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Okay guys... and girls.... hints needed.
I have read and reread the single-handed docking thread. Very helpful ideas on there.
Now I haven't previously thought of this as I haven't ever dropped anchor, but since I am planning a trip soon that will require anchoring, it has occurred to me how tricky that could be by myself. More so raising the anchor than dropping it.
Last week I put my anchors on the dock and pulled all the chains out to see what condition they were in. I have an electric winch, but it is a slow process getting the chain in and down into the locker.
I picture myself starting the motor, then pulling up the anchor till she drifts away, then running back and forth to the helm to keep her in the right place till I get the rest in. All kinds of scenarios are giving me the horrors. Sandbanks.. other boats.. rock walls.... 
How do you single handers do this?
ok.... 44 of you have read my post but no one has said anything... either my question is really dumb, or it is going to be just as hard as I imagine it will be and no one can think of anything that will alleviate the situation. 
If you have to run to do something on board, or strain yourself its a bad plan and needs rethinking! Especially if its the skipper doing it!
I would assume that the boat would be lying down wind / down current of the anchor to start with.
You could slowly motor up past the anchor (without running over it or its line) until it jerks out of the bottom (I do that often) then start hauling it up. You would have lots more drift time before you went too far downwind.
If you moved your anchor winch switch next to the helm you could do all the winching without leaving control.
And it doesnt matter if you drift miles while hauling the anchor up as long as theres nothing to run into.
McN, 1stly the site is trawled by Google bots and the like so half a dozen hits may just be search engines updating the site. The others are probably people who don't know or are searching for an answer. There is no stupid question.
As HG said what is your current setup? I assume you are running back and forth between the helm and the winch control? Does the chain automatically drop into it's locker? I'm also assuming you don't have a chain link counter? I'll also assume the winch is a "held on" switch meaning you can't walk away? What depth of you intend anchoring in? Have you read up on setting anchor?
That's just a few of the questions running around in the brains trust minds by my guess, so let's wait and see.
As for me I don't have a winch so I pull it up till she breaks free and pull in as much as I can, then if I'm drifting off too far I'll get to the helm and move to deeper water to finish off. I'm guessing you could do the same.
Hey McNautical, I'm guilty of running up your read count without adding a response (except now?), but only as I've not anchored much.
Part of the joys of web forums is sorting out those who do, and those who just talk about it, and taking offered advice accordingly.
If you asked about masking the equivalent of 120ft of waterline, scraping bird**** off boats or trying to figure out how to get more time sailing and less time working on the boat, I might have chimed in with a semi educated response. 
For me, I think Trek and Slammin have it, I'd just drive the boat forward slowly, retrieving what you can, until the point you break free., and yes you will expect to drift at this point , but it should not be a drama if there's space around.
Being alone on the boat it's tempting to think you have to run everywhere, but I did it and slipped once, falling onto the genoa winch and thought I'd busted a rib.
So....
i single hand (my boat ) quite a bit.
i have a free fall electric winch and the ability to. Lock the steering
as I approach my desired anchor position I will check the depth
calculate how much chain I want to let out
look at where my scope may have me in relation to potential issues/ boats ,sand banks ,ect.
then , as I come in to position I tend to turn helm to a few degrees from straight lock the wheel and proceed up to the front deck and drop out
four times depth in chain and wait for boat momentum ( of course it is no longer in gear at this point)
to sraighten the chain and hook anchor.
as this happens the ark of travel of the boat allows for the chain to pass beside the boat to the inside of the ark of travel
as the anchor hooks the boat swings the stern around (clob hauling ala pirates of the caribian but not at such speeds!)
try it slow!!! At first till your confidant.
i have used this method in twenty knots wind (it's not slow then!!!)
As I do 100% anchoring without a crew I do have a little experience in this matter.
1st thing I did with my past and present yachts was removing the admiralty anchors, happily now sitting in garden beds on dry land where they belong!
2nd I modified the roller systems to pivot and take a suitable anchor. The Marsh is best as it has a round shank which helps with retrieval as it can sit anyway it pleases when it hits the rollers.
