Canalling Stories

Anchors Away!

While my immediate family visited on the Fourth of July in 1998 shortly after the purchase of our Party Cruiser 30 Pontoon boat, we planned a trip south to Taughannock Falls Park for dinner offshore and a cruise down to Ithaca NY for a view of the local firework displays.

So we used our mushroom anchor to station in the deep waters well offshore at the park and had a nice meal before heading down to Ithaca in the twilight. In what seemed to take forever, we finally came within a couple miles of Ithaca and saw postage stamp-sized fireworks going off in the distance over town. Dismayed that it was taking so long to get there, we decided to turn around and head back to Sheldrake. Our beverage supply was dwindling (a serious matter in my family), and our mother Ann was beginning to announce her bladder discomfort, so we pushed the speed to full throttle and sped north.

Being unaccustomed to night cruising (this was our first night outing on Cayuga Lake), I felt that our seeming lack of speed must be an illusion of darkness, but I could not figure out why our Mercury 115 outboard was squealing for oil every 10 minutes during our hour long return. Eventually I was so frustrated by the oil pressure alarm, bladder alarm, no booze alarm(s), that I was beginning to get upset and started swearing at the boat while pounding the steering wheel with my fists: "G-- D-- piece of junk! Why does it use so much oil? Why in the h-- are we going so slow!?"  That kind of profane burst was becoming more frequent as we neared Sheldrake.

Cayuga Lake is a classic glacial lake- ancient glaciers cut very deep troughs (up to 480 feet) in the center of the lake and it tapers off dramatically on the shores as shown in this illustration:

So if someone were to say, leave their anchor in the water after having dinner, and then tried to cruise toward shore after a trip up the middle of the lake, they would eventually stop dead, because their anchor rode would eventually hit bottom as they move toward the shallows of shore.  And we did just that - stopped dead 20 feet from our dock. My fists of fury were working overtime at this point, and I even made a cell phone call to the boat dealer to complain (on their answering machine) about the oil pressure and sluggish nature of the boat while cruising at night (is dark water more viscous than day water?).

So there we are with the boat straining on the anchor line like the Foghorn Leghorn dog at the end of his chain, booze gone, bladders full, toilet full, and tempers flaring when my sister mentions that it "feels like we are held by something". Eureka! Captain Ben runs to the front of the boat and has a look at something stretched as taught as piano wire running from the anchor cleat under the pontoon boat. Oops - I'm feeling just a bit sheepish - no - really stupid at this point. My younger brother calmly states "F--- this," and jumps in the water with knife to extract the offending object. He surfaces a minute later, plops the mushroom anchor on the deck of the boat and says, "Could THIS be the problem!?" So he pulls us African Queen style over to the dock, my crew bolts to the house for tinkle and drink (laughing at Captain Moron all the way), and I call back the boat dealer to say "Nevermind!" in my best Gilda Radner "Emily Latella" impression.

Ironically, my next Coast Guard basic boating skills meeting covered anchoring.

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