Mooring...

[oldiesrocker2001]

Well I've finally done it(no, not succumbed to 2-foot-itis just yet) and decided to say goodbye to recovering my boat by standing neck deep in water at Spruce run because they've drained the water by at least 8 feet and pulled the docks. I should have a mooring for next year at Hopatcong, but I have some questions now.
I often singlehand; can a mooring line be picked up from the stern and simply walked forward? Attach to the same bow eye that I secure to the trailer? Run additional line to my bow cleat for safety? Will a snap shackle(like I have for my vang/mast raising block) work for the ball or will I have to tie an anchor bend to it every time? Lastly(I hope) how much 'rode' from the ball to the bow eye? I Know that's a bunch of questions that could be answered by studying the other moored boats, but I'd rather have a plan and necessary hardware/lines before I'm circling my mooring for the first time. Thanks in advance, everyone - this is by far the most informative site on the web and I often sail vicariously through the many posts here when I'm too tied up to get to my own boat.

 

[Deadhead]

You could use a bridle

Pass the mooring pennant over the bridle and secure each end of the bridle to your bow cleats.

I made a bridle with 5/8" double braid line from West Marine. I bought 30' of line from them for $0.47 per foot thanks to a computer glitch. A length of 3/4" ID nylon reinforced rubber hot water heater hose from Home Depot was another $18.00.

Lubed the inside a 3' length of the hose with some watery dishsoap and passed the line through it. Sewed each end of the hose in the dead center of the line with whipping twine & sailing needle. Then I spliced a 12" ID eye into each end of the line. Instant bridle!

Well - in actuality passing the line through the hose took longer than an instant and quite a bit of cussing. And each splice took about 45 minutes.

But in the end it came out pretty good. I used it several times a few weeks back and my only thought is that it might be a tad too long.

 

[BobM]

Answers

Hmmm...perhaps things are done a little differently on a lake, but a mooring for a boat this size can easily be picked up. If you can leave pendants (ropes with loops in the end that attach to the mooring and then loop around your bow cleats) I recommend adding a pick-up buoy. Taylor makes the ones commonly used in my area. They are available with varied stick lengths. Essentially you tie the buoy to one of your mooring pendants. Then you approach the pick-up buoy from down wind, grab the stick and walk it forward. Piece of cake on a 21 footer.

If that is uncommon, a number of companies make boat hook like mooring catchers. As I said, your boat is small enough that you can catch the mooring aft and walk it forward. I had no problems with a 3000lb 25 footer. I am still learning how to do exactly what you are concerned about with my new boat, a 10,000 lb 30 footer that I solo sail a lot. I thought about running a line from one of my bow cleats aft to the cockpit then securing it to a heavy hook with a spring clip. Then I can grab the buoy, clip onto the pendant and be secured to my mooring. The I would just go forward and pull the boat up. I haven't tried yet...I'll let you know how I make out tomorrow night!

What are others doing on the lake? Have you contacted folks nearby like at The Sailboatshop (link below). They can probably provide specific advice.

 

[oldiesrocker2001]

bow cleat

Thanks, Bob. I have a single bow cleat but it is aft of the forestay/furler. I would need some way to reduce chafing(and rubbing the forestay pin snap loose!) for this type of setup. I was wondering if I could snag a bouy (or pendant-it would float seperatly from the mooring ball(?)) with an ordinary boathook. I'm not quite sure how a bridle works as described by deadhead, as I couldn't be sure from the picture, but I'm pretty sure I don't want to try to reach down to the bow eye to secure the boat each time but was hoping to have a line secured to it already - if i was going to use it - and snap on to the pendant or bouy with the use of a strong snap shackle similar to the trailer bow eye shackle. Just 'fishin' for info so far, so keep those Ideas comin' and thanks! Oddly enough, I bought my boat from the sailboat shop in the link. They seem pretty knowledgeble, but I did have to watch about what kind of 'deal' I was making on purchases at times.

 

[Scott]

Oldies, did I talk you into Lake Hopatcong?

You might be in for a little culture shock, coming from Spruce Run. We have real powerboats with high performance engines, even a go-fast boat with a jet engine, though I haven't seen him around this year. The fishermen even have 200 hp on their bass boats. Nobody is restricted to an electric motor like you must be accustomed to on Spruce Run! But since you sail on Lake George, you probably won't be too shocked ;D

Did you talk with the folks at Lee's Park and get a mooring for next year? Did they have any kind of accomodation for you for the rest of this year? You can tie up on the wall for about $5 a night and after Labor Day, there will probably be no problem finding space. In fact, I've seen somebody's sailboat tied up on the wall this week since about Monday.

I don't have a bow eye on our boat so I simply cleat the two pendants to the bow cleats. After cleating, I criss-cross the bitter ends around the cleats and tie them together with a square knot. I don't bother with a bridle and I have never had any chaffing to worry about either. We obviously have no wave or current action, but the wind can be strong at times in the fall and spring. We are very well protected (especially where I am moored at the north end of the field) from the northwest winds which are the strongest by far.

I have threaded my mooring pendants through the those swim noodles that you can buy for a couple bucks. That way the lines float in the water at the mooring and make retrieval very easy. I always just motor up and reverse to a halt with the bow right next to the mooring and then run forward and reach down and grab the 2 lines. I could catch them with a boat hook just as easy but I never bother with that step. With practice, I have gotten pretty good at it and hardly ever miss, even with a little wind pushing the bow! I always do this single hand because we don't use a dinghy and I always drop everybody off before catching the mooring. I just about always swim to and from the boat even though you are not supposed to. Lee's doesn't provide a dinghy storage area and it is a pain to shuffle people around with the row boat that they provide at the pier. That's why I swim.

