If you have a regular anchor locker with a hatch on top of the bow, you could keep the anchor line in there and you wouldn't need a milk crate. The milk crate really gets in my way when I kneel down to secure my mooring pendant line to my bow cleat. I use a 3/16"X 3' line to close up the eye splice on my mooring line and tie it over the cleat just as an extra added precaution when I leave my boat at the mooring. I also lock my anchor chain to the Herreshoff cleat on the bow. As for the anchor roller, I was able to bolt mine to my bow and get at the backup plates, along with the nuts and washers pretty easy from inside the V birth section. You may need to mount some wood on your bow and mount the roller to that. You'll need to get it out far enough so that the anchor doesn't hit the bow when you're raising it. I was pretty lucky when I mounted mine. It's out far enough so that the anchor doesn't hit my boat. Where you have a 25, you may be able to find a roller that's long enough to do that for your boat. It's really worth having on your boat. My roller doesn't have a bail on it for securing the rope and I've found that in most cases it's better without it. If one was needed on my boat, I would prefer a removable pin on a small chain or lanyard.