Plow Anchors

The CQR, a favorite anchor among cruisers, along with the more modern version, the Delta, are anchors based on a farm plow. The idea is simple, plows dig into the substrate and digging deep into the substrate is a desirable feature of a good anchor. The problem with plow anchors is that they are plows.

Plows are designed to dig deep into the earth and pull through it, turning the soil to prepare the land for planting. Plow anchors do the same (except not for the subsequent planting).

An anchor dragging is characterized by the anchor not holding onto the bottom and sliding across its surface. Plow anchors don’t necessarily “drag” when they are set well, but instead “plow” the sea floor. This is what a plow was designed to do!

The problem comes in when someone anchors with a plow anchor in an anchorage. Other yachts are anchored with good anchors that hold in place while the plow anchor slowly plows the sea floor. This means that the yacht anchored with the plow anchor will slowly meander through the anchorage and potentially into other yachts!
While snorkeling in Formentera, I noticed a 30 foot sailboat that was anchored in shallow sand with a CQR. I was looking for treasures in a small patch of seaweed near the sailboat and noticed that in a 20 minute period, the sailboat had moved significantly! So did the CQR anchor.
There was minimal wind and the anchor was not under any load. The chain fell from the yacht vertically to the bottom and then turned a 90* angle to make its run to the plow anchor. Under no load, the anchor was making a huge plow mark on the sandy bottom!

After seeing this, I began noticing many long plow marks on the sandy bottom. Some were hundreds of feet long! On the clear morning before any wind had picked up, you could clearly see the sandy bottom and the cross cross of plow marks left in the sand.

Plow anchors were a popular anchor when they first came out and created quite a following behind them, but their favored use was due to personal opinions and the lack of actually good anchors to choose from. Now there are modern anchors that really do hold well and keep your yacht stationary in the water.

These roll bar anchors will stay put, even as the wind changes direction or the tide reverses. They will stay where they are and keep you safely anchored to the bottom!

Please, for the sake of everyone around you, please stop using plow anchors.

Knowing where to work

For a long time, we have wanted to switch our only non-self tailing winch to one that is self tailing. This winch is on our boom and is very important while you are reefing in a blow. Having a self tailer would literally free up a hand!

The problem is new winches are expensive, so the project got put onto the back burner until we happened across an affordable winch. For 3 years, we have searched every consignment shop in 5 states, and 8 countries, all looking for the right winch.
One day in Almerimar, Spain, a fellow cruiser was having a yard sale on the back of his boat. He was changing gear and systems and selling the unused components. They had winches, but they were much too large or not self tailing, so once again, we had no winch to complete our project.
The night before they left, he came by our boat with one more winch that he was selling: an Andersen 12ST.

The family was doing some questionable modifications to their boat, such as removing all the booms from their ketch and replacing all the sails with Genoas. I know, it sounds strange and I personally don’t think it would work out too well, but he was selling the winch that was on the boom he had just removed!

Best of all was the price! They were heading towards the Americas and wanted to sell it for US Dollars, so we paid him $60 for this used but very functional winch.
Now we had the last of the components to install the winch on the boom!

I began removing the boom in the morning to mount the new winch on the side of the boom when I ran into a small problem. The screws at the front of the boom were rather seized on there. I tried to force them off and started to strip the head of the screw. I could cut the head off and replace the screw after but I needed to secure a replacement screw first.
This was the next roadblock. We are in Spain and our boat uses imperial sizes fasteners. The closest machine screw to what I need is an M6, but an M6 does not fit because the thread count is different. I stopped the project and put everything back where it was, and all the bits and pieces of the winch project will be stowed in a bag for when we arrive in a country that sells imperial fasteners.

How much work is Cruising?

The simple answer is: as much work as you want it to be.
When we started planning our cruising life, we wanted to enjoy the destinations as much as possible. This meant that when we got somewhere we would leave the boat and explore the land. To do this simple activity means that you can’t be fixing your boat when you get somewhere. We all have a finite amount of time and how we spend it is up to us. We can either be enjoying our time or repairing things with our time.
How do you fix less things? Have less things to fix!