3rd is to have a up/down switch in the cockpit.
When deploying the Anchor I hold the boat into the wind and dump chain with the switch only using reverse if I feel the chain is piling up on the seabed
which usually happens in a no wind situation. in a good breeze it is easy to keep her into the wind laying out the chain using a combination of reverse and forward and on and off with the chain dump.
It is important that you don't allow the boat to sail sideways during this practice as I witnesses a catalina 42 yesterday and another yacht a few weeks ago both with admrialtys and both dragged before the anchor had set due to increasing water depth and dragging the anchor out of the sand and into weed.
Retriveal is much the same , in light winds I let the winch do the work dragging me slowelly forward using the up switch on/off in intervals not to overload the circut breaker and gear. If it is breezy I will use a bit of both engine forward and anchor up Always trying to keep the bow into wind till the last meter of chain.
Finally I try always to anchor in no more than 10 meters of water and in sand if possible. Polarise Sunglasses are a must for such activitys.
hope this helps.
dont feel to bad as i think anchoring is one of the most underrated skills, when droping anchor before entering the anchorage i prepare my anchor by pushing it out of stocks so its ready to shoot at a moments notice if anchoring under sail just come in to desired depth under main alone luff till the boat stops walk forward firing the main halyard as you go start paying out anchor slowly not all at once as you will just have a big pile on the bottom i normally let about 2/3 of my scope down tidy up then let out the last third this gives time for the rode to straighten out
when retrieving anchor i normally shorten right up first so i only have about 1and half times my depth out then either hoist main and trip it out or slowly motor up and trip it out for the last couple of years this has been a pain as my anchor winch has jammed up and she has to be hoisted by hand (i should get around to fixing that but sailing always gets in the way
i think the main skill in anchoring is finding a good spot not to close to other boats so you can sleep at night without worrying about someone dragging onto you
As with everything,
it's all a variable .
each situation is different.
when it suits I use that method.
with thirty eight ton and eighty feet of boat to worry about cleaning up
everybody else I try do things in a no risk fashion!
I remember a certain skipper on a Maxi yacht in the Whitsundays would trip the anchor while doing 5 knots coming into the anchorages the massive yacht would grab the bottom and spin round to a hault! Perhaps a show off or had issues with the company who knows!
I come in to anchor you do the sums of height of tide and scope prior to entry:
1 - Head to wind.
2- Slow the boat to a crawl.
3 - I have a manual anchor winch therefore I release the brake and let it fall in a steady fashion then go back to the helm and reverse the engine let the anchor grab and then neutral.
4- let out some more scope.
5 - put on anchor snubber.
6 - set anchor alarm on GPS and look at features on land to get a transit to see if I drift too.
7 - stay clear of all boats and I anchor in 6-10m of water.
Thanks Southace haven't done much solo anchoring myself so your thread was very enlightening for me
I think that if you read all the above you would just about have it covered.
Just a few things though,
As Whitout stated, use a snubber for overnight or longer. I have two, a commercial (read expensive) one like a very over-rated bungie chord, and a rope one. The snubber does two main things it stops your anchor rode snatching (bloody annoying when your trying to sleep) and acts as a shock absorber for your anchor and anchor post or windlass. By acting as a shock absorber it applies the load to your vessel more gradually and at the same time causes less jerking on the anchor helping to keep it burried.
I use the rope snubber for most of my anchoring and the commercial (more elastic) one for heavy weather anchoring. While the commercial one wasn't cheap it gives a far better result than the rope one.
When retrieving your anchor use your winch until you see the rode just start to tighten, then disengage the winch. The boat will now be moving forward. When there is a bit of slack in the rode engage again and repeat (usually only a few seconds or more). If you keep doing this you will slowly pull your boat to your anchor without putting any noticeable load on your winch motor. Once the rode is nearly vertical pull the rest up in one go.
VERY IMPORTANT, know where your circuit breaker switch is for the anchor winch and KNOW how to reset it. It it trips in the wrong circumstances and you don't know how to reset it your in deep doggy-doo.
