I'm personally debating on what I wanna do... Last year the wife and I rafted up with the club (about 6 boats from the club anyway). We swung on one huge anchor, and watched the fireworks at the bottom of the lake (which are very impressive)... It's about a 1-1.5 hour straight motor back. I have a 1 liter outboard, and wide open it only runs for 1 hour. Which is fine, I can refuel underway, HOWEVER. The nutcases all buzzing back up the lake after the fireworks are shockingly poor drivers at night. My boat is lit up nicely with LED running lights, so that's not an issue, but the steep chop running back to refill fuel, is a PITA.
My stepson and his girlfriend want to see the fireworks, which usually go off around 9:15-9:30pm, on the 4th. My daughter wants to see them as well, but the wicked ex-wife won't allow me to keep my daughter for the evening.... So I must return her by 7pm on the 4th (which is 1 hour away from the lake and 1 hour the wrong way from home).
SOOOOo... if I do this, I must pack my stuff up drag my daughter home, then drive up to the lake (2 hours start to finish), then meet my stepson and his girlfriend, pile onto the boat (it's now 8pm)... motor WAO up the lake, anchor JUST as the fireworks start (in what is likely a crowded harbor, boo).
Other option is to drop my daughter off about 1 hour early (I hate cutting any time I have with her off), and follow same otherwise.
Also if I get to the lake 1-2 hours early, our club holds a "sailboat parade" where fully dressed sailboats parade around all the stinkpots... before they anchor up...
I have 10 feet of chain, a suitable anchor, and 150ft of rode, so that's not an issue even in our lake where anchoring can amount to being in 50 feet of water (3:1 is sufficient if it's not blowing a gale)... but I typically find shelter in 30feet or so.
Last years raft-up was a cluster... the low freeboard of my boat (almost 1 foot lower than the next boat - puts my rub rail below theirs, now imagine being smacked by 1-2 foot waves), along with the happy (pronounced drunk) stinkpotters, conspired for an uncomfortable raftup (short steep chop), and some clanging of spreaders before we got settled in (we got buzzed while we slid down beside our raft-mate I had tons of fenders out, but it didn't matter). This led us to disembark first as soon as the last work exploded (to keep from banging on the hook). I won't raft-up again, unless the feeboard is better matched... so I'll be anchoring alone this year, and also waiting until the first hour of ridiculousness passes before we head back after the fireworks. All of this basically changes my nice sailboat into a glorified motorboat, which I totally hate. I am all cool with anchoring, but the right way to weigh anchor is while sailing off anchor (hehehe). Last year I missed some great sailing before the fireworks... because of a mis-communication from our "social" director for our club. I could have sailed the parade route, and done it faster than under motor, and had more fun. Don't think me ALL sour on the event, it was better than all that of course, we had a nice swim beforehand and the parade was nice (social director and wife dressed as uncle sam and lady liberty).... one of us had a 16ft USA flag, I was in complete parade dress, with a 6 foot flag, it was pretty neat... we rafted up, and I whipped out the BBQ grill on the stern rail, and we did shish-kabobs (which were shared with the raft-up, while they all passed wine/cheese/snacks back, yeah, you heard me I was the only raceboat in the raftup, and I was the only one cooking, go figure). So we still had fun... but the trip back was downright scary, having stinkpotters buzz you at 30+mph (with drivers you know are smoked) generating 3-4 foot wakes right next to you, the whole way in the dark. Just waiting for an accident to happen.
This is a picture of my boat just before we rolled out of the slip (ole glory was raised before departure), see behind all that, the 16 foot Ole Glory flying on a club-mates boat. Turns out I lost one of my signal flags too after that, I believe it was (N)ovember winds picked up smartly after this picture (probably had 12-15mph winds).
and, just before the parade finished, I removed the signal flags, but left ole-glory up.
Every light in front of the shoreline is a boat... it was equally as populated on our side of the lake... the direction of the camera in this picture is nearly directly towards where the fireworks were launched.
