Where boats move in Vermont
Lake Champlain is effectively the whole market. Burlington, Shelburne Bay, Malletts Bay and Colchester hold most of the slips, with Vergennes and Basin Harbor to the south and Grand Isle and North Hero up the island chain. It's a real sailing lake — masted boats are the majority, and the yards unstep them on site with a single crane and a fixed schedule.
Yard capacity is the planning constraint. Most Champlain marinas run one travel lift, and in the two weeks after ice-out and the two weeks before haul-out that lift is running dawn to dark. A transport date that isn't coordinated with the lift date isn't a date.
Elsewhere, Lake Memphremagog at Newport, Lake Bomoseen and Lake Dunmore are trailer work with narrow camp-road access. Interstate access statewide is I-89 and I-91, with Route 7 running the length of the Champlain shore.
Get a quote for your boat
Powerboats and cruisers
Center consoles, sportfish and cabin cruisers. Under 8’6” of beam it travels on ordinary plates; over that we pull the permits and plan the route around the bridges.
Quote a powerboat
Sailboats
Mast unstepped at the yard, keel cradled, air draft planned before the truck books. Tell us your rigger’s date and we schedule around it.
Quote a sailboat
Small craft and PWC
Jet skis, skiffs, tenders and anything already on its own trailer. The quickest to schedule and the cheapest per mile.
Quote small craftMoving in or out of Vermont
Ice-out is usually the first half of April on the broad lake, later in the narrows; haul-out starts the first week of October. Anything moving out of state should move in that quiet stretch from mid-October to March, when rates are lowest and the roads are the only variable.
The two common long runs are south on I-91 toward Connecticut and Long Island Sound, and the fall trip to Florida. Champlain boats going to salt water need the same bottom and hardware check any freshwater boat does.
Where a hull is not worth the cost of the haul, donating the boat is a cleaner exit than trucking it somewhere to sit again.
When trucking is not worth it
Boats coming out of long storage are the ones worth pricing carefully. If a hull has sat for six seasons and the quote to move it is climbing past what it would sell for, donating the boat is a cleaner exit than trucking it somewhere to sit again.
Still working out the details? The marine transport guide covers permits, prep and pricing end to end, and the FAQ handles the short questions.
Ready when you are
Tell us the boat, the two addresses and the week you have in mind. The quote comes back with the permit and access notes already accounted for.