We planned for simplicity. The less we have, the less we have to fix. The list of gadgets on a typical cruising boat is long, but the common items we hear other cruisers talk about fixing are:

1. Diesel motor

2. Generator

3. Water maker

4. Computer and on-board internet access

5. Bow thruster

6. Furlers

7. Chart plotter and instruments

8. Electronic autopilot

9. Dinghy outboard

10. Inflatable dinghy (usually peaking air somewhere)

11. Propane stove

To keep our cruising life simple, we simply did without.
Electric motor instead of a diesel, no generator, no water maker, no computer, no bow thruster, no furlers, no chart plotter or instruments, no electronic autopilot, a hard dinghy with oars instead of an outboard, and no propane stove (we did alcohol instead because it can burn a wider variety of fuels, meaning we can get fuels anywhere we go).

This meant that when we got somewhere, we were there and nothing complicated or time consuming could be broken that would distract from where we had just arrived. Well, life without is rather difficult and we kept it up for about a year, then we have in to the life of convenience.

The items we have added from the list are very limited, but we did give in.
First, we added a generator because sometimes the sun is hidden away for a long time and the batteries just need charging, especially when you have an electric motor.
The next thing we added was an outboard motor because rowing over a mile with currents and winds gets old really fast! Next, we switched from a hard dinghy to an inflatable because they are so much lighter and we can pick them up by hand to put them on the deck instead of a complicated lifting contraption. Lastly, we got chart plotters (Navionics on our phone).
All of our additions have one thing in common, they are disposable.
A built in chart plotter is expensive and goes obsolete in a few years. A plotter on your phone gets updated every time you get a new phone. This means that you have no installation and you get modern software with a simple app update.
We bought a small (cheap) inflatable and outboard that we can simply replace when they start giving us problems instead of constantly fighting a losing battle of time. The generator is also a small (inexpensive) portable unit that we can simply replace when it starts to give problems.
By keeping everything simple, we can enjoy where we go instead of slaving over the boat. As you plan to go cruising, be sure to keep in mind the reason you are going cruising. The less you have, the less work you will have and the less expense you will have!

Peeing off a boat

Nature calls, especially when you are out at sea! Some ground rules come into play:

1. Never pee into the wind (don’t pee off the high side of the boat)

2. Hold on while you pee so you don’t fall over!

The first rule means that you need to pee off the low side of the boat and aim towards the downwind area. If you are going downwind, the shrouds are a good place to pee. If you are going upwind, the stern is a good place to pee. 

The locations play into the second rule: holding on. 

While you are peeing, you need to keep a secure hold on the boat. The best way to do this on a pitching deck is to lean into something secure, like the rigging. 

I personally lean into the stay with my shoulder and chest and take a leak off the side. The shrouds are nice because there are a lot of them and I feel very safe nestled in there with them, the stern is a different story. 

On our boat, we have split backstays so each stern corner has a stay to lean against. This means that either corner is a safe place to water the ocean’s surface. I just peed off a boat on my way to Ibiza with a single (central) backstay. The stern was completely barren of handholds or chest supports! I ended up grabbing onto a topping lift attached to the davits to hold safe. 

If you are looking at a boat to go cruising on, consider one with split or twin backstays that way you can safely take a leak off the stern. 

Furling Vs. Hanks

Sails that are hanked onto the stay are a traditional system that has worked for centuries. The problem with it is the sail never really “goes away”. It’s up or down, nothing in between and when it’s down, it’s all piled up on the deck or boom.
Roller furling is the modern alternative where the sail wraps up around a tube that is positioned either over the stay or inside the spar. The sail can be furled or unfurled part way giving you unlimited variability in the sail size. When you want to put the sail away, it just wraps up and disappears. When you want the sail out, you just release it and never need to hoist the sail up against the force of gravity.
This all sounds very convenient, but what about when something goes wrong? With hank on sails, the sail goes up and down the spar or stay. If the halyard breaks, the sail will fall because of gravity. If the hanks get stuck, they will not slide and the sail will not want to move. Hanks on a stay are almost impossible to get stuck and if they do is because they have lost their shape and need to be replaced. They can be yanked hard to get them to break free and come down, but bronze on steel make for a slippery combination that almost never gets stuck. Hanks on a spar can get stuck, as the sail slides can resist movement on the mast track or get fouled up in the fasteners attaching the mast track to the spar. Different systems exist with differing prices and differing levels of headaches. The cheapest is an external metal mast track where metal slides hook on and secure the sail to the spar. This setup is inexpensive and very secure, but requires maintenance to keep it all moving smoothly. The sail will always go up but might struggle to come down if there is enough wind pressure on the sail. We use this setup on our boat for the storm trysail and it has proven itself reliable.
A more expensive option is a plastic track by Tides Marine where the sail slides are bronze or stainless steel. The setup is very slippery and the sail will always move up and down with ease. In storm force winds (over 45 knots in our experience) we were able to lower the mainsail just by pulling on the downhaul even though the boat was heeled over pretty far and the wind was technically “blowing the sail up” as the wind was blasting it from foot to head!
Some spars come with internal mast tracks where plastic slides fit into the key way on the aft edge of the spar. These work, and are the cheapest of all setups (because it comes with the mast) but it is also notorious for getting stuck on the way up and down. Many people who have this setup will switch to an external track to make life easier and sailing more enjoyable.
Furling systems offer the ease of working everything from the comfort of the cockpit as all the control lines are led aft. This means you can easily steer and work the sails without getting up!
While it might sound convenient, you must also think about “what if” scenarios. More parts means more failure points. It’s not just a halyard and some hanks keeping your sail up and set, you have an entire machine to worry about!

