A crewed catamaran in the Bahamas costs five times a bareboat one, and the reason is not the cooking. This is the one Caribbean cruising ground where local knowledge is a safety input rather than a convenience: the banks are shallow over enormous distances, the cuts run fast on the tide, and the anchorages are open to the direction the winter fronts blow from.
The published ladder
Read on 11 September 2026, The Moorings prices a seven day Exumas charter for two from 4,529 USD bareboat, a skippered charter package at 14,559 to 18,199, and a crewed charter at 22,619 to 49,919. It also prices a skipper added to a bareboat at 345 USD a night, which is 2,415 over a week. Those are three genuinely different products and the middle one is the least understood.
Skipper added, or crewed outright
A skipper on a bareboat at 345 a night takes a 4,529 week to about 6,944 and gives you somebody who knows the cuts. A crewed charter from 22,619 gives a larger boat, a captain and a cook, provisioning inside the price and nobody in your party on watch at any point. Between them sits the skippered package at 14,559, which bundles crew with a boat from the company's own fleet. The cheapest way to buy local knowledge is the skipper, by a wide margin.
What the crew is for here
Reading water color, which is how these banks are read when the chart is older than the sandbars. Timing the cuts at Conch, Dotham and Galliot so the tide is not running against a wind. Knowing which anchorage to be in before a cold front clocks the wind into the north west, which it does roughly weekly from November to March. None of that is on a plotter and all of it decides whether the week is relaxing.
Questions people ask about crewed catamaran charter Bahamas
How much is a crewed catamaran in the Bahamas?
The Moorings publishes a crewed Exumas week from 22,619 USD, up to 49,919, against 4,529 bareboat for the same seven days and two people, read on 11 September 2026.
Is a skipper cheaper than a crewed charter?
Much. A skipper added to a bareboat is 345 USD a night, so a skippered Exumas week lands near 6,944 against 22,619 for the cheapest crewed yacht.
What does the crew actually do that a plotter cannot?
Read water color over sandbars the charts are older than, time the tidal cuts so the current does not run against the wind, and know which anchorage to be in before a winter cold front clocks the wind into the north west.
Is food included on a crewed charter?
Normally yes, along with soft drinks and fuel within reason. Alcohol beyond a house allowance, marina dockage and the crew gratuity are usually outside the price, and the gratuity is conventionally ten to twenty percent.