My Top 10 Great Loop Anchorages

A list of my favorite anchorages along the Great Loop, including a few off the beaten path.

One of the biggest expenses of cruising the Great Loop is the cost of overnighting at marinas. Before I got my dinghy davit upgrade and struggled to launch my dinghy to take my pups ashore, I spent a lot of nights at marinas. Do It Now is only 32 feet LOA, but at $2 to $6 per foot, that can get expensive quickly. In fact, I figure that the money I saved by being able to anchor out more conveniently easily covered the cost of my new dinghy davit.

That said, I visited a lot of anchorages during the 464 days I was on the loop, especially after September 2023. While a lot of those anchorages weren’t anything to write home (or blog) about, others were spectacular — at least in my opinion. Here’s a list of my Top Ten with the reasons why I like them.

• Pelican Bay, Gulf ICW MM 25

  
  When Rosie gets hot enough, she’ll just lie down in the water.

  This is a bay between Punta Blanca Island and Cayo Costa, a short distance off the ICW, with several medium sized anchorages. It was recommended to me by liveaboard Looper friends Kenny and Rhonda. It was probably the best anchorage I stayed at, at least in Florida. Although there were lots of boats in there with me, I had easy access to two beaches: a small one very close to the boat and a larger one at the state park across the bay. What was nice about the anchorage when I was there in January 2023 was that the park was still closed from Hurricane Ian and there weren’t park visitors or rangers to keep us off the beach. My dogs could run in the sand — which they love doing — and I could hunt for shells, barefoot in the sand. I spent just two nights there but could have easily spent a week.

• Capers and Bull, Atlantic ICW MM 448.2

  
  I have quite a collection of small whelk shells that I gathered on the beach here. I let Jason have as many of the large ones as he could pack.

  I was traveling south with my friend Jason on board when we visited this one on a whim. I liked it so much that I visited again on my way north months later. It’s off the ICW on Price Creek, just before the creek gets to the Atlantic inlet. Anchor where a side channel meets the creek. There were lots of dolphins were feeding in the area when we arrived. There was surprisingly good holding in a strong tidal current. A dinghy ride down the creek to the beach on Bull Island yielded an amazing collection of whelk shells, empty and in pristine condition. There was no one else around and, other than early evening and early morning fishing boats, it was very quiet and calm.

• Kings Bay, Crystal River, FL

  
  Sunrise at Crystal River’s Kings Bay anchorage.

  My only regret about stopping at this anchorage is that I couldn’t stay longer. I dropped anchor in less than 10 feet of clear, calm water in a No Wake area. It was near the end of the day so I didn’t do much other than make and eat dinner. I left early the next morning, with buddy boater Nagui in Boundless, but not before the wildlife show. In the misty dawn air there were birds flying, chattering, and fishing. And although I didn’t see any manatee, I knew they were nearby, just under the surface. I had my morning coffee up on my command bridge and took it all in. If I hadn’t been on my way to Tarpon Springs, trying to beat out some bad weather expected on the Gulf of Mexico, I could have launched my dinghy and rowed up to the springs to see the manatee swimming there. This is a must-stop destination when I do the Loop again.

• West Palm Beach, Atlantic ICW MM 1022.2

  
  Nighttime from the anchorage at West Palm Beach.

  West Palm Beach has a pair of excellent free docks with a catch: you can’t stay overnight. Fortunately the area is surrounded by anchorage space. On my stay there, I docked at the northern dock, explored the town with a friend, and then found I could not cast off because of a very strong tidal flow pushing my boat into the dock. It’s a good thing I couldn’t leave when I wanted to because thunderstorms passed through the area and I definitely would have been in the path of at least one. By the time the tide changed and the weather cleared, it was too late to continue my northbound travels. So I repositioned to the anchorage for the night. It was easy enough to dinghy over to the dock in the morning to give my pups a break. I should mention here that this might be the only anchorage I stayed at that was walking distance to all kinds of shopping, including a supermarket.

