One of the traditional sailing skills that gives me pleasure when cruising is "sailing off the anchor" and "sailing on the anchor". Sailing off the anchor means leaving the anchorage without using the sailboat's engine. Sailing on the anchor means anchoring without using the sailboat's engine.

Before cruising sailboats had auxiliary engines they had no choice except to sail on and off the anchor. But today I see almost all cruising sailboats come into and leave the anchorage with all sails dropped, running the engine both ways.

One reason most cruisers today do not sail off the anchor is because they use an electrically powered windlass to raise the anchor, which requires running the engine. S/V Ubiquity has an electrically powered windlass, but I have never used it in powered mode to raise the anchor. I always raise the anchor manually by grinding (turning with a winch handle) the windlass by hand. I figure it is good arm exercise for me, saves wear on the windlass motor, saves the batteries, and does not require running the engine. Plus I can sail off the anchor.

So Ubiquity often sails off the anchor. If the wind is blowing the boat offshore, it is easy. We raise the anchor, Ubiquity starts moving offshore and gains steerage under bare poles, and we leisurely raise sail to speed up. If the wind is blowing Ubiquity onto a lee shore, or perhaps some nasty reefs, the captain and crew of Ubiquity confer first about the procedure. Typically, we raise the mainsail at anchor and then the captain grinds the anchor chain in while the crew flakes the chain in the chain locker. When most chain is in the captain calls the crew to man the helm. The captain grinds in the remaining chain and stows the anchor. After the anchor breaks loose the crew sails the boat to windward, under mainsail, following the agreed course to clear the shore hazards.

Sailing on the anchor can be harder, but is easy for an open roadstead type anchorage, especially if the wind blows offshore. Whatever the conditions we first furl the headsail to reduce speed when coming into the anchorage. Then if the wind blows offshore we will tack under mainsail until reaching the desired anchoring location. The captain will then ask the crew manning the helm to steer into the wind as the captain goes forward, quickly drops the mainsail, then drops the anchor as the boat comes to a stop and the bow starts blowing off the wind. When I stop letting out chain the ground tackle (anchor plus chain) will pull the bow back into the wind and hopefully set the anchor.

When sailing onto the anchor with the wind blowing onshore, or in a more crowded or tighter anchorage, after reaching the desired anchoring location I may either drop the mainsail and lie ahull before anchoring, or heave to (Ubiquity heaves to well under mainsail alone) with the mainsail up and then drop the mainsail before anchoring. Either lying ahull or hove to Ubiquity will lie fairly still in the water, making very slow leeway, giving time to attend to the mainsail before anchoring.

There are other ways to do it of course, as described in the sailing books. You can set the anchor more dynamically under sail, perhaps eliminating the need for what I discuss next. But these procedures we use on Ubiquity we like, and feel very calm and controlled.

Now the bad part. After sailing onto the anchor I always ask myself if I should run the engine to make sure of a good anchor set. Even if I feel great about the sailing on the anchor, when I ask myself if the anchor should drag, with some consequent problem, would I feel stupid that I did not take the precaution of backing down on the anchor with the engine, I answer yes. So I besmirch the purity of sailing on the anchor, perhaps after sailing off the anchor in the morning and not using the engine all day, by running the engine.

Hal Roth himself, a famous sailing author and cruiser, who espoused the skill of sailing on and off the anchor, said that perhaps the most important role of the sailboat auxiliary engine was to test and set the anchor. So purity is nice, but protecting your boat is nice too.