Anchoring

At 17, I bought my first boat. It came with a custom made, hand crafted, cement filled coffee can with a loop of steel protruding from the top. It wasn't much but it did the trick for keeping my 16' Lone Star Arrow somewhat still on a calm day. If there was any breeze, I was going with it, slowly, but there was no holding that boat back.

The kind folks at Paul's Marina, back when they were off Westerville Road, showed me a 15 pound "Navy" type anchor. I was excited to try it out and see if I could get the boat to stay above the blips my old Humming Bird. (The type with the circular depth gage and flashing blips) We'll in my haste to try out my new equipment I tied a half a$$ knot and sent my new anchor to the bottom of Hoover. It's near the underwater ridge just west of Lake of The Woods. I learned to do an eye splice with a stainless thimble inside and two weeks later, I bought another anchor.

I was never happy with that anchor and after many years sold that boat and got our 1963 15' JetStar. She came with two fluke anchors that I thought were a joke! They could not have been more that 5 pounds each and there was no way this was going to keep the boat still. I went out and bought another one of those 15 pound "Navy" anchors!

Over the years, we spent a lot of time starting the motor back up, weighing the anchor, and going back to where we started. In 2012, I met some folks at Papa Boos in Buckeye Ocean that told me about The United States Power Squadron. They talked about the classes, the trips, the camaraderie. It was their passion and enthusiasm that got me to look into joining.

We joined and the first seminar I took was Anchoring and WOW! I didnt know a thing about anchoring! I spent years finding the spot I wanted, threw the anchor into the wind as far as I could and tie it off.

Nine years and three boats later we are a bit more elegant about anchoring. We find our spot, I get the bow into the wind and we go forward about 7 times the depth. I call out to Capt'N about what length of rode to pay out and we start backing up. Once we are near our desired spot, I stop all movement, she ties it off, and we reverse to set it.

The key to anchoring is to keep the pulling force as horizontal as possible. This is usually accomplished with some heavy chain and enough rode to pay out the proper scope.

America's Boating Club has a Boat Handling and Anchoring Seminar that will teach you how to anchor and what types are going to be best for your conditions.