Sailing up the Sacramento Delta
Anchoring was a near disaster as I sailed up The Delta from Sausalito
Waiting until dusk to drop anchor was a big mistake, since it became fouled with seagrass that I could not remove in the dark.
The wind was blowing my boat in one direction, but a strong current seemed to be moving my boat closer to shore. Evidently my anchor was not holding. Even in the dim twilight I realized I was much closer now, and also closer to the multiple wrecks indicated on my electronics. I put the engine in reverse and revved the throttle, and began to back away from shore. I‘d nearly run aground, but that wasn’t the only close call I had that night!
I had left Sausalito heading for Rio Vista, a town along the Sacramento river delta. I have family staying there this week while visiting from Ohio, so it seemed like a good opportunity to do some sailing and test out the boat in a hot climate.
I took my time getting prepared, and I really like staying safe with an unrushed attitude. However issues always come up. At noon on July 30th, as I left my slip in Sausalito I realized the fuel dock was closed for lunch hour. Would I have enough fuel if I didn’t top up? I judged that I would be fine since the forecast was for strong and steady winds from a favorable direction, so I shouldn’t need to motor very much.
I felt quite happy and content as I headed up Racoon Straight past Angel Island and into a part of the Bay that I’ve never sailed before.
I passed under the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge and thought about how I’ve been over that bridge many times recently, but never passed under it. Then I noticed a Google bus drive over the bridge and thought about how many of those buses I’ve ridden before my recent retirement. The world keeps changing, and my role is changing a lot now.
I did a lot of planning with a chart book that laid out my trip across six or seven large pages. The charts showed lots of details of water depth and many other important considerations for sailing in these waters that were completely new to me. I figured it would take me two days sailing, so choosing a place to anchor out would be critical. The charts showed several “general anchorage areas” around where I thought I would need to overnight.
This Windy screenshot shows my route to Rio Vista with day one in purple. Note the favorable winds expected along the way (indicated in white). Many areas near Concord looked good for anchoring based on annotations on my chart.
This is the story of the difficult night I spent at the middle red dot in the chart above.
I wanted to sail conservatively, so I steered clear of anything on the chart that I didn’t understand. I used both my chart book and my electronic chart plotter which had the advantage of being able to zoom in to see more details on water depths. Sometimes one would warn me of a hazard that was not visible on the other. Indications of “Shallows” and markers of the deep channel were clear and very helpful. But sometimes there was just an “S” or “M”. What did that mean? I pulled out my book How to Read a Nautical Chart (by Nigel Calder — a name I trust completely for all things nautical). Evidently they’re telling me the bottom is sand (S) or mud (M)?
I chose an area that looked like it would be a good place to anchor, and figured I’d get there before dark, though not before sunset. There was a marker on both my chart sources that said “DOL” and wondered what that meant. Looking it up in the abbreviations section of my book it said “Dolphin”.
“Huh, I wonder what ‘dolphin’ means?”
I tried to drop the anchor in my chosen spot, but the anchor barely made it to the water. What was wrong? I put the boat on autopilot and went forward to figure out what was stuck. Evidently the chain was tangled below because it wouldn’t come up no matter how hard I tried to pull it up out of the chain locker. So I went below and cleared out an area of the v-berth so I could crawl forward and investigate. Opening the chain locker I could see the chain came down from above but was stuck — covered by other loops of chain. Yanking hard I was able to free it, so I pulled out about fifty feet of chain and restacked it inside the locker so it would run free.
As I poked my head back on deck I saw to my horror … that a dolphin means a group of pilings, which I almost crashed into! Here’s what it looked like the next morning.
Lesson learned: if you don’t know what it is, avoid it!
I turned around and motored back to my chosen anchorage spot and dropped the anchor. This time the anchor dropped into the water followed by a good amount of chain. Would it hold? Was I safe now?
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I went forward again to check on the anchor, and expected to see the chain holding the boat against the wind. But the chain led off at an angle, not heading into the wind at all. What was going on? Was there a current moving the boat one way, even as the fifteen knot wind was blowing me the other way? How could I tell if I was stationary or still moving?
