1. A 25 ton is the lowest ticket the USCG will give regardless of how small a
boat you have sea time on. If all your time was on an 18 foot Boston Whaler,
you still get a 25 ton license.

2. If you own a boat, you can attest to your own sea time. The USCG never
checks. All you have to do is prove you owned the boat. You can then fill in
any amount of sea time and put in any location you want, even if all you did
was to live aboard at a mooring and never went anywhere. Heck, you don’t
even have to own a boat! You can have a friend sign off on your papers saying
you were on their boat for X number of days. The more days you claim, the
higher the license you can get...i.e. a Masters instead of just a 6 Pack.
Bottom line: NO PRACTICAL KNOWLEDGE NEEDED, NO EXPERIENCED REQUIRED !!

3. All sections of the test are multiple choice. All the possible questions,
and all the correct answers; and this includes the chart work, are available to
anyone. To pass the test you need only memorize the correct answers. You
don’t have to know or understand a thing. Most of the test is open book
anyway.

4. Near Coastal or Inland? Almost anybody who boats on the east coast will
get a Near Coastal, because they leave inland waters as soon as they claim to
have gone outside of the inlet. Only boaters around New England and the
Chesapeake have problems.

5. Most launch drivers have 100 ton licenses because 100 toners are a dime a
dozen. Perhaps they have some experience driving slightly larger yachts or
they have fudged on their applications. Either way, that is about the only job
you can get starting out with on a "YACHTIE" ticket. After that ,if you are in
the Keys, know how to drive a bigger boat, are sober, and can show up for work
on a regular schedule, there are often openings available on some of the sight
seeing cats, etc. While there is a fair amount of work if you have the
experience, the pay is very low. You might have to start out as a mate, or
relief, but you can get full time pretty quickly. Yachties are not often hired
to run big boats, etc., and on the smaller ones, if you are not a good driver,
everyone will know very quickly, and your "maritime career" will be over.
Charter boats are usually run by their owners, so there isn’t much work
available there.

6. Getting a license is really nothing more than getting a piece of government
paper and, for some perhaps, an ego trip. In the U.S. it has no meaning other
than to say you most likely fudged your application, paid to go to Sea School,
and are good at memorization. It has nothing whatsoever to do with competency.
At least with an automobile you have to take a road test to get a driver's
license.

CRW