St. Kitts & Nevis - Facts
St. Kitts & Nevis FAQs
Pre-Arrival Boat: Pre-register with SailClear. See Clearance for details.
Pre-Arrival Crew: A visa is not required by citizens of many countries. See Immigration for further details. All crew must complete an online Customs & Immigration form in advance. See Clearance for details.
Where can I enter? Charlestown is the port of entry for Nevis. During the yachting season (Nov. to May) Christophe Harbour Marina is the most straightforward port of entry for St. Kitts. See Clearance for details.
Are fees high to enter by yacht? St. Kitts clearance costs are lower than those in Nevis. In Nevis, fees must be paid in cash. There are Customs charges and harbour dues to pay on both islands, but no Immigration costs. Marinas that have Customs and Immigration on site charge an Admin fee. See Fees for details.
What security concerns should I know about? Very little suspicious activity towards yachts is reported from this country. See Security for more info.
St. Kitts & Nevis Facts for Sailors
- The Federation of St Christopher (more popularly known as St Kitts) and Nevis is part of the Leeward Islands in the Lesser Antilles.
- St Kitts and Nevis are rather off the cruising track. It is a tough return beating against wind and current to more popular Antigua. However, the St Kitts Yachting Strategic Plan and the Yachting Implementation Plan 2017-2022 both aim at diversifying St. Kitts tourism product with a special focus on yachting and the marine services sector.
- The rebuilding of Port Zante Marina at Basseterre following hurricane damage and the opening of Christophe Harbor in the south of Kitts in 2015 has meant a considerable improvement to marina facilities.
- Although they do not abound in scenic anchorages, the islands themselves are extremely attractive and their interesting past makes visiting ashore a worthwhile experience.
- Facilities are very basic on Nevis where there are plans to build a small marina at Fort Charles, at the southern end of Charlestown. Another development is planned at the old Newcastle harbour, on the NW side of the island near the airport.
- For more information on supplies, see the Yachting Essentials section.
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We cleared in yesterday at Charlestown Nevis. We paid the expected $30 ECD to customs. Afterward I was guided to security to pay the port authority fee. I initally planned on staying about three weeks but was quoted over $900 ECD. I reduced my request to 10 days and was charged a total of $536.50 ECD, itemized as ANCH $134.00, HBD 360, ENVL $16, and PHT $26.50.
This was significantly more than I expected based on reading the cruising guide, and I have not been able to find any resources online that match this calculation. The person that took the money called someone else to determine the charges and did issue a detailed official receipt, but it was definately unexpected.
Thank you Roy for reporting this. Nevis Port Authority have confirmed:
The yacht mooring fees can be found on our website: naspakn.com/yachtmooring.
We also charge a head tax of $5 USD per person and an environmental levy tax of $4 XCD.
Further investigation with the help of Nevis Nautics who made a visit to the port authority offices, has also uncovered another fee – Port Dues – to by paid by every vessel, but for vessels under 150 gross tons, it’s only 60EC. You were charged 360EC, which clearly was too much. It also appears that you should be charged either the head tax, or the environmental levy, but not both.
We have detailed all these fees in our St. Kitts & Nevis Fees section.
Hi All,
Please find here the up-to-date informations(last week) about arriving by boat in St Kitts. I got that after inquiring to put my sailing boat ashore on SKMW boaryard.
It seems you’ll have to pay for everything (customs, taxes…etc) and not being allowed to put a toe on St Kitts island.
I wish you nice time on water.
Joel
Hi good day, Great News Guys
We are now allowed to accept three (3) vessels per day starting From Tuesday 07th July for hurricane season 2020.
Please note there are some very Strict Rules that goes along with procedure due to the Covid-19 situation. These are Government rules not SKMW. The different agencies will be present and controlling the operation with a zero contact by them.
¿ Boat owners are ask to make arrangements for someone to pick them back up on the same day due to the fact that individuals are not allowed to enter the Boat Yard or on land at all.
¿ Customs, Health &immigration paper work and fees along with the SKMW contracts and paper work and fees has to be done online 24 hours before you can receive a confirmation booking date and time for Hauling. Payments via credit card can be called in over the phone for your security or wire transfers can be done.
¿ Any vessel that arrives without booking or documents will NOT be accepted and the Coast Guard will make them leave the island.
¿ Upon arrival your vessel will be sanitized before it is placed in the yard for storage.
For information on:
Customs contact the officer1-869-762-8291
http://122.176.104.29:88 – Sail clearing
Longsmatthew@skncustoms.com ¿ customs
https://caricomeapis.org this is for vessel and crew registration for immigration
SKWM Office 1-869-667-8930 / 662-8930
Be advised that covid-19 has closed the borders…
February 18, 2020.
We’ve just cleared in at Charlestown, Nevis.
Reading all info and other documentations about the process may give you headache. In fact it is neither complicated nor painful. Officers were all professional, helpful and prompt.
First of all forget calling VHF Ch.16 to contact the Port Authority for a mooring assignment. It seems nobody listen, at least not for call from small vessels and there are no moorings that can be used. Simply anchor N or S of the main harbor dock.
