Do any schools run RYA training courses where you don't live aboard?

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maxmonk

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Do any schools run RYA training courses where you don\'t live aboard?

My girlfriend and I are part way through a competent crew course and I at least would like to progress to Day Skipper. However, she has now dug her heels in and refuses to spend any more weekends in cramped sailing school boats with a bunch of unknown flatulent blokes who wake her up all night as they stumble to the head (but fail to aim at it correctly) and where we seem to have to spend as much time cooking and washing up as we do sailing, when we could just as well have an apple and eat later!

Although I'm prepared to tolerate all that myself in the name of blokey back to basics adventure, you can't fail to see her point of view.

Is there anywhere where we can do our training but return to shore at night? At least until we reach a stage where we can get a boat on our own and then it's only me that's stumbling to the head - she's used to that.
 
Re: Do any schools run RYA training courses where you don\'t live aboard?

Have to admit, I would not go on a similar course for exactly the same reasons as your g/f. I am male but value privacy... hence why we sail.

How close are you to buying a boat. I ask as you could buy now and learn with a skipper, that way you can call the shots. If not buying, then there is flotilla charter where you can sail with just a skipper and offset costs by arm bending friends to join you both and fill the boat. That way there is only one stranger on board.

Do you know anyone who has a boat or experience who might show you the ropes?
 
Re: Do any schools run RYA training courses where you don\'t live aboard?

Second Dogwatch's suggestion.

You'll learn more quickly in a season in your own boat than a succession of formal courses - but make sure you've got some experienced help aboard to begin with.

Obviously you have to take responsibility for establishing what you need to know and making sure you know it.
 
Re: Do any schools run RYA training courses where you don\'t live aboard?

If I recall correctly - you have to spend a specified number of nights aboard to qualify for day skipper.
 
Re: Do any schools run RYA training courses where you don\'t live aboar

Phone a sailing school reasonably near you and ask. They all have free-lance instructors, some of whom have their own boats, and would probably be able to arrange a course of instruction to suit you. It would cost more than a standard one, but you'd be able to concentrate on the bits you need to learn. It could be a lot more fun, too. If you are buying your own boat, get instruction on it - then you will learn exactly what you need to know - a huge confidence-building experience!
 
Re: Do any schools run RYA training courses where you don\'t live aboard?

we seem to have to spend as much time cooking and washing up as we do sailing,
------------------------------------------------------------------------

If, you finally get your own boat, are you intending 'never' to cook & wash-up?

This, IS, part of the 'sailing experience'.
If you wanted a 'waited on, hotel type experience', you might have to reconsider if sailing is for you.

If you are still keen on sailing, you might just consider changing your girlfriend.
If she is dictating at this stage, just think of your future with her.
 
Re: Do any schools run RYA training courses where you don\'t live aboard?

The other alternative is to look for schools that do all girly courses.
 
Re: Do any schools run RYA training courses where you don\'t live aboar

Thanks for all the replies. Own boat is a way off yet, just looking to prepare for flotilla holidays and charters.

The "spend as much time cooking and washing up as we do sailing" is perhaps more my complaint than hers. It seems that sailing schools are obsessed with making 3 course meals at every opportunity and we spent a lot of time in the galley cooking and washing up when we could have been sailing. I don't see the need to make a meat & 2 veg dinner with jam roly poly & custard (yuk!), cooking over a homicidal dancing camping stove and washing up in a thimble full of lukewarm water, when we could eat in the pub later. Likewise cooking a full english breakfast whilst under way, when at home even with a non-hostile cooker and an automatic dishwasher we'd just have a piece of toast if we had something more interesting to be getting on with. Sailing schools seem fixated on cooking and washing up though.

I don't expect to be waited on or never to cook or wash up as Alant suggests, I just don't want to waste time making unnecessarily complicated (and still unappetising) meals and trying to scrape hardened egg off plastic plates under a dribble of cold water when I could be sailing.

I wish I could share Alant's enjoyment of domestic chores that is for him all part of sailing but I'm afraid for me it isn't. Sail now, eat later would be my approach. I'm not into this Caravan Club stuff and I think I'll choose to disregard his relationship advice if he thinks love is sharing the washing up! You'll have to find your own woman Alant, I'm hanging on to mine!
 
