For several years now we have been planning to spend a night in Ayala Cove at Angel Island. Not that the planning took that long, just that a disgusting variety of life's complexities kept stopping us from carrying out this trip. It's not really a big deal; sailing there is something we do fairly often, and we've spent many nights onboard E.T. so we know all that. The big difference is the need to "Pick Up Moorings" while staying the night in Ayala. The park service requires that boats staying there moor bow and stern to buoys provided.
We have discussed the process of picking up bow and stern moorings with various friends with a particular view to doing it short-handed, and had, as usual, at least as many ways of doing it described as people we asked. None of our limited supply of basic sailing books go into it at any length: apparently requiring two moorings is an unusual situation.
At last, this September presented a time when circumstances seemed to be willing to allow us to try our hands at this task. We could, of course, have gone out and moored, then dropped off and come home, but we both felt that if we were going to go to all that trouble we wanted to enjoy the night out.
There are several choices to be made when picking up bow and stern moorings.
First, do you approach the moorings up-wind or down-wind? As most books describe mooring to one buoy as done from down-wind, we assumed that would be the way to do it.
Next, one approach is to drive past the stern buoy and slow down enough to grab it and attach a very long line -- whereupon you go slow forward paying out just enough line from astern to keep up with the boat motion and not enough to let the line get where it wants to go, in the prop. You drive up on the bow buoy and put a somewhat shorter line through it. You then cleat everything off well so the boat is balanced between the buoys and has a little slack to play with.
Another approach says you drive up to the bow buoy and hook your longest line through that one. Then you back down to the stern buoy and catch that one.
The other way round, you come from up-wind and do the same kinds of things.
After much dithering we decided to try the bow first/up-wind approach, figuring with the bow attached, if we missed the stern buoy, it would be easy to pull the boat up-wind to the bow buoy and try again.
After going over the selection of long lines on E.T. we selected two "spring" lines of three strand twisted nylon. These are about 50 feet each. We looped one of these through the eye splice in the end of the other and through its own eye splice thus making a single 100 foot line with a fairly small bulge in the middle that shouldn't come out. We planned to use this as our bow line, pulling it through the buoy's ring and doubling it back so it hooked to both bow cleats for extra holding power and for ease of release.
We selected a 50 foot line, we think an old Freedom main halyard, as a stern line. We also had purchased a "Happy Hooker," a device one fastens to the end of a boat hook which allows a line to be put through a buoy at a slight distance. You have to see it to believe it but it works!
On a cool but fairly sunny Wednesday, we loaded our tons of stuff aboard E.T., filled her fuel and water tanks, pumped the holding tank, and headed off for Angel.
The sail, in 15 to 20 knot winds, was a snap; we didn't even pull a reef, and it seemed like we were there in no time. We started the engine and dropped sails, and Tom hopped about the boat laying out the lines, hitching one end of each to one cleat, bow and stern, and attaching the free end of the stern line to the hooker. The "theory" was that Tom would work the bow, bringing the free end of the bow line back on the port side to the cockpit where the freeboard is lowest. After catching the bow buoy, Tom would walk it up to the bow, cleat it off and then pay out line while Sue backed E.T. down and hooked the stern line with the "Hooker."
We drove around Ayala cove a bit looking at how other boats were moored. To our surprise the only boat there was moored stern to the wind, but we puzzled about this for a while and decided to try it the way we'd planned first.
It took us about 5 passes to catch the line through the intended bow buoy, which sits 12-18 inches above the water. We were glad there was only one other boat moored, so we had lots of maneuvering room. It's tricky to steer E.T. close to a buoy and stop her long enough to get the line through, The freeboard even at the cockpit is almost an arm's length so one doesn't have much reach. Sue made Tom use a tether so she wouldn't worry quite as much that he would fall into the water.
When we finally had the bow line secured, Tom started paying out the line and Sue attempted to drive E.T. backwards down-wind to the stern buoy. Well, one of E.T.'s few faults is backing slowly; it just doesn't work. She simply insisted on turning sideways to the intended track and just didn't want to go down-wind backwards. With that, and a mass of tangled line forward, it was quite a thrash for several tries before we decided this wasn't going to fly. It was with great reluctance that we removed the line from the hard-won buoy.
By this time, a second boat came in and moored next to our intended position, in the same direction as the first boat. Looking at the way those two boats were moored, we considered moving the lines around and starting down-wind from the stern buoy, having realized that steering in reverse at very low speed gave us very little directional control. While Sue drove around near the cove slowly, worrying about the depths between buoys closer to land which got as low as 6.5 feet at times, Tom untangled all the mess and re-attached the lines with the long one aft and the shorter one ready on the bow. Sue, using the "Hooker," managed to snag the stern buoy, but after the hooker had done its job, as the boat moved away from the buoy, the hooker pulled off the end of the boat hook and wedged itself against the buoy ring! (Oops, make that hose clamp tighter next time, Tom). We were able to gently pull ourselves back to the buoy without breaking the hooker, retrieved it, and drove forward paying out line till we had it all out, again trying to end up with both ends of the line cleated to the boat. Darn, nowhere near the selected bow buoy, and not really able to steer where we wanted to go. We think the wind, very low boat speed, and having the boat somewhat tethered, all contributed to not being able to steer well even going forward.
