Shortly after our downtown anchoring fiasco, we learned yet another valuable lesson about anchoring and boating in general. Yep, the old line wrapped in the propeller trick. Our dear friends Lynn & Tony had an outside tie at a marina on Hayden Island.  They told us about a calm little anchorage just outside of the marina and suggested we stay there while doing some work on their boat since it’d be a short dinghy ride back and forth. The anchoring went smoothly and we had a great holding, letting out plenty of scope this time.  The next afternoon, we got ready to haul up the anchor and head out.

Since we prefer learning things the hard and stressful way, we pulled up the anchor line until it was taught then, without noticing that the line was not straight up and down as it should have been but instead pulled tight against our hull and headed straight back, put the engine into gear with the intention of driving over the anchor to pull it out. This is a commonly used method of breaking a well-set anchor free but it’s important to make sure your anchor line is clear of your prop and you’ve pulled in as much rode as possible by hand or windlass.

A terrible sound from under our cockpit, followed by a lack of forward momentum told us that our plans had been cut short.  It turns out, the anchor line had slid in between the keel and the rudder and slowly wrapped itself around both as we spun in the calm anchorage. As the engine was put into gear, the line wrapped around our propeller enough times to pull the anchor out of the ground. Now we were adrift, with our poor little prop holding the weight of the anchor, no wind to sail out of it and a slight current pulling us slowly towards some rocks and pilings.

In this scenario, we should have tossed out a backup anchor but being the ill equipped, novice sailors that we were, we did not have another anchor on board. By some miracle, our other friends Chris and Anna, who were headed into the same anchorage in their Cal 33, happened to arrive while this chaos was unfolding. We called them over and explained the predicament so they dropped their anchor and let us raft up to them.

Now that we were secured, we had to assess the damage below. Again finding ourselves ill equipped, we had to dinghy over to Lynn & Tony’s boat to borrow a dive mask from their cockpit. We were able to cut the line from the prop and were happy to see that the shaft had not been bent and the propeller appeared to be undamaged. We were also able to retrieve the anchor, hooray!

By this time, it was dark and we were exhausted so we decided to stay the night there, tied off to Chris and Anna. They had to leave for the night so were happy to have us there to keep an eye on things. Before going below, we stayed in the cockpit for a while to reorganize the anchor lines and tidy up a bit. There were some condos on the hillside overlooking the marina and we noticed a bright light shining at us from that direction.

After a moment, we discovered that a man was standing on the shore flashing “SOS” at us in Morse Code with a giant spotlight. He ignored our attempts to speak to him rationally and continued this absurd display for about 30 minutes. Obviously, this man was paying a lot of money for his view of the marina and did not like the idea of a couple of 20 year old drifters enjoying it for free. He eventually stopped and we went below.

While we were in the cabin eating dinner and unwinding from the day’s excitement, we were interrupted by another spotlight shining into our windows and a voice over a megaphone announcing itself as the police and requesting that we come outside. I went out to see what the problem was. It turns out, somebody (most likely the man from the condo) had been watching our ridiculous mishap unfold. He decided, rather than walking down to shore to talk to us, to call the POLICE and tell them that we had boarded a boat in the marina and stole something off of it.

I explained the whole situation and the officer went to Lynn and Tony’s boat to confirm our story. He was very kind and understanding about it and after clearing things up he told us to have a nice night and went on his way. Needless to say, we left in the morning and never returned to that anchorage.

This was a very worthwhile lesson that taught us to ALWAYS keep at least one backup anchor and NEVER put the engine into gear without checking for lines that can foul the prop.  We were lucky that we had such great friends on the water to help us out and that it didn’t end badly for us or the boat.

We haven’t had another prop incident since (knock on wood) but came to realize, through other boaters’ stories and my work in boat towing, that it is one of the most commonly made mistakes on the water.  To read about more valuable lessons we’ve learned the hard way, stay on the lookout for Fair Winds Ahead!