....
There's a good passage somewhere in the Patrick O'brian books about the mate
standing for twelve hours with his hand on the anchor cable while the ship
is anchored in a deep and dangerous spot.
....

And there's a passage in one of his books about a 30 foot schooner
averaging 12 knots... Patrick O'Brian was a wonderfully gifted writer
and I love his books, but he was no sailor, and it would be very
unwise to use him as a guide to things nautical.

More on topic, in aggregate I've spent years at anchor in this boat,
often in very remote and potentially dangerous spots, and I still find
that anchoring can be pretty tricky at times. I agree that care and
deliberation are good things, but I think any much more specific
advise needs to take into account a fairly precise knowledge of the
situation. I've seen folks from all around the world anchor and there
are lots of techniques out there that seem to work pretty well, but I
don't think there is any one technique that provides universally good
results on all bottoms or in all situations.

-- Tom.

wrote

I don't think there is any one technique that provides universally good
results on all bottoms or in all situations.


I agree. And I'll agree with Geoff above that we shouldn't imply that
single handed anchoring is easy. I'm just saying that, if someone is up to
the other challenges of singlehanding (with however many warm bodies on
board) they probably won't find anchoring to be the most challenging thing
they do.

I'm trying to point towards a philosophy that will help out the anchoring
OP's. Situations are way too varied to take anything from a fourm like this
by rote. The thing about feeling how the anchor touches down for example.
I don't go up on the bow and go dipping around with the anchor (although it
might have sounded a bit like that). It's just part of a philosophy of
paying attention to the little things. A clink might be an early warning
that the plan may need some modification.

Planning ahead means already knowing what you are going to do if the anchor
doesn't grab. Even if you have a crew, it may be hard to get them up to
speed on your new plan, especially if you lose precious time making it up.

Eventually, things to go wrong. The boat blows off the wrong way, the
anchor doesn't grab. Even then, it's amazing how much better the mind works
and how much time there really is if you learn to keep mentally processing
at optimum speed instead of blasting off into panic overdrive. Boats move a
lot slower in these situations than it seems when things aren't working out
as expected.

It's all about learning how to think and plan, not creating a mental list of
"If this happens, do this." items.

-- Tom.