Just in the nick of time a friendly neighbor with a dinghy buzzed by and offered to take our bow line through the buoy, but we explained that it didn't appear our stern line was long enough. They suggested a single length, but we did not know if we could unmoor in the morning if we used a single length. They agreed it might be a problem, and motored off. We considered whether it was time to give up and go back. We decided we wanted to accept the help and stay, so we asked the obliging couple, who came past again, if they would take the bow line through the buoy. They needed to return something to their boat first, so while we waited, we made the stern line single. To do this, we pulled it mostly aboard, pulling ourselves to the stern buoy in the process, uncleated one end, then tied a bowline with a long loop (for ease of removal) through the buoy. We made sure of the bowline, and even put a couple half hitches in the free end to be sure. When our benefactors returned, Sue tossed them the bow line. Then we drove downwind again, paying out the single stern line. Finally! we were close enough for our friendly dinghy operators to put the bow line through and bring it back to the boat to be cleated.
Now all we had to do was pull in extra stern line and secure things. Tom's remaining concern was that the stern line was only cleated to one point on the boat. This meant that the major stress of holding the boat was on one dock cleat only! This just didn't seem prudent, so we took the 15 foot dock line which is on the starboard stern cleat and passed it round the stern of the boat and to the port cleat. We put it through the eye splice in the end of the long stern line. Thus on the stern of E.T. we had a "Bridle" of a dock line between the cleats with the long line near its center. At the bow the line passed from one bow cleat, through the buoy, and back to the other cleat.
Yay! we were finally moored and could sigh and unwind.
We spend a typical newcomers' night onboard, worrying about depth and tide, and every strange sound and change in boat motion. Tom always expected to feel a jerk and hear a bang at the end of a big wave, and have us swinging down to hang on the bow mooring only. Luckily Sue's choice of location left us clear of other boats so that such a happening shouldn't have been a disaster, we hoped. It didn't happen that way, the only real annoyance was a persistent rubbing/tapping near Sue's head all night. We finally dressed up, complete with pfd's, tethers, and armband strobes, and went on deck about 2:00 only to find nothing more ominous than the starboard fender having slipped overboard and dangling against the boat, tapping tapping tapping away. That easily remedied, we managed to sleep through the point one foot low tide at 3:30 A.M. and so didn't find out how shallow it really got.
After an entertaining night, yes we both did get a reasonable amount of sleep, the morning procedures were simplicity itself. We started the engine, but carefully did not put the prop in gear. Tom went forward and cast off one end of the bow line, pulling the line through the buoy and back aboard. Sue pulled E.T. easily up to the stern line and Tom untied his fine bowline (it held and released as it should have) and pulled the few feet of line free of the stern buoy. When all lines were aboard, we put E.T. in gear and were off.
So what did we learn? First, the first time you pick up moorings it's gonna be a thrash, expect it and enjoy???
Second, E.T. doesn't back up slowly particularly with her bow tied to a buoy, no matter how carefully the bow crew controls the line. Even driving up-wind, it is difficult to go slow and maintain steerage way.
Third, you will need more line than you thought.
Fourth, with less than 10 knots of wind, it was not difficult to pull the boat back to the stern buoy to release the knot.
Fifth, although not well-tested, Sue felt the steering was easier with a single line, and that trying to turn a boat with a line paid out from port and starboard cleets was unlikely to succeed.
What will we do next time?
Approach the stern buoy from up-wind with 100, or hopefully 200, feet of line ready to go astern. Catch it with the "Happy Hooker", stop the boat, tie to the buoy with a bowline, then pay out the single stern line and drive down to the bow buoy ready to grab that one. We won't expect to always find a friendly boatman ready to hand with his dinghy.
We also wonder about the usual practice of doubling up lines when mooring, although we observed that the other boats had all lines doubled. It is assumed that double lines mean double strength, but think about what that line does: it is essentially a single line where it passes through the buoy, and at that point it is bent at a sharpish angle. We've been told by several experienced sailors that bending a line weakens it at the bend point, and one wonders if it makes much difference after that whether the line is simply tied in a bowline or goes back to the boat. As mentioned above, it does seem like a good idea to spread the load to all four dock cleats with a 'Bridle" made from a shorter line. If the long line doesn't happen to have a handy eye splice in its free end, tie a good bowline there too, it won't come loose and it won't tighten up on your bridle.
Other hints, bring plenty of water (we used the whole 9 gallon tank) and even if the weather is good, bring some warm clothing -- you will have to go on deck at least once in a night and it's chilly and very damp out there. If you don't have to go topside at least once your first night on moorings or at anchor, you are entirely too sanguine and should take a course in worrying more. See Tom and Sue for instructions.
Ayala Cove is a commonplace overnight for many sailors, but it was a good adventure, and we learned a lot. Besides that we had fun.
See our article At Bay By Fog for the return trip.
Written 1998.
Updated 6-20-2005