If I were you, I would just hang a pendant off the mooring (two for redundancy) with a snap hook and hook it to your bow eye. Use the swim noodles to keep the line(s) floating and to make retrieval easy. You could catch them at the stern and walk them to the bow easy enough. I don't know how awkward it is to reach under to snap the lines to the bow eye. You'll have to figure that out. You also might consider re-doing the cleat, and putting a pair at the bow anyway (instead of the single one) so you can use 2 lines as I do.

Look for S/V Thunderbird and we'll have the SBO burgee and my new CUBS flag flying!

 

[oldiesrocker2001]

A bit different...

Yes Scott, I eventually found out that the powerboaters were the real menace rather than 'skinny water'. At spruce Run, sailboaters are the majority, but non-boaters in overloaded but powered rented aluminum boats are often a pain because not a one of them think that one time that they cut accross your bow and then stay in your way that you might not be able to manuever away in time. Should I consider mounting a deck gun?
I was wondering how much of an inconvenience having to shuttle back and forth with the rowboat provided there at Lee's. I suppose I have to row out;scramble aboard after tying off the rowboat; get ready to drop the mooring;tow the boat back to an unoccupied(?)dock spot and walk it back to it's own berth then take off for the day. Coming back I have to come to the dock first to get the rowboat and tow it out to the mooring unless I want to swim back. Sounds like it'll be pretty interesting with a neurotic dog in tow as well. I wonder yet if it would still be quicker to launch and recover each time and leave the boat in the lot(I'm usually ready for the water at spruce run in 15 min - but I leave much of the boat ready to go - don't know how much I'd do that only 20 yards from the road).
While I've never seen a pendant,actually, I would assume it would float visibly perhaps like a flag marker on the green of a golf hole. The pool noodle Idea sounds like it should work to keep the line visibly floating. So far, I'm thinking snap shackles on my bow eye with enough line to connect to the pendant(or the ball?) that I'll keep around the bow pulpit. My bow eye is pretty low, and I often have to back the trailer farther into the water to allow the winch shackle to clear the V at the bow. Are there places to beach the boat to get out and relax at times?

 

[Bob Poff]

Double Attachment

When we had the Mac 22 on a mooring I had a snap shackle on the bow eye and brought the line up and cleated it off on deck. Figuring if one let go the other would hold until I got there next.

At the time I thought that maybe I was being a bit paranoid.

Until the morning I saw one of the other boats drifting down river after his mooring line slipped off the cleat.

 

[oldiesrocker2001]

Better safe...

Thanks bob, I often go 'overboard'(couldn't resist the pun) when it comes to safety. This is likely why rigging for the water or the road takes me longer than some others with the same boat{check, check again, give it a tug THEN move on}, but in thousands of miles of towing, I've never had a knot come undone or anything fall off the boat. Did your system then rely on the bow cleat with the snap shackle on th bow eye as the backup? Do you think it would work in reverse with the shackle line attached with an anchor bend with a long end which is then secured to the bow cleat in case the shackle fails somehow or the bow eye comes loose(I opened up a door in the bow just to check on this item)? This, of course, assumes I tied the bend properly to begin with. Still not sure how much line to use from the ball or the pendant(anchor line or dock line?).

 

[oldiesrocker2001]

hardware recap..

So then.... I'll need to purchase(or create out of anchor line?) one or two pendants of 1/2" line or better - and these are actually different from pennants which apparently are the same as pickup sticks that float upright attached to the pendants making the lines easier to catch. I can guess that the mooring balls will not come supplied with either; Or I can devise lines for this with snap shackles rather than the eye spliced in and use Scott's pool noodle idea to float the lines making them more visible/accessable - couldn't I loop these shackles intended for securing to the bow eye or cleat onto the ring of the ball while awaiting my return to mooring?

 

[Scott]

Getting lost in terminology ...

I'm guilty of using the term "pendant" incorrectly. I simply have 2 5/8" triple strand nylon mooring lines which are also called "pennants" I believe. I bought the pre-packaged lines which are 10' or 15' and have an eye spliced at one end. The bitter ends have no splice.

Even though you are not supposed to attach your pennants to the ring on the top of the bouy, this is what I do, because we do not have a lot of action where we are and my boat simply isn't that big (many of the other sailboats do attach their lines under the mooring ball as you are supposed to I've noticed). We have a 27' Starwind that weighs about 5,500 lbs. That would be heavier than your Venture, I believe. I simply luggage tag the eye splices to the ring on the bouy for the permanent attachment. I thread the lines into the swim noodles for flotation and easy pick-up. I simply cleat the bitter ends of the 2 lines to my bow cleats and then tie them off together with a square knot for further redundancy. If I had a bow eye, I believe that I would attach a snap shackle to each line and snap both lines to the bow eye.

I don't use any chaffing protection because after about 3 seasons when the lines begin to wear out, I simply buy a few new ones. They are getting pretty grungy by that time anyway.

I saw a blue Venture 21 on the lake this afternoon, was that you? I've been hearing that the lake is going to be lowered 5' this winter, starting in September. They typically do this every 5 or 6 years to give homeowners the chance to work on their docks over the winter. The last time they did it was in 2002, I think. The September 2 date seems a little bit earlier than normal, though. It appears that the lake has dropped almost a foot already, just in the last week! It's far lower this weekend than it was just last weekend. The folks at Lee's Park told me that the DEP plan is to lower a half-inch per day starting on Sept. 2.

I may be out of the water by the end of September if that is the case. You will be able to use the ramps at your discretion if that is the case, but I depend on Barnes to lift our boat out, which means I have to worry about the water getting too low.