise for the coverage to kick in. Some policies may require a named storm to be within a certain number of miles of your destination, while others have alternative definitions of “severe weather” that apply. In most cases, you must purchase the insurance policy at least 24 hours before a storm is named—otherwise any hurricane losses are not covered. As long as you purchase on time, you can often recoup costs of everything from airline tickets to the yacht’s charter fee.
Your yacht charter contract, too, can offer some protections. There are clauses about “liquidated damages” and “force majeure” that may cover things like storms and yacht owner decisions to cancel a charter based on weather predictions or other factors. Different charter contracts include variations on these clauses, so ask your charter broker to explain the fine print before you sign.
Hopefully, you won’t need to invoke any of these policies or clauses, because most summertime charters in the Caribbean go off without a hitch. If your experience ends up being anything like mine, then you just may decide that the rest of the world is crazy for waiting until December, January, or February to visit the islands from Antigua to Grenada. If the weather stays on your side, then June, July, and August can be the best times of year to charter a yacht in the Caribbean.