Do a little reading about fouled anchors and how to overcome it. It can save you a lot of money. I recently anchored in 15 meters over coral and tripped my circuit breaker twice trying to recover it. After the second reset we did a bit of maneuvering and finally got it free. The cost of 20 meters of chain and a replacement Delta anchor was not something I wanted to contemplate.
I have up and down switches on my anchor winch but I usually let it free fall as its much easier to gauge when it hits the bottom that way. I have switches at the helm and switches at the bow. I single hand quite a bit and never use the helm switches as I like to be on the bow and see whats going on and where the anchor is. I cant do that from the helm.
Common sense and practice. Know your water depth. If possible know what material is on the bottom. Know whats around you, on and under the water. Most importantly, when you anchor, look around and prepare a "what if" plan in your head.
Thanks all of you... I'll read and re read 
Great advice. I think I'll work on pulling it up manually and feeding it into the locker later. I have an electric winch on the bow but the feed into the locker is not a good setup and the chain doesn't run into the locker freely, so its a matter of one foot on the winch switch, other hand feeding chain into locker and keep stopping the winch as the chain wraps back around and gets stuck.. making it a slow process, but I feel better now about finishing the anchor lifting while driting a little.
Macca, there are lots of vids on youtube to get ideas from .....
or maybe you could just toodle off and find a nice safe place to practice in .... you know ... shallow, no rocks, no rip tides .... just you and the boat (a real zen moment) just dropping and setting and then retrieving .... and just for fun.. do it all over again.
I dropped my anchor over the side the other day McN. It's only small and kept in a well on the foredeck.
I have no anchor winch. When I came to pull it up hand over hand I was surprised at how heavy it became,
in fact I got quite out of puff with the effort. I had to stop halfway and loop the rope around the cleat to
have a blow. So just be aware that retrieving by hand needs a bit of strength. Mind you, I'm not a young'n
any more.
hi mcn
what ever you do keep your fingers away from the chain gypsy many people have lost digits in this fashion have a hefty screw driver handy for if it jambs or better still reverse to clear also if you have quite a bit of chain out it may jamb because it is feeding into the boat down the pipe creating a pyramid you will need to clear away the chain from the drop point to stop jambing
cheers ian
Im totally retro style.
I plan my spot....put the motor in neutral. Miss said spot. ...muck around at least 6 times more trying position on finding said spot
than
Run forward. ..Think about correct scope...drop anchor .
Run back....put motor in reverse. ...run forward. ...tie anchor chain off like a rope....run back turn off motor.
Wait..watch...become disappointed.
Run forward. ...pull anchor up... ( the last two foots the hardest)
Repeat process. .x 4 or 5.
when totally exhausted.
Take bowline...row ashore. ..tie too tree.
return. ...cross fingers...cook tea and sleep
Hey....im still alive
Good one Chopes.
Good safety points about keeping hands away from the gypsy...You don't want to be the "literal" single-hander 
.
Try to keep at least one of the side decks clear of obstructions, no jib sheets or other lines across it, and make a point to calmly walk between helm & bow, everytime Im in too much of a hurry & run, I trip over.
i also have the problem of chain pyramid in anchor compartment.
i use a stick in a second hole just behind the hole the chain goes through to spread it as it falls in
Lots of good advice here. I would just add two things:
1) When anchoring in a tidal channel, don't rely on the wind to (slowly) reverse your vessel and lay out the anchor rode. Instead, engine reverse to to ensure the rode is stretched out properly on the seafloor.
2) Make sure you get a good tug, before you assume you're properly anchored. Again, a quick burst in reverse gear is an easy way to test that you're holding.
Hi mcn
re depth transducer
you actually don't née a thru hull td
saves slipping
one less hole in hull
i just walked a big gob of silicone and it works fine(Airmar brand)
(lots of stuff on web re this,don't seem to need oil baths etc
cheers
Yep ditto to that $100 fishfinder and big wack of blutack works for me. I have a solid cored fiberglass hull.
