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"Jeff Morris" wrote:

Get a pair of FRS radios with headsets. Your life will get much better when you
can just have a simple conversation. Or, if you have two cell phones with free
minutes on the weekends ...

We tried this and it just did NOT work. Bob is a bit deaf and so am I
and the FRS radio transmissions just weren't intelligible to us.


wrote in message
.. .
Does anybody have a good system of hand signals for anchoring, i.e. a
means for the person on the bow handling the anchor to communicate
speed and direction to the helmsman without having to yell it out?

This would be for my wife and I where she is typically at the helm
while I am on the bow. She's not real experienced at the helm so a
clear set of signals would be helpful, especially when retrieving the
anchor with the wind up, crowded anchorage, etc.

Thanks.

This was us. Me at the helm, not experienced. Bob retrieving the
anchor.

He has learned two things:

a) Don't anchor in a crowded place

b) Explain to me face to face what he intends to do first so that the
hand signals will make more sense. For anchoring, he says something
like - I want to anchor about there (pointing) in 10 feet of water (or
whatever depth he's decided on) and I want you to come into the wind.
I sometimes call out (yell) the soundings to him as we motor in.

For pulling the anchor, he will say something like - the anchor's dug
in good (because he always retrieves most of the chain first to allow
the boat to come up close to the anchor so he can tell that), and you
will have to motor up into the wind for me to break it out. When the
anchor is free, I want you to go out of the anchorage this way (and
shows me by pointing) out to the red 17 marker and then down the
channel.

We have a MINIMUM of hand signals and we almost always use them more
for pulling the anchor rather than anchoring.

The hand signals are only 4
1) Go forward in a specified direction
2) Drop back to idle
3) Back up (mostly for anchoring to check that the anchor is set)
4) and mostly for pulling the anchor- The anchor is up - leave the
anchorage

1) Point with whole arm and pointing finger means put the power on and
steer in the direction he is pointing. Move arm up and down from the
elbow pointing in a direction and looking irritated means go faster in
that direction. As the boat swings, he continues pointing in the
direction he wants the bow to go.

2) Move hand side to side quickly parallel to the water means go back
to idle

3) Facing forward if he drops his hand back down to his side with the
palm toward me and pushes the hand backwards a couple of times, that
means back up. He may also turn and point backwards. This is usually
to set the anchor.

4) Extended forefinger pointing and circling.

These hand signals were not agreed on by me particularly because I
would not have known what signals were needed - they just kind of
evolved. I don't think you need anything elaborate and your wife
doesn't have to come up with the signals for them to work.

My main problem is with #1 - if there is wind or current, I have
trouble holding a heading without swinging past it as it takes the
boat some time to respond to the power and actually go in the
direction I want it to go and then it goes on past before I get it
corrected. So your wife should practice steering some without
anchoring.

It is helpful to have a rudder indicator on the autopilot because I
can see which way the rudder is set. Before we had an autopilot, I
put a piece of white tape on the wheel where the rudder was in the
center.

grandma Rosalie