@tmxmsails - Cooper discourages anchoring because of the sea grass and turtles. I anchor at Norman all the time, but the 50+ foot depth outside of the mooring field means few, if any, charter boats can anchor there. Great Harbour on JVD has such terrible holding that I'd take a mooring there. I've picked up a drifting catamaran, still attached to the mooring, in less than 5 knots of wind at Norman. When I do take a mooring, I will snorkel it and check as much of the line as I can. Recently I took a mooring in Grenada where it looked substantial from the surface but was only a thin polypro line holding me. But other places such as Leverick I can't understand why one would take a mooring - less than 20 feet depth and great holding in sand.

Despite WH's comments, if he'd eliminated all points of failure, he'd still have his boat.

Backing down on a mooring makes sense.