Home Harbor, Thoughts on Anchoring

Owls Head Light at the north end of Owls Head Bay

From Rockland Harbor we headed south on August 25 through scenic Owls Head Bay, with its prominently perched lighthouse, to the top end of Muscle Ridge Channel. The channel tide would once again have been against us, so we took advantage of a light southeast wind to unfurl our sails and head northeast through Fishermans Passage. (We were determined to do more sailing than motoring, if possible, on this return leg of our coastal cruise.) Once clear of Crescent Island and some shoals, we tacked south, then northeast, and finally south again, straight toward the narrow entrance to Home Harbor at the south end of the Muscle Ridge islands. Home Harbor is well protected and quiet, a lovely bay surrounded by bird-perch rocks and bouldery islands. It seems infrequently visited, which suits us, and it's conveniently located on our way back toward Muscongus Bay to the west. We anchored and relaxed a bit in the cockpit. A few homes were visible on each island, and a dinghy and a small powerboat sat on nearby moorings, but for now, we were the only sailboat.

GPS track through Owls Head Bay (top), then tacking into
SE wind almost all the way to Home Harbor (bottom)

Before dinner, we climbed into the dinghy to explore the harbor and look for birds (and mushrooms, according to the photographs downloaded from Sue's camera). We went ashore on a small beach and wandered the shoreline and into the woods. The most common land bird by far was red-breasted nuthatch (we counted 35), but we also had great looks at a hard-to-see winter wren and a fledgling slate-colored junco being fed by its parent in a juniper bush. We were treated to an aerial contest between an adult bald eagle and an osprey: although larger and less agile, the eagle managed to get the osprey to drop its fish, which the eagle then snatched from the air and carried off. A resident merlin gave a great show chasing a shorebird (possibly a dowitcher) in dizzying zigags around the bay before finally giving up. Merlins are fast fliers, but the shorebird out-dodged it. Later that evening, we watched the merlin – or a merlin – go after a belted kingfisher. That would have been quite a catch for the small falcon. We lost sight of both of them in the gathering dusk, but the next morning, Curtis heard a familiar rattling call and said, “Ahh, the kingfisher lives to fish another day.” We also wished the merlin luck. It's tough business being a raptor.

Curtis birding in Home Harbor

Sue birding in Home Harbor

Fern forest

Yellow amanita?

Our Muir Hercules 1200 windlass

Spare 45-lb CQR anchor on port bow (foreground); working
35-lb CQR on starboard bow (background)

 A second sailboat entered Home Harbor just as we headed back to Cilantro, and we had the opportunity to watch them anchor. Sue admits that before taking some sailing classes and reading books about cruising, she really knew nothing about anchoring. She had only sailed small boats – who needs an anchor on a Sunfish? – and thought an anchor was just a heavy metal object you tied rope or chain to and threw over the side of the boat. Ground tackle? Scope? Holding power? Chain versus rope rode? Plow versus claw versus Danforth type? Electric or manual windlass? These were all concepts to learn and put into play. Cilantro has a Muir Hercules 1200 manual windlass, and we use a 35-pound CQR anchor as our primary anchor, with 30 feet of chain and 175 feet of nylon rode. A 45-pound CQR also came with the boat, but we don't have it set up to use. We store a back-up 25-pound Danforth with a mix of chain and nylon rode in a locker at the stern. All of this is probably adequate for our coastal Maine cruising, given the good holding and relatively shallow anchorages, but we are seriously considering switching to all-chain rode and, because this will be too much weight to lift manually, an electric windlass for the Sea of Cortez, where depths may be greater and the anchorages are not always well described.

View from above of both anchors on bow

We've watched quite a few boat crews set their anchors this week, and it's been a good way to see different methods and compare them with our own developing repertoire of skills. We've seen crews with windlasses and crews who lower and lift the anchor by hand or with the help of a winch. We've watched crews who bring their boat to a controlled stop into the wind, use an electric windlass to lower their anchor and all-chain rode in a straight line while backing down, reverse to set the anchor firmly, and finally rig a snubber line to take the weight of the chain off the bow roller and windlass. We've seen other crews power up to a spot, heave the anchor over the side (or drop it all at once from the windlass), then throw the engine into reverse and back down quickly and hard. Still others toss the anchor out while still moving forward – which seemed to us to be a less dependable method, since the anchor could start to set in the wrong direction and then be broken out or the rode could tangle on top of it as the boat drifts back downwind.

Patience seems to be an important factor in anchoring. Bill Creighton of Toda says he likes to let out some scope and wait, wait, wait while the boat drifts downwind, then let out more scope and pull it back in, helping the anchor to dig deeper. He might do this more than once. When he finally puts the engine into reverse, he likes to pull hard enough to feel anchor just start to move, then he waits some more. Nigel Calder (the former owner of Toda, when she was called Nada) recommends patience after anchoring as well. Before he is willing to load everyone into the dinghy for a trip ashore, he takes some bearings and then drinks a cup of tea, keeping an eye on the boat, the wind, the current, and the general environment for any potential hazards.

Curtis working our Hercules 1200 manual windlass

Especially in crowded anchorages, we've noticed that many cruisers in Maine anchor on very short scope, 3:1 or even 2:1, even though all the books we read before coming here advise 7:1 as ideal and 4:1 or 5:1 as adequate. We still prefer using more than 3:1 scope when we can, however, so we try to position ourselves in an anchorage accordingly. We've seen all kinds of approaches to anchoring on our short stint here in Maine, however – short scope, quick stop and quicker reverse, forward-moving anchoring, and throw it all over at once – and it has all seemed to work out OK for folks. We feel very fortunate to be getting our first anchoring practice in coastal Maine, where there are many recommended anchorages, the depths are well charted and fairly shallow, and the holding is generally good, usually a grayish mud. Weather and wind conditions during our cruising have also been benign. We've picked up and re-anchored a few times – twice in Dix Island, to reduce our exposure to current and to avoid swinging over lobster pots, and once in Seal Bay to put more distance between us and a neighboring boat – but it's all been character-building, especially for Curtis, who does most of the cranking.

Curtis using the washdown pump to spray
mud off the anchor as it comes up