Here is great resource for boaters on the Internet. You can now check the tide schedule for just about any place in the country.

Let's say you are planning an afternoon cruise and a stop at a local restaurant on the Manatee Pocket (FL) just inside the St. Lucie Inlet. You want to make sure there will be enough water to get there and dock safely. When you use the link to the Nautical Software - Tide Predictions website you will first be presented with a page similar to the one below.

Daily Tide and Current Predictions

Tide and current predictions are available for thousands of locations in North and Central America as available from NOAA and CHS. First, choose a general region from the Region list, and then enter part or all of a port, city, or location name in the location prompt. If more than one location matches, a list of matching locations is returned for your final selection.

Select Location for Prediction

Select day: Today or Tomorrow
Select prediction type: Tide or Current
Select unit type: Feet/Knots or Metric
Region:
Enter partial port or city name: or
for example, enter SEA to match SEATTLE and SEAPORT

Note: These buttons are for demonstration purposes only.
To use this form, you need to visit the site.

In order to begin your search, you first select Florida (NOAA) from the Region drop-down box. Next, since I am looking for information in the vicinity of the St. Lucie Inlet, I type in the partial name so that all reporting stations with that name are listed. Next I use the button to get all stations listed that begin with that name. From this list I selected Manatee Pocket and then hit the button. In no time, the program does its thing and you are presented with the information below.

Daily Tide and Current Predictions

You now have the tides for the Manatee Pocket. Study the graph above and you will see that you have all kinds of information. By the way, the yellow area represents daytime and the dark areas represent night. As you can see, the afternoon high tide occurs at 1701. This is just about the time you have planned your arrival so you should be able to safely navigate the entrance.

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