Anchoring in anchorages and plowing a channel…Oh well
14 May 2012 | Gibson Island, Md.
Tim,
Anchoring in anchorages and plowing a channel…Oh well
So, incase you have ever wondered what happens when you take a boat that draws ~5’8” through a “channel” that shows 3’6” on your depth gage. I can fill you in. Nothing but higher blood pressure and a little anxiety if you happen to be leaving Gibson Island in the Magothy. Lots of mud. Turned left about 10 ft and we were back in 8’ of water. No harm no foul.
Tina and I left the slip Friday about 3 minutes after I got to the boat and spent mother’s day week-end out on the bay from Friday to Sunday afternoon. Friday we had the head sail out in 20 kts as we cleared the marina. Sailed at ~5.5 kts all the way to the red channel marker for white rocks and we were at anchored before 8pm. Sitting in the cock-pit with music, drinks and a light dinner for the evening. Pat the cat made an appearance top-side and all is well with the world. One power boat in the anchorage for the evening with us.
Saturday we waited on the breeze to pick up and headed out with Tina at the helm and Pat the cat below. Wind was from the south at 17-20 kts and we had all three sails in the wind by the time we cleared white rocks. I did disconnect the staysail shroud so that tacking would be easier. We took a hard look at heading to the eastern shore up to Rock Hall or Swan Creek.
Looking at the charts just did not give me a good feeling about finding a decent place to set the hook if there were many other boats out. So we sailed across the bay then turned back and aimed at the Magothy. Curt and Cathy of Five and Dime, have talked about anchoring at Gibson Island so we thought we would try that out.
We motored through the Gibson Island channel about 4pm and it is narrow and a little thin but we went slow and poked through. We did get a little too far north on the channel but a local home owner waved us out and we didn’t have a problem. The anchorage is great and we can see why Curt and Cathy love it. It’s large, reasonably protected with woods on three sides and a horse farm on the 4th. There were about 12-15 other boats when we arrived including a 5-6 boat raft.
We set the hook in ~10 feet on ~50 feet of chain and settled in for the evening. There were about 6-8 more boats that came in to anchor including two sail boats that thought anchoring ~40 feet directly in front of us was a good idea. Right over top of our anchor. After I asked them what time they were planning on leaving in the morning so that I could retrieve my anchor from under them, they decided to re-locate, as a raft. They wanted to sleep in on Sunday.
Sunday we were up and moving before 9 am. I knew the channel was narrow and we were unfamiliar so I went really slowly through and had Tina monitoring the depth gage for me. We plowed the mud, turned a little left, stopped plowing and motored the rest of the way out with out a problem. Got on the Bay and had exactly ZERO wind. So we motored up to the Patapsco and when we made the turn a bit of breeze started. Tina raised the sails herself and we gave it a go. We wallowed around for a couple hours with the sails up. (At one point the boat speed indicated 0 and the GPS showed 0.5.) We doused the sails lit the fire and motored on in. Hit the slip at ~1:30, Steve from Meant to Be, helped with the lines, Tina recovered the boat hook and we washed the top-side then our selves. Invited John and Nance from Green Flash for a sundowner then met with Monique and Maurice for dinner and survivor final episode (and a few drinks) then to bed.
All in all a great week end.
Have a great day all.
Tim