Ring ring! You anchored incorrectly, please haul anchor and try again

I’m writing this from a perspective of watchful nervousness. I anchored here last night knowing this was a tidal creek. Indeed, I thought to myself that nothing other than a stiff tide would dredge this area so much deeper than surrounding areas. However reality often gives us wakeup call that differentiates between knowledge and wisdom. Tonight the call was the ringing of the telephone just like children play with cans. As of now I have two anchors out, one off the bow and one off the stern. When I anchored there was a weak tide blowing northward, so my bow was pointed south with my strongest anchor in the same direction. I measured out 90’ of rope for my stern by walking the rode across my deck, cleated the rope off, then I got in the dinghy and rowed the stern anchor off. The one thing I forgot to do was to tension the stern anchor to the tightness of a fiddle string using the winch, however I had the foresight to wrap it around the winch and set it that way. I even left it somewhat tight, but I didn’t account for stretch of the rope. But the big problem here is that I didn’t set the stern anchor. Years and beers have made memories of my last tidal anchoring with Rosa in The Ditch a blur, but now I recall doing the same thing. The result is that instead of the boat pointing fore-aft to the current, held in place by the mutual tension of the two anchors, the boat has now leaned well over to the side, causing the broader side of the rudder and keel to meet the incoming flow and causing an increased load to be put on the stern anchor. The predicted high tide from yesterday was 7:10PM, and low tide today was 3:19AM, which puts me smack in the middle of the tidal swing. So I will wait nervously. Nervous why? Other than I’m nervous about all aspects of boating when I know of catastrophic effects. Really, I’m exaggerating. The boat won’t sink, I’m just worried about it not floating. If my stern anchor decides to let go, which I would have well tested by tightening it like a fiddle string mind you, then the boat will swing abruptly around, likely trip the forward anchor. The feeling in my stomach will be bad at this point as I can simulate the effects. Given the shallow nature of this area, I’ll end up aground and I’ll have to fiddle and fuss all night with anchors, winches, grunting, cursing and sweating in the sincere hopes that I won’t be a fixture of the landscape tomorrow morning. So nervous, yeah. So lessons (re)learned regarding anchoring in strongly tidal regions: never anchor halfass, and make sure bow and stern anchors are equally set and capable. Have them both tight to pre-stretch the nylon and sink in both anchors. I know it’s a pain to get the stern anchor out and do all this, but just envision a nightmare of run-aground hell and kedging off for the remainder of the night, and that should be impetus to do things right. The other thing I might have done is performed a Bahamian mooring, where both anchors go to the bow, and there’s a “kellet” or “sentinel” which is a weight that keeps both roped down so they don’t get caught around the keel or rudder. I actually have 10’ of chain for this exact purpose that I forgot about… I mentioned that the boat gave me a telephone call? The water moving swiftly over my bow chain is causing it to vibrate. The vibration is passed into the hull and sounds like a low turbulent rumbling. I suspect I’ll be awake until the tide abates a bit. Sleep easy, house-people. You don’t have to worry about such things. So I was awake or sleeping in a haze from 11:30 to 4:30, waking frequently to check the state of ropes and the anchors. The boat bobbed a bit, and soon it became evident that the stern anchor was slowly dragging. This is a bad thing, causing the boat to sit further crossways to the current, increasing the load, causing more drag. Mercifully, however, the tide slacked until it was nil. At 4:45 I felt a shift and the boat was once again pulling against the bow anchor. No time like the present, I decided to see what I could do to pull up the stern anchor. To my utter shock and disbelief, it came up without the slightest fight. All night the only thing keeping me put was the surface friction of the anchor and chain. Flabbergasted, I stowed the anchor, chain and rope having learned a valuable lesson that hopefully I won’t forget this time!