"Believe it or not but in face to face instruction most ppeople learn the bowline faster and can tie it faster that the double eight. There is trick for it. You can make an eye and pull a loop from the working through it. Push the loose end through that loop and size the bowline. Now you can pull on working end to get the knot tight. Thatīs it."
This is the way I usually tie my bowlines as well. Although occassionally I'll fall back to the way I learned in Boy Scouts, "Make the letter b, then bring the rabbit out of his hole, around behind the tree, and back into the hole."
Anyway, be aware that the "pull a loop" method you mention can result in several different versions of the bowline. If you pull your initial loop from the standing end, you will end up with either a "normal" bowline or a "left handed" bowline, depending on which direction you then feed the running end through. A left handed bowline is considered inferior to a normal one. And if you pull your initial loop from the working end, you'll end up with an "eskimo" bowline or an unamed (AFAIK) eskimo bowline variant depending on the direction of feed for the final running end tuck.
My advice would be, if someone likes the "pull a loop" method and they're a beginner, let them make it however they can remember it, not worrying about which variant they will end up with. And then instruct them to ALWAYS finish off the knot with a good tight security overhand knot attaching the running end to it's adjacent rope. Thus if they inadvertantly end up with a left handed bowline, it is improved by the overhand so that they don't have to agonize over whether they originally tied the "best" variant in the first place. This should be good enough for general use of the bowline.
Previous Topic
Index
