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[bulldog1935]

Since bd0202 mentioned rigging a kayak on another thread, decided to throw up some examples of the most useful piece of rigging on the flats - the anchor trolley.
You can use this thing to move an anchor line to either end of your boat while seated.
When my daughter was young, also used it to tie off her bow line and send it to the stern of my boat, though she hated to be towed, and only did it when the wind took control away from her.

On the flats, the greatest use is rigging a drift sock while seated, and sending it to the stern of your boat for cozy easy-chair drift fishing.
You also use it to bring your drift sock back in, paddle back up and set up a new drift on water you just found to be fishy.
Some people won't go out in the wind. I love it and take advantage of the wind for drift fishing.
Note the narrow Tarpon hull lets me stradle my legs to get this comfy seating position.

Also note, if you have a big redfish, they make a couple of trips around the boat before you get them to hand,
so being able to get your drift sock out of the water in a hurry before you get them to the boat is smart.


There are a few essential ingredients for an anchor trolley: a pair of pulley blocks, a loop of braided line (dinghy sail line is perfect), a ring to guide your anchor line or attach your drift sock,
and a piece of tensioned bungee to keep tightness in your trolley just right.

Fairleads are important to guide the trolley line around curved boat hulls, keeping it out of your cockpit, but fairleads can only be on one side of the line,
so the ring can pass from end to end on the other side of the line (top/bottom)
Line guides that allow the ring to pass can also be helpful.

Cheek blocks can be permanently fastened to the hull

Note if you use two cheek blocks mounted firm to the hull, you should use two rings on your trolley line joined by a segment of bungee for your line tension.

You can usually get into a bow hold to put good leak-tight backing on fittings, but often there's no access to the stern.
You can use orbit blocks at one or both ends of the trolley, and often figure out mounting options with an orbit block that are more flexible than with a cheek block

Note if you use an orbit block at one or both ends, you can get by with one ring in your trolley line, a continuous loop of double braid,
and a bungee outside the trolley loop to both mount the orbit block and tension the trolley.

Orbit blocks also let you get salty and work on lashing.


Line guides
There's no right way to rig your trolley as long as it works.
Here Neumie has his double rings with bungee on the top line, and pad eyes for fairleads to guide the line around the hull on his bottom line.
He told me this was the way they did it when he worked at Jerry B's.

Note another good use of a trolley - staking your boat through the trolley ring to hold your position in the wind, or get out and wade.

That curving around the hull thing - here's use of one type of fairlead on the top line (this top line won't pass the ring),
and a line guide on the bottom line that will pass the ring:

Also note in this photo, if you want a rod leash, you can get by with a fairly short short one,
by hooking it so that it glides between fairleads on your trolley line.

One other thing you might want on your non-ring side - here it's the top line - is a Z-cleat that lets you lock the position of the trolley
The Z-cleat will also have other line uses, like tying off an anchor line.


A well-planned kayak day starts paddling upwind to structure where you expect to fish, also planned around the tide.
Then use the wind to get you back home, drift fishing much of the way.
And yes, if the drift fishing is good, turn around and try it again.

[bulldog1935]

Rigging a drift sock works best with 2 lines - good idea to make them 2 colors.
Paracord works well for this. These lines don't need to be stiff.

The shorter working line anchors to the drift sock parachute.
You don't need your drift sock more than about 4-6' behind the stern of your kayak.
You can tie a bowline knot to attach the working line to the trolley ring.

The longer deployment line ties to the back of the drift sock, collapsing the parachute when you pull, and needs to tag in your cockpit, so you can easily pull in the drift sock -
- you can use a bowline to tie off the deployment line to the side lift handle on your kayak, cleat in to a Z-cleat, etc.

My best rigging clips the working line on a scotty clip to the trolley ring, routing the deployment line through the ring, and lashing the deployment line to a cockpit z-cleat.
Here, the black line on the scotty clip is the short working line attached to the drift sock parachute - the working line scotty clip grabs the trolley ring.
This way, when you pull in the deployment line, it also runs the trolley back to the cockpit.
You can rig all this sitting in the boat on the water with the ring at the cockpit, and then use the trolley to move it to the stern.

The yellow line going through the ring is the deployment line, and has to go all the way to the cockpit.
The working line is always tight under drag load, and the deployment line is always slack, except when you're hauling in your drift sock.


A spinning drift sock can foul your rigging, so some way to keel your drift sock helps. Some folks use a weight on one side of their drift sock.
But since I'm so much in skinny water, I do it the other way:
took the corks from a couple of dead Mansfield maulers, and lashed them to one drift sock webbing strap using a sailmaking needle and 1mm lashing twine -
-many brands of lashing twine include the needle with the twine spool.

[BayFly]

Your post is very timely, since I'm updating my Wilderness Rides with new seats, etc., including rehabbing my trolly. I've never used the kayaks for drift fishing, so a drift sock has never occurred to me, but something I may reconsider. Thanks Bulldog, very informative!

[bulldog1935]

you're welcome, bro - I tried to percolate years of rigging posts on TKF into something lucid.