Now Playing: Paradise Cove - Anchoring Tip
After spending a week in Paradise Cove I was pretty sure I was hooked well. I prefer a Bahamian Moor, that is: Two anchors deployed off the bow, one towards the south west, one to the northeast. Supposedly, this gives you eighty percent holding power on each by itself but adds up to 160 percent when the wind swings the boat between the two.
There is a problem with this technique in that as the wind shifts, the anchor line from the slack anchor can hang up on the hull, the keel, prop or rudder. It can at least sand away bottom paint on the underside of the bow.
The boat just has to swing the wrong way when the wind shifts for this to happen. Then you are robbed of the holding power you can get of hanging between two anchors on a strong prevailing wind.
A certain amount of twisting of the lines is also inevitable as the boat circles in the changing winds.
Untwisting the lines each day by passing the line on deck around the tensioned anchor line takes a few minutes.
I have a one inch line with a big swivel, shackle and rubber snubber for attaching chain bitter ends to two or three anchor rodes. In shallow, tight anchorages, I could lay a pretty strong storm mooring with three anchors and chain.
The idea is too lower the three rodes on one or two lines below your keel so the boat can swing unobstructed and the lines don't twist.
I was wracking my brain for a solution to using long nylon rodes and a swivel. I did buy thimbles (tear drop shaped steel inserts to wrap the line around) for the bitter ends of my two main rodes. I may install them for a future worse case storm where I'd lay out all 350' of each rode.
Most anchorages don't allow you to lay those lengths without dropping a line over someone else's line. If they leave before you there will be problems and words. If someone new comes into the anchorage, they will most likely lay over your line. Some tangling is inevitable. More problems and words.
After three days on two anchors off the bow, the slack line deployed to the northeast did hang up on my rudder. In spite of tensioning up both rodes earlier, the strong afternoon west wind probably straightened out the chain or dug in and dragged enough to slacken the other line. The line from the deck to the rudder was very tight, stuck. The side of the hull was struck broadside to a strengthening night east wind. Diving on it at ten at night to untangle it wasn't desireable.
I didn't want my prop or strut bent if that's where I was snagged, so I loosened up the other anchor and pulled the boat back thirty feet to take up some slack line and walk it around the back stay and up to the bow on the opposite side to the bow. This took the tension off whatever had snagged below. The boat swung around to the wind and hung perfectly on the two anchors.
The next morning I suited up and took a long time making the plunge into the cool fall water. A small school of Dolphins passed by the boat. Then I jumped. They kept going. The anchor line had simply passed between the prop and the rudder. I pulled it out in a second.
I finally came up with a sort of swivel-like solution to keep the lines from fouling on the hull or underneath the boat. I took out a 20 lb. dinghy anchor with 15 feet of chain and 30 feet of 1/2" line. I attached a stainless steel carabiner that has a reinforced
eye, using the bolt for the shackle to the chain to attach it.
I opened the carabiner, put both anchor rodes inside it and lowered the dinghy anchor 15 feet below the keel. All extended lines were now out of the way of the boat. My holding power was now increased because of the lower angle of the scope. Remember what a SENTINEL does?
The boat pivoted nicely for the next four days. It would untwist as much as it would twist. There's a balance in nature, even with it's winds. I pulled it up each day to check for chaffing and then shifted it several inches in depth to avoid chaffing any one spot of line.
I trusted this set-up for a day of work in town. I don't like leaving the boat at anchor unless I can keep an eye on it every few hours. Boats are like small children and dogs. If they can get into trouble they will. I'll cover that adventure next time.
Noel Diotte
coverunner@tmo.blackberry.net
310 376-7057
Coverunner Radio - Ocean/Island Music
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Sent wirelessly from the sailboat, "Shearwater" off the Southern California coast.