Proper Anchoring – Top tips!
Sailing and cruising can be compared by a lot of factors, perhaps the most important being proper anchoring. If you decide to rent a bareboat sailboat, catamaran, gulet or a motor yacht, You must know some proper anchoring techniques. Sometimes good anchoring is all that determines would you stay or float away. First of all let’s get into technical terms.
Anchor is a heavy object, or a tool you use on a boat to stable your boat in place on sea. Anchoring is an action of laying an anchor to the bottom of the sea and making your boat stable on the water. The most experience sailors would go far enough to call anchoring an art, or at least a skill that needs a lot of practice to perfect. There, now we can get into the fun part. Here’s some tips on how to anchor perfectly anytime.
1. Find a safe bay
First of all, it would be best if you can find a safe, calm bay sheltered from the wind. Watch the forecast, and be familiar with the upcoming weather . If the wind, or current direction changes, you might find yourself in a tight spot, so always find a safe spot
2. Account for depth and type of bottom
It’s extremely important to know the type of the seabed. Rock and sand react very differently to anchoring. You should never drop the anchor, but lay it down. Once it hit bottom, you should move slowly backwards to make sure the anchor “catches”. Also you should never leave too little of chain on the outside. The length of the chain should be considerably larger than the depth you drop the anchor at.
3. Point the bow to the wind
The wind should blow directly into the bow of your boat, and split in the middle, so that the surface it catches is minimal. This is also why an anchor is always positioned on the tip of the bow. The current will rotate
4. Adjust the anchor
Anchoring is a dynamic process! This is important because you should closely watch for the changes in conditions, and adjust the length and sometime even re-anchor. A great tip is to spot the surroundings such as rocks, trees on the shore or recognizable landmarks, and look out for movement of the sailboat according to them.