While on a passage with a friend, the mizzen sail got stuck upon deployment. The sail started to come out but then stopped! The skipper had to go on deck and yank the sail out of the slot in the spar where the sail was pinched. The sail was new, so it wasn’t a shape issue, instead it was as simple as the sail not being fueled up tight enough the last time it was put away so the furled sail was pinching on the walls of the spar until it got stuck. The sail would not come out but worse yet, would not go back in! In a storm when you need to reduce sail, having a sail stuck part way is a horrible fate!
On that same sail, the Code 0 sail on its continuous furler gave some serious troubles. The sail simply did not want to fuel in as the winds started to build. Wrestling a Code 0 in winds over 20 knots is an impossible task for 3 able crew as we struggled for some time to get it to yield to our commands!

What happened was the sail had so much pressure that it pressed against the furled Genoa. When we finally got it to start to furl, the Code 0 sucked the Genoa sheets in with it, so we needed to unfurl it and free the sheets; but the wind was stronger and everything was stuck! We eased the halyard to get the luff to pull away from the Genoa, which worked but then the furling line kept falling off of the continuous furler. With the luff tight, it pressed too hard on the Genoa, luff loose it could not furl either. The winds continued to build so we deployed the mainsail and set upon a broad reach to try and blanket the Code 0 to reduce the pressure on it, but this had us sailing straight for a lee shore at 8-9 knots! The Code 0 was so big and effective that the dirty wind from the mainsail was still too much pressure for the furler to operate, so we decided to take it down open like an old time sail. This was a huge mistake!
As we eased the halyard and sheet to bring it onto the deck, the sail became even more powerful as the luff billowed and the sail filled. The power in the sail was tremendous as we rocketed towards shore even faster. We couldn’t turn into the wind because the sail could foul on the rig and make matters even worse so we continued to try with no avail.
The sail began to flog and yank on the yacht as it pulled us towards our destiny with terrible fright! We decided to try again the original way and got the Genoa sheets clear, tightened the halyard, and installed the furling line. This time, the sail furled in with reluctance and we were able to veer off from our course towards land.
It was a frightful experience that thankfully caused no loss to the sail, yacht, or crew. The skipper claimed that if he were alone, he would have needed to release the sail into the sea because it would have been impossible to recover alone on the boat. The Code 0 is of similar shape to our Drifter, but our Drifter is hanked onto a stay, so releasing the halyard brings the sail down without allowing the luff to billow out. The further it comes down, the less power it has. On the Code 0, this proved the opposite, as it came down, it increased in power! Free flying sails are a lot to handle (ask anyone with a spinnaker which sail is easier to bring down: spinnaker or jib) and adding a furler means that when anything fails, the sail becomes a powerful free flying sail!
Sadly, this was not an isolated experience, for the next day in very light wind, we set the Code 0 again, and took it down long before the winds built up like last time. As it furled, the torsion rope got stuck and stopped furling as the electric winch continued to pull on the furling line. When we eased the furling line to fix the furler, the torsion rope spun straight and wrapped both furling lines tightly around it and completely obscuring the furler. Now we had no access to work on the furler! We managed to reach the winch with the continuous loop and put the whole thing on the winch to force the furling line off the torsion rope, then under tension, fix the furler, then continue furling it back in. What if the winds built faster than we could work? What if a squall came up? What if the skipper was alone and didn’t have us or anyone else to help?

While furlers are very convenient, the problems they can bring far outweigh the inconvenience of raising a sail in my opinion.