Choosing an Anchorage

One of the two other cruising boats that shared Great Salt Pond with us, lit by the dawn after the blow.

As I write, the still gale force remnants of the Halloween Storm of 2011 are howling in the rigging as Morgan’s Cloud tugs at her anchor and bucks to the chop here in Great Salt Pond at Block Island.

I sometimes call cruising, particularly when tired and crotchety, “death by a thousand decisions”. And deciding where to seek shelter with a storm on the way, particularly when far from home and in unfamiliar waters, can be one of the most stressful calls we voyagers are called upon to make. So here is the thinking process we went through and some of the alternatives we considered before deciding to ride out the blow at Block Island.