Dinghy access at Charlestown is really limited and your only option is to tie up at the N side of the main commercial dock and climb up over those big tire-fenders to get to the dock upper side. If you’re lucky you’ll get help with that from a local port policeman like I did and all others that were clearing in at that time.
Customs/Immigration/Port Authority offices are located on an upper floor of the yellow building just outside the harbor gate to your right while exiting.
I pre-filed Advanced Passenger Notification on https://caricomeapis.org/. And contrary to a common lore nobody threatened no-one for not doing that. It can be done on the spot, just bring your laptop. There’s some public Wi-Fi net access there, too.
First go to customs. The only form I had to file was about illness status on my vessel. All other info came from my cl
earing out docs from the previous port of call. The fee was $30 ECS.
Next to immigration to get your passport stamped. At the last the port authority to pay your mooring fees and taxes, $112 ECS for two crew on 15.9m/53′ vessel.
We searched several sites and cruising guides and found information confusing and contradictory. Here’s what we did today.
After mooring about a mile north of the ferry docks last night on a clearly labeled mooring ball after hours we went to the customs building promptly at 8 am the next day. Everything was done for us by the woman at the computer who, while initially cold and unfriendly, easily became sociable and chatty when treated kindly. Bring cash, preferably small bills because she didn’t have change, for checking in. Next go to immigration. We never spoke to her or saw the inside of the office because it was being cleaned. She took our papers from customs and our passports and returned a bit later with paperwork completed. Then we went to port authority and paid for mooring and assorted fees. Bring cash again. All together I think we spent $50US and were treated very well. We were told that you can save some time and do paperwork online through RCS and APIS, but I wouldn’t bother.
This information is not quite correct. We cleared into St Kitts via Basseterre at the end of March 2019. The eAPIS spreadsheet was a nightmare to complete as it asks for ISO Country Codes and UNLOCode Seaport Codes without any guidance on how to find these – we eventually found them on Wikipedia, or you can download ZIP files from the eAPIS website http://www.caricomeapis.org. We then discovered that Immigration are not currently using eAPIS as their internet connection is apparently not reliable enough, so we had to complete all the information again on paper. Customs then announced that they are still using SailClear, which we hadn’t completed, so we had to fill in all the customs paperwork too. I have better things to do with my time, but Brimstone Hill Fortress made it worthwhile visiting St Kitts.
Message from John J Duffy – President, Caribbean Marine Association
Dear Sirs
Your website states that St Kitts & Nevis are using SailClear.com for yacht entry. Recently, the Caribbean Marine Association has been receiving complaints that St Kitts & Nevis have ceased using SailClear.com in favor of eAPIS.
In 2008 all the Eastern Caribbean countries and a few others met to agree that APIS was totally inappropriate for use by yachts and the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) issued a paper in which it was agreed to use an alternate system which became SailClear.com
For some reason, St Kitts & Nevis have decided to re-introduce APIS for yachts and several yacht skippers have been threatened with heavy fines for their failure to use APIS. As result skippers are now by-passing St Kitts & Nevis in favor of nearby ports which use the SailClear.com system.
Today March 6, 2019: we do agree entirely with the comment of “omeiomei” on Nevis.
Attitude has not changed so far :
First we risked our lives using the “dinghy pontoon” = a concrete structure where the wooden layers have disappeared
we spent 2h passing from “Customs” to “Immigration” to “Port Office” back to “Customs”: we filled out 3 times 3 different documents with all 3 same info about us and about the yacht: we had to pay EC$ 113 to port office & mentioned the awful condition of dinghy dock too but all we got was a smile …
Before leaving Nevis for St. Kitts we had to return to immigration with OUR computer to fill out an excel sheet with same info we already gave them before: the intention was a warning for St. Kitts & st; Barth that we were coming up !!!!!
We are now for 5 yrs in the Caribbean, never had an experience like this!
Hello, are there any temporary import fees involved with storing the boat here for up to a year? Thx!
Tom, I suggest you email the Customs department (see contact details above in Formalities) and also try messaging “paladin” below, who kept their boat during hurricane season at St. Kitts. Just click on their user name to get their member profile. I am sure St. Kitts Marine Works will probably be able to answer this question too. Please let us know what you find out so we can include it on noonsite!
I spent the last 37 years living aboard and the last 5 cruising around the world. By an overwhelming majority, I met educated and police officers, Customs, Immigration and helpful Harbour Masters. Sometimes they were very friendly, like in Western Samoa and St. Helena.
I was, therefore, more than surprised to be treated with such unpoliteness and total lack of concern in some of the Caribbean Islands. Only there, except for the Maldives, have I found such a level of vulgarity and hostility.
The immigration officer in Prickly Bay is very unpleasant, but most of the people are charming in Grenada. Just an isolated case. Nevis and St Kitts (on the other hand) are the worst.
Nevis: Waiting 15 minutes in front of a customs officer who played with her smartphone (just under the sign: no cellphones please), then started to eat a big hamburger before opening her mouth with so low a voice that you hardly can hear a sound, is an interesting experience.