• Cocoa North, Atlantic ICW MM 897.7

  
  There was a lot going on at Cocoa Village when we stopped there, southbound, in early December 2023

  Cocoa has a great little free dock — or at least it had one. My notes say that it’s closed for renovation and with all hurricanes that go through Florida, that does not surprise me. On one visit, however, when I couldn’t get a spot at the dock, I anchored nearby and took the dinghy over. The town has farmers market/fairs on Saturdays and there are lots of little shops and restaurants within walking distance. It’s also a great spot to watch rocket launches. (Mosquito Lagoon at MM 861.1 is another good spot and here’s a tip: you can get a lot closer to shore, where there’s a boat ramp (for easy access to land), than the guides suggest.)

• The Pool, Baie Fine, Georgian Bay

  
  A view of The Pool anchorage from the trail at Topaz Lake.

  I’d heard some great things about this anchorage and they were all correct. The Pool is a large, sheltered, calm, quiet body of water nestled into the mountains at the end of the Baie Fine fjord. There were quite a few boats in there, but plenty of room for my little Ranger Tug. Another solo Looper friend, Bob, anchored not long after I did. The next day, we went for a hike up to Topaz Lake, eating wild blueberries along the way. There are lots of trails in this area. I spent just two nights but could have stayed longer.

• Bad River Bay, Bad River Channel, Georgian Bay

  
  A view out to the Bad River Bay anchorage from the shore.

  I met up with some Looper friends at this remote anchorage at the end of Bad River Channel — or at least as far as you can go with a cruising boat. The area is criss-crossed with narrow channels, many of which have rapids, depending on water levels. I followed my friends through the Devil Door Rapids in my dinghy, banging the prop protector on a rock halfway through (with no damage to the prop). Beyond it was a maze of channels to explore, some of them with more rapids to navigate. I kept things simple and stuck to calm water, but you can easily spend hours exploring up there and I suspect the rapids disappear when the water levels are higher. At night, it was calm and quiet, despite the other 10 or so boats in the area. This one takes some guts to get to — be sure to follow the markers and then the depth indications on your up-to-date chartplotter. Well worth it, though. I’d go again and likely stay longer to enjoy the night skies. Be advised that there is no cell signal at all.

• Inner Bay, Go Home River, Georgian Bay

  
  Bruce and LeaAnne soaked in the Go Home River. I enjoyed buddy boating with them; it was so stress-free and they were just as interested in saving money as I was.

  I buddy boated with Bruce and LeaAnne on New Bearings — rest in peace, Bruce — around Georgian Bay and, one afternoon, we ended up in Inner Bay on the Go Home River. The anchorages we’d planned to stay at had a few too many people for our taste, so we cruised around until we found a suitable spot for us. What made this anchorage special — other than sharing it with Looper friends — was that we piled into our two dinghies with our pups and headed up the Go Home River as far as we could — a distance of nearly 2 miles. There was a little dock there and we parked. Then we hiked up a gravel road alongside a creek with rapids, discovering another lake at the far end. Leanne and Bruce went for a swim in the river while I watched with the dogs. (It has to be really, really hot to get me in the water.) The anchorage itself was calm and quiet.

• Kagawong, North Channel

  
  Bridal Veil Falls was a popular spot for locals to cool off in the summer. I enjoyed the quiet walk along the river to get there from the boat.

  Kagawong is a town on Manitoulin Island. There’s a marina, but they didn’t have space for me, so I dropped anchor nearby. The main feature here, other than a small town with a nice little museum and a few restaurants, is Bridal Veil falls, which is walking distance from shore. I walked along a cool, wooded trail on Kagawong River with my pups, eventually arriving at the falls, where dozens of people were soaking in the river and enjoying the mist on a hot summer day. It made for a nice stop. (Sadly, that’s also where I started experiencing symptoms of a bad sinus infection that haunted me for more than a week, but that’s another story.

• Bluff Point North (per Active Captain), Valcour Island, Lake Champlain

  
  Aerial view of Do It Now at Bluff Point North anchorage.

  This was a nice sheltered anchorage on the northwest side of Valcour Island. There were campsites on shore and a floating swim platform in the little bay. I stayed for two nights with no problems from a passing summer storm. Easy access to shore by dinghy where there are hiking trails in the woods. I did some hiking with my pups, visiting the old lighthouse (which was closed). It was a bit too buggy on shore for my taste, but not bad on the boat. Some small boats and jet skis came through one afternoon but the anchorage was, for the most part, quiet and calm.