T&T: Anchoring vs Existing Moorning

[C. Marin Faure]

 >If there is no boat attached to the mooring when you show up, is it  
legal to anchor so close to the mooring that your boat would  
interfere with the other boat, if that boat arrives after you did....

This is  a very good question although the legality part of it may  
not be the issue.   I doubt there is any law on the books governing  
the situation that  you describe, although there may be something  
covering this in the rules and regulations of a government or private  
marine park that has mooring buoys for its guests.  But I'm of the  
mind that we don't need a law for every possible situation that might  
arise.  I think common sense and courtesy can suffice for most of the  
situations we encounter.   So common sense and courtesy would dictate  
that if you are going to anchor and there is a permanent mooring buoy  
nearby, don't anchor in such a way as to make the mooring buoy  
unusable.  You have no way of knowing when the buoy is going to be  
used next.  Even if it looks like it's hardly ever used, the evening  
you anchor may be the same evening the owner shows up for the first  
time that year.

As to the issue of using a private mooring buoy if the owner is not  
using it, this is a situation my wife and I deal with on a regular  
basis at the small private island in the San Juans on which we own  
property.  There are a number of private mooring buoys around the  
island.  We don't have one.   So when we're going to take the boat to  
the island for a weekend, we call the island's caretaker and he or  
his wife tells us which buoy we can use.  They know who is likely to  
be using their buoy and who is not.  However, we had to sign a  
statement stating that we will not hold the owner of any buoy we  
might use responsible for any damage or accident that might occur  
while we are using the buoy.  This includes accidents or damage as a  
result of the mooring itself failing---- chain breaks, shackle pulls  
out of the concrete buoy anchor, etc.

One of the risks of using an unoccupied mooring buoy is that you will  
most likely have no idea what shape the hardware is in.  The buoy may  
look fine, but that's the least critical part of the mooring.  The  
mooring buoys in the marine parks in our state are inspected annually  
by divers (or they're supposed to be) to check the condition of the  
chain and heavy line securing the buoys to the anchors, and the  
condition of the anchors themselves.  These components---  
particularly the chain and line and the connections between them---  
have finite lives.  If the divers find excessive wear, damage, rust,  
etc., the components are changed.  But that's in a marine park.  We  
have no idea how recently a mooring system at our island was  
checked.  Sometimes the caretaker will mention that so-and-so just  
had a diver install new chain or whatever, but most of the time it's  
a crap shoot.  I've seen statements in the past on T&T by long-time  
cruisers that they will not use a permanent mooring buoy even if one  
is available but always anchor instead simply because there is no  
uncertainty about the condition of their anchor and rode.

If you do choose to moor to an unoccupied mooring buoy, the obvious  
correct action to take if the owner shows up in his boat is for you  
to get off the buoy.  The owner may or may not be "nice" about this.   
But if they yell at you, that may not be polite but they're not  
wrong.  If you came home to find someone has pitched a tent in your  
yard thinking it's okay because you haven't pitched a tent in your  
yard, what would your reaction be?  :-)


____________________
C. Marin Faure
GB36-403 "La Perouse"
Bellingham, Washington