Good Day Madam, Good Bye Madam, not a word of answer.
But the worst was to come at St Kitts:
I hope that the lady in charge of the immigration treats her dog better. Also eating a big and fat fast food just 8 inches from my documents, she ended up spilling her Seven Up all over my registration papers.
Not a word of apology, and a way to ask me to leave which obliged me to remain extremely calm and apparently not concerned.
I consider myself educated and, after 45 years of extensive travels, I think that I know how to deal with unpleasant officers. But Customs at Nevis and immigration at St Kitts deserve close attention from their respective Ministry if they want to see more sailboats visit their waters. I in that case saw much less than 20/30 years ago.
I will not come back to these Islands, except in an emergency.
I’ve been cruising the Eastern Caribbean for about 10 years, and stored my 35’mono hull at St. Kitts Marine Works for the hurricane season. I consider it the safest place to store boats for several reasons.
First, the boats are stored in excavated pits, lined with tyres and strapped down with large screw anchors. They are not going anywhere because they are already there. Unlike many other yards in surrounding islands, the boats are not jammed in so close that one failure doesn’t cause a chain reaction. No boats were damaged in the back to back hurricanes that devastated many other islands in the area.
Second, theft isn’t an issue here. The yard has full-time security, but it probably isn’t necessary. I did not hear of one instance of theft. In fact, I overpaid $4 when I initially paid my storage bill. When I returned four months later at the end of hurricane season, the bookkeeper chased me down in the yard to give me the $4!
Third, the yard has great prices and allows owners to do their own work. Reggie, the owner, knows his stuff and is always willing to lend a hand.
Check it out.
Sargassum hits St. Kitts:
Reported by Joan Conover 10 August 2017.
St. Kitts has its beaches full of Sargassum weed. There is currently no solution to this problem. An online site to track Sargassum weed via satellite images is in development – lots of discussions right now about what to do about this problem.
Search “Sargassum” on noonsite for latest news items.
We visited St Kitts and Nevis last May.
We sailed from St Martin and we spent the night at anchor in White House Bay flying the ‘Q’ flag, it was too late for Customs.
Very nice anchorage with good holding. WiFi is also available from the local bar on the beach, good for a beer at sunset.
We moved to Nevis the next morning and we picked up one of the mooring balls available. There are plenty of them.
We went ashore for Clearance with the dinghy.
There isn’t a real dinghy dock, but you can find a wooden dock that normally is used by fisherman. It’s possible to leave the dinghy here in the upper part of the dock, but not locked because they would need to move it if necessary.
We asked a police guard about this, he told us that it is safe to leave the dinghy there unlocked as there are a lot of cameras on the pontoon. We trusted him and nothing happened.
All the offices, Customs, Immigration and Port Authority, are on the first floor of the building just next to the pontoon in the Cotton Ginnery. You must visit them in the order listed.
We paid 30EC for Customs and 130EC for Port Authority (up to 20 tons).
The moorings are free of charge. It’s possible to anchor anywhere, also in front of the town just to the left of the Ferry Dock.
Posted on behalf of Christian Kleitsch – 26 October 2016
Just came back from a sailing trip in St. Kitts & Nevis. I cleared in at Basseterre, Marina Port Zante (customs) and at the cruise ship terminal (immigration and port authorities). I cleared in for 5 days for both St. Kitts & Nevis.
The fees:
Customs/Marina Port Zante: 30 USD
Port Authorities: 20 USD
Because we asked for clearance for Nevis the customs officers didn’t clear us out at the same time! We cleared out with the customs in Marina Port Zante a day before leaving St. Kitts. No fees for outbound clearance.
With immigration, we could clear in and out at the same time!
If you consider to drydock the boat during hurricane season I can recommend St Kitts Marine Work near Brimstone Hill on the southwestern coast of St Kitts. The boatyard is located on a field and is very simple. Not much facilities. But I must say it is the cheapest boatyard in the whole Caribbean. I have compared boatyards between Trinidad and Antigua. The solution to do a safe hurricane safe choking is to dig a hole for the keel and put the boat there and put some truck tires around the hull.
Easy and hurricane safe. Google on St Kitts Marine Works. The disadvantage is that there is no boat chandleries on the Island. You have to bring all stuff you need. Close to the boatyard (which is very remote located) is some good apartments for rent while you are working with shut down or the opposite. St Kitts & Nevis has daily flights to Miami. I have more info of my experience if somebody is interested. Give me a mail jan.o.h.guste@gmail.com
Update on clearing into St Kitts and Nevis: Customs now have an office in the Port Zante marina office (on the second floor of the yellow building). Customs fees were USD $12. There doesn’t seem to be a “cruising permit” anymore and they checked us in for both St Kitts and Nevis. As we were only staying a week, they also cleared us out at the same time.
You also need to stop at the immigration office and the port authority office. Both are located in the cruise ship “welcome building”, immigration on one side the port authority on the other. Port authority charged USD $13. No immigration fees. I asked about any need to check in at Charlestown in Nevis and was told that there was no need.
Cheers- SV Perry
http://www.svperry.com