Yikes, I was super close to the shore! I rushed back to the helm and put the boat into reverse hoping I could back away. Now I’m hoping my anchor is not holding me in place. Luckily I had not run aground because the boat seemed to move, and once I had a bit of distance I turned the boat around and motored away from shore. With a headlamp on I went forward again to raise the anchor. As it came to the surface I could see it was completely fouled by seagrass. The windlass didn’t even have enough power to lift the heavy anchor and huge clump of wet seagrass, so it remained out of reach. What was I going to do without that anchor? At least I wasn’t aground or on the rocks, but how would I spend the night?
I went back to the helm and scanned the general anchorage area for another spot to anchor in. I could use my little emergency anchor that I had stowed a few weeks ago just in case of an issue like this. Maybe if I pick a place farther from shore, but still shallow, my little anchor would hold. Zooming in on the chart I saw a little circle of eight feet depth within a deeper area. If I dropped my anchor there I should be OK.
I pulled my little danforth style anchor out of the locker and saw that I had not connected anything to it. “Where is my anchor rode? Do I have any rope that I can use?” I need stretchy nylon line, not the typical dacron which does not stretchy. I found two long half inch dock lines that might work. I walked the anchor up to the bow, then made a trip with the dock lines and connected the first one to the anchor and secured the other end to a cleat. Back to the cockpit I maneuvered the boat into the wind and up to that little shallow area where I wanted the anchor to go.
By this time it was quite dark, but with my headlamp I was able to move forward and position the anchor on the bow roller and let it down into the water. Back to the cockpit and I put the boat in neutral and let her drift. Back to the bow and I paid out the dock line to its limit on the cleat. It pulled tight, and then held. Yea! I let out a sigh of relief.
I wanted to add a second dock line to provide more scope for the anchor, to make the pull more horizontal and less vertical. I needed to engage the engine just to relieve enough pressure to get the dock line off the cleat. The wind was still blowing fifteen to twenty knots, pulling the rope as tight as a steel cable. Revving the engine a little beyond idle was enough that I could pull the line hand over hand to inch the boat forward and unhook the line, hooking the second line on and paying the line out again to its new longer limit.
I turned off the engine and took a deep breath. It looked like I was going to be OK. I went below and finally ate the dinner I’d cooked an hour or two earlier.
As I was eating I checked the weather. The wind usually dies down at night, so I was hoping that I’d seen the worst of it, and could sleep as conditions eased. However it looked like the wind would continue unabated. That’s unusual. I’d better check my position periodically through the night.
Every half hour I woke up and looked at the chart plotter I have at my navigation station and saw this same comforting image.
All night long I would glance up and see that small blue circle — like a blue safety balloon keeping me in place. As long as I saw that blue I knew I was in the same spot and my anchor still held. However the wind was getting stronger. In the image above it shows 14.7 knots, but during the night it increased to a steady twenty knots, gusting to twenty five. Yet my anchor held.
In the morning, I felt pretty good. I was able to take the pictures seen here, and even get the seagrass untangled from my anchor. Things were looking up. I ate a nice breakfast and thought about what I would do next.
Raising the anchor was another problem. The wind was still blowing fifteen knots, so I needed to motor into the wind just to relieve some pressure so I could pull in the anchor line.
Setting the autopilot and motoring at fifteen hundred rpm seemed to relieve enough that I could slowly pull the rope in. The boat crept forward, and the anchor line moved from mostly horizontal to mostly vertical. But I still couldn’t get the anchor unstuck. The anchor must have dug in quite deep due to the pressure all night long holding the boat in place. I went back to the helm and increased the throttle. I remember learning that using the boat to pull the anchor in several different directions might eventually find a direction that would break it free. Moving forward was the most logical direction, so I tried it first, and I knew it worked when I noticed that the boat was moving again along the terrain shown on the chart plotter.
The anchor was muddy, so I left it partially submerged in the water to clean it off as I motored back on course.
The rest of the trip to Rio Vista was mostly uneventful. I came close to hitting a couple of channel markers, but learned to never hold my attention on anything for very long without returning soon to check my course and position.
I learned a lot on this trip. I knew that anchoring is often harder than sailing, but this was a real test of my ability to anchor and the equipment I carry on my boat. My boat came with three anchors, the small one I used here, a medium one of an old style, and a huge one for storms. I added a better medium one, but that didn’t work. Anchors are essential, so I had a backup and was able to make it work.
Here she is, happily docked in Rio Vista.
The return trip to Sausalito will probably take three days due to unfavorable winds. I’ll have two nights at anchor, and much more challenging sailing. That will be another challenge, but with this recent experience I’m actually looking forward to it!
