Open Pilot Guide

Open Pilot Guide is an open platform for publishing and discovering local maritime knowledge.

How It Works

1. Explore Locations

Browse the interactive map to discover slipways, anchorages, landing points, and other locations shared by contributors.

2. Contribute Knowledge

Create an account to add new locations or improve existing entries with practical local knowledge.

3. Knowledge Evolves

Entries can be updated over time, allowing local knowledge to improve as contributors share new information.

Preserving Local Maritime Knowledge

Open Pilot Guide brings together practical, place-based maritime knowledge that is often scattered across forums, outdated pilot books, or personal experience.

Open Access

Free to read and accessible to anyone. Anyone can explore shared maritime knowledge without paywalls.

Community Contributed

Anyone can contribute updates and local knowledge, helping information evolve over time.

Local Knowledge

Learn from people who actually use these places.

Our Story

Open Pilot Guide grew out of real trip planning and real use on the water. While preparing recreational sailing passages, it became clear that essential local information was fragmented, outdated, or difficult to access.

Practical details were often buried in forums, locked behind paywalls, or missing altogether, including which slipways a car could access, suitable islands for a short lunch stop, or wind directions that offered the best launching conditions.

This platform was built by someone who needed this information themselves, with the goal of preserving local knowledge in a clear, map-based, digital format.

Open Pilot Guide is designed as an open publishing platform where contributors can share and update local maritime knowledge over time.

Featured Locations

Explore the interactive map to see all published locations within Open Pilot Guide, or take a quick look at a few examples below.

Built for the Future

Digital-first, so local knowledge is not lost when printed guides go out of print.
Community-contributed, allowing practical local experience to be preserved over time.
Open access, so essential information is not locked behind paywalls.
Size-independent, applicable from small craft to deep-draft vessels.
Versioned entries, preserving the history of local knowledge and allowing updates over time.
Non-affiliated, shared without commercial or institutional bias.