We go on and off anchor almost every day unless we stay in the same place for a couple days. For us I'd stay exactly like we are. It works great and there never has been a problem in letting the rode out or bringing it in.
I would strongly recommend against the idea of bringing the rode in and leaving it on the deck to dry. I can't imagine having 100+ feet of rode and 20-30 feet of chain all over the foredeck after leaving anchor. It would be a mess and if any of it were to go over the side it would probably drag the rest with it.
I thought about an anchor locker for some time, but for us didn't like a couple things associated with it. One is that the rode is going down there wet. Out west where it is dry it isn't quite as big a deal but if you are in an area of high humidity it isn't going to dry at all. Also some places like Florida the rode is going to come up muddy so now you have a wet/muddy rode down there. We sleep in the V-berth every night and didn't want to use it for a locker. Thus we would of had to empty the floatation foam out of the area above it or used the area ahead of it that also has foam in it. Both places I worried about a line that for some reason tangled.
Also as mentioned you are trying to run the rode/chain down a smaller opening, hawse pipe, into the locker and that opening has to be sealed with a cap or something. Doing that meant a hole in the deck and then making sure water was collected at the bottom of the anchor well and disposed of somewhere, probably another hole in the side of the boat. I weighed all of that and decided for us the only thing we gained was better looks and that isn't a big issue for us and that we loss the ability to deploy and bring the anchor/rode aboard quickly and easily.
We started with soft...
...bags on the bow for the rode and that worked fine but....
.... the hard side/hard top ones work better. The rode comes out of either soft or the hard bags with never a tangle and I can stuff the rode into them as fast as I pull us to the anchor or usually Ruth motors to the anchor. The hard are easier to stuff as the lid lays back and the sides don't fold in. Just stuff the rode into them. You don't have to coil it or anything. It goes in fast and comes out fast.
The foresail drug a little on the side of the bag when we had the hank-on sail, but now with the furlere the Johnson Lever raises the bottom of the sail enough that it clears the bag top and Ruth loves being able to see under the sail now.
There is more here....
http://purplesagetradingpost.com/sumner/macgregor2/rigging-20.html
...and here....
http://purplesagetradingpost.com/sumner/macgregor/rigging-4.html
Another thing I've done is mark the rode every 25 feet. I just use a short length of black electrical tape doubled back on itself. I put in one piece at 25 feet and two at 50 feet and 3 at 75 feet and 4 at 100 feet and start over again with 1 at 125 feet.
I started with color coded and numbered like above, but now just use the black as the number of pieces tell me how much rode is out. The nice thing is that Ruth can be backing down if the wind isn't doing it and I don't have to stop the rode to see where we are. I just watch how many pieces of tape are on the line as it comes out of the bag.
We have done all of the above to make getting on and off anchor fast and easy. We have it now to the point where we can even put two anchors down in just a matter of minutes.
One thing I would have a hard time doing without at my age now is the anchor rollers. They make it so much less back breaking bringing the anchors on board and no more dragging the chain over the side of the boat. The tubes worked well, but the rollers are definitely better in all ways. Our anchors and chain are also a little heavier than what a lot of people use on a Mac. We use a 25 lb. Manson Supreme and a 22 lb claw and they both work great.
The Endeavour has an anchor locker, but so far....
...I have it rigged more like the Mac and have the one rode in the Blue container above. The second rode for the CQR is in the locker there.. That might change if at some point we have a manual windlass. With a windlass, manual or electric, the rode is coming in pretty slow and the windlass is setup to feed the rode directly down into the locker below it through the hawse pipe that is located right under the windlass. Usually they recommend that drop to be a couple feet so that the weight helps to pull the rode down into the locker. On the Endeavour above the locker is just right under that Honda generator and doesn't have that drop, so changes would have to take place there also,
Sum
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