If there's one group of sailing skills that are most important to enjoying your time out cruising, it's those skills belonging to the category of 'anchoring.' When we left San Francisco we felt confident in our sailing, but definitely were weak in the anchoring category, and we paid for that, with uncomfortable nights, stress, and losing sleep, not what you want at the end of a several day passage. Since then, being anchored out for more than 3 of the last 4 months, we've had a little bit of insight into what makes for successful anchoring, and so we present a brief, pre-coffee, guide to anchoring, the practical and the theoretical.

Practical Stuff:

Gear
We're not going to go too much into the gear part of anchoring, because really you can find so much information about this stuff out there already. Our setup is a 45lb Bruce, and a 45lb CQR, 200 feet of high test chain, and then an additional 100 foot length of chain stored further aft. We've used both anchors as primaries, and they both have worked great. We are very happy to have all chain, not just for the weight, strength, and chafe resistance, but also because boats on all chain move much differently in the anchorage: we pivot around on wind shifts, but we don't sail all over the place the way boats on rode do.

A lot of people down here have the Manson Supreme or Rocna anchors, they also seem to work great (and for some reason the folks with Rocna anchors are always evangelizing about how amazing the anchor is...). A common setup we've been seeing is as big an anchor as you can comfortably carry, 100 feet of chain, and then a bunch of nylon rode.

Location
Before we left to go cruising we were always looking for anchorages with shelter from the wind. Now what we care about is shelter from the fetch (wind driven chop or swell). Your properly sized anchor setup will hold you tight through all sorts of wind, but even a few feet of chop hitting you on the beam or thereabouts can make your night very very uncomfortable. For a fantastic example of this check out Tao's website (shawnchris.blogspot.com) and look for their 'Rolly Anchorage' video.

Anchor Placement
Until you've gotten a bit of practice, one of the most stressful parts of anchoring will probably be placing your anchor in the right place so that your boat ends up where you want it relative to other boats, rocks, shoals, and expected wind shifts. Unfortunately we don't have very many helpful hints to offer on this, as it's something we are still working on. However, we do recommend getting into the dinghy and getting some distance away from your boat to take a look at the placement from another perspective. Usually when we do this we realize we are way off in the middle of the anchorage and are nowhere near anything we thought we were.

Other Boats
You are anchored in a beautiful little anchorage, there are a few other boats there, but you are all well spaced out, the sun is just starting to set, and you are enjoying a drink in the cockpit when....around the corner of the point pulls into view a 45 foot powered catamaran going 9 knots with music blasting, 4 kayaks on deck, a dinghy on davits on the back, and a boston whaler being towed behind. Like some sort of homing missile they head straight for you, split the difference being you and your closest neighbor and 'chunkachunkachunka' drop their anchor. All of a sudden you feel just the slightest bit crowded, and you have visions of a windshift putting them right on top of you. What to do?

Well it depends. We haven't been in an anchorage yet where there simply wasn't room for another boat. Starting from this assumption, take a look around, given the available space, are they really too close to you? Or would everywhere else in the anchorage put them similarly close to another boat? Our comfort level with other boats has a lot to do with the space of the anchorage, in a tight anchorage it's going to be tight between boats, but if someone gets in tight with us at an anchorage with plenty of room, we will ask them to move, there's just no need to be so close. Similarly, if the forecast is for settled weather, you might allow someone a bit closer than if you have a forecast for strong or shifty winds. On the flipside of this, if you are that boat coming in to anchor right before sundown, pay attention to the (not very subtle clues) your neighbors are giving you. If they are standing on the foredeck staring you down as you drop your anchor, chances are they are unhappy with your location. Up anchor and try again.

Anchor Waypoint
So, you are anchored, now you just need to stay that way and equally important stay re-assured that you are staying that way. Most GPS units have anchor alarms that set a circle from your location and beep if you move outside of that circle. This is handy, but it doesn't give you a lot of information aside from telling you that you have already dragged. We have taken to setting a GPS waypoint right where we drop the anchor (Julia is usually on the helm and as I start to lower the chain she just pops below to the nav station and presses a couple buttons to set a waypoint). When we are done anchoring we then use the 'navigate to point' functionality of the GPS to navigate us to our waypoint. The handy thing about this is it gives you both distance to your waypoint (which is where your anchor is), and also the direction to your waypoint. So, if you pop up in the middle night and it's dark out and you're bleary eyed, instead of standing in the companionway for 5 minutes trying to figure out where you are, you can look at the GPS and say 'oh, we are now 125 feet from our anchor, but we've swung around to the N side.' (When we can't get a waypoint directly at the anchor, we just set one wherever we first end up, as relative motion and distance can still be useful).

Theory:

The theory side of our anchoring guide is really just about trying to get your expectations for being anchored to line up as much as possible with the reality. When we first began, our expectations were more in line with land-based life than anchoring out. Namely, when we lay down to go to sleep we expected to stay asleep until we woke up in the morning, well rested and ready for the day. Some of the lowest moments of our trip have been when we were tired, expecting to get a good nights sleep, and then as we lay down in bed something happened that pretty much guaranteed a sleepless night. Talk about demoralizing.

Our first night at a new anchorage we set the alarm for 2 hour intervals, to get up, look around, and make a entry in our anchorage log (Location, Barometer, Wind Direction/Speed, Distance to waypoint, comments). We find that it's better to know you'll be up every few hours than to have some underlying anxiety about the anchorage, which can cause you to half-wake up even more frequently listening to the sounds of the anchorage and the boat wondering if you should get up and check.

When we go to bed at any anchorage, if there's any indication at all that something might change during the night, we'll do the 2 hour watches. If things take a change for the better we'll stop watches, if a change for the worse we'll increase the frequency.

We've also come to expect that some portion of the time we will not be able to sleep in the v-berth, and instead will have to use sea berths. This has been more common recently as many of the anchorages in the La Paz area become very rolly at night from the Coromuel winds. At first this really bothered us, as our expectation was that in a 'good' anchorage we would be comfortable enough to at least sleep in the v-berth. Now we realize that sometimes it's worth it (or the only option) to put up with a bit of rolling at night to be able to enjoy the beautiful location during the day (usually the rolling is less than being underway anyway). Just keep a focus on the positive reasons for being where you are, rather than dwelling on the fact that you are losing sleep. You can always sleep in late, you can always sleep in late, you can always sleep in late.

Whew, long blog post, but anchoring and life at anchor is probably the single biggest adjustment when you start cruising. As an anecdote to put it all in perspective. Yesterday we arrived at Isla San Francisco after a day of light winds and motoring. The popular anchorage on the island 'the hook' was fairly crowded with 15+ boats, and open to the Coromuel winds we expected that evening. We went around the back side of the island, to a much less common anchorage, where we were and Tao the only two boats. As we came up to anchor dolphins played around our boat, leapt clear of the water, and we could even hear their calls from the bow, we were actually concerned as we dropped the anchor that we might hit one of the dolphins. In the evening we shared a fantastic birthday celebration dinner for Shawn, and went to bed full and happy. An hour later a small swell started hitting us on the beam, rolling us a bit, and waking me up. I was up and down a few times, checking out the anchorage, making sure that the swell didn't portend anything worse to come, and then eventually my tiredness beat out the small swell, and I got to sleep. The anchorage though was so beautiful that even if we had not gotten any sleep, or had to leave in the middle of the night, we'd still be glad we had come.

Lat 24 50' N, Long 110 34' W