Hart Miller Island

[skibum]

Hehe... I must have seen 6 boats stuck between HM and Pleasure Island, and my boating season didn't even start until July 29th! We saw one smaller boat head through there on plane - for a few seconds. It took all 3 people on board over an hour to push it back out into the deep. Later that day, we saw the same boat running through the cut on plane. He got lucky as he exited it to port about 30 feet before the last marker. If he hadn't been on plane, he would have got stuck again.

Just an FYI, the cut is a 6 MPH zone on holidays and weekends. You can go through as fast as you dare during the week.

Michael

 

[rhytid]

Man, I don't think I would ever go through the cut at more than idle speed... although I guess I would draw a shallower draft on plane...

I come out of the Back river and it's too much of a pain to go all the way around Hart Miller...

 

[270Dancer96]

Ok, I'm less than clear on what the different areas are being called. There's the channel from the south, the passage at the north end, and a deceptively open looking, but VERY shallow, area at the south end of the island just north of the channel. Which one of these are you referring to as the 'cut'?

This was what I was interested in - I was confused by the terminology used in this thread. Someone mentioned a "lighthouse" which is actually a range light, that is the tall maroon/white structure just south of Pleasure Island. I guess by the "cut" they mean the channel that brings you in from the Bay past Pleasure Island, with the range light to starboard as you proceed north.

Now to my question. I went to the Hart-Miller vicinity the weekend of May 17 08 and anchored between Pleasure and Hart-Miller Islands. AT LEAST three boats, one of them a nearly 30' cruiser, went out to the bay in between the two islands. Being curious, I headed out that way myself, but at idle speed. There are two markers (the same type as speed limit markers) but I couldn't read them. No issues until I sped up a bit after being well past the closest gap between the islands, while being closer to Pleasure Island, seeming to bump the bottom with my drive. No problem, I just slowed back to idle and continued until I got into deeper water.

In case you are wondering, my depth finder works like crap, which is why I don't have more detailed info. My question is, does anyone know whether or not this is a viable path in/out to the Bay, and what those boats I saw speeding through there might know?

 

[Overextended]

To be clear in my statement, my understanding of the cut and my claim that with our 40 inch draft we make it through the cut no problems I was speaking about the official channel that runs between Pleasure Island and Chuckhold (sp?) point (Dock of the Bay area). I have seen smaller boats run through the Pleasure Island and Hart Miller Island on plane at high speeds, especially some local watermen, but I would not attempt it in my boat.