Re: Do any schools run RYA training courses where you don\'t live aboard?

It's interesting to me that so far nobody has really answered your question. I am a little out of date now, but when I was an inspector of RYA cruising schools way back in teh 1980s one school in the Westcountry lost its recognition because on all its courses the yacht returned to the home port each afternoon and the instructors went home.
I feel sure that it is a requirement for RYA recognised schools that students remain with the yacht for the whole of the course. How else would you get your night hours in?
Maybe an RYA certificate is not important to either of you in which case you should consider one of the actions suggested by others here.
It does get a bit involved because if the owner of the yacht being used charges you for anything, even if only a share in the food costs, the yacht must be coded. Do be careful if you choose a 'private arrangement'.
 
Re: Do any schools run RYA training courses where you don\'t live aboard?

Talk to a few schools. You should be able to find either an all female course, or perhaps one with two couples though you will pay a bit more if there are four rather than five on the course.
 
Re: Do any schools run RYA training courses where you don\'t live aboar

pm me I know a couple of freelance instructors with own boats who would happily run a course as you described.
 
Re: Do any schools run RYA training courses where you don\'t live aboar

Are you sure that sailing is the right thing for your girl? If she's baulking at this, I can only begin to comprehend the realities of say a rough night passage complete with cooking, washing up and a sail change.

I guess there is nowhere to plug in the hair 'they don't use a lot of power' straighteners either on a sailing school boat!
 
Re: Do any schools run RYA training courses where you don\'t live aboar

Don't let all these negatives put you off having been at Sea all my life as both a Merchant Seaman and then a professional sailor I married my darling wife who although she loves sailing gets terribly seasick - so now instead of beating over the channel we have a gentle cruise to Newtown Creek, and we both have a lovely time. Sailing should be fun if you are happy doing a night passage across the channel and cooking three course meals good luck to you - if bliss is sailing up to a great pub and having dinner ashore it dosen't make you any less of a sailor. As long as you are having fun and not hurting anyone else good luck to you
 
Re: Do any schools run RYA training courses where you don\'t live aboard?

I sympathise with you completely. However I would suggest that you talk to some of the RYA schools and tell them of your concerns. Cooking on board isn't 'per se' a requirement of a RYA course, but, as has been said, living on board probably is, as you do need to put in some 'night hours' experience. It can be a very good and rewarding experience. However a skipper should be able to provision and cater for the crew, but there are ways and means, that do not involve cooking from scratch with 'fresh' produce especially on passage.

You should be able to find a sailing school that will offer a course that will fulfill your requirements.

Just ignore the forumites that seem to think that if you, and your girl friend don't want to spend 5 days on a pre-dominately all male boat, comprised of guys who have no consideration for others (using the heads all night with no aiming skills)./ You don't have to look for another sport/pastime, just look for the sailing school that does the course in a civilised way. They are there.
 
Sharing the costs

Since when does a boat need to be coded if the crew put something into the kitty for food/booze/berthing etc???????????????????
Not even in todays ludicrously over regulated world has it come to that.
 
Re: Do any schools run RYA training courses where you don\'t live aboar

[ QUOTE ]
Own boat is a way off yet, just looking to prepare for flotilla holidays and charters.

[/ QUOTE ]

Surely you can go on a flotilla holiday without the Day Skipper? It'll probably cost you less than the Day Skipper and be about 7.6 million times more fun.

After a couple of flots under your belt I bet you'd find a firm that would charter to you bareboat in the med, again cheaper than the day skipper.

After a few Med Bareboats I bet you'd find a charter firm somewhere sheltered-and-not-very-tidal like the Firth of Clyde that would hire to you. (You'd need to watch the weather there, and not bite off more than you can chew.) With that under your belt you can charter anywhere.

If you're really not up to it you'll find out soon enough on the Flotilla.

Also can I suggest you acclimatize your girlfriend to sailing at home by p*ssing all over the toilet seat 5 times a night.
 
Re: Do any schools run RYA training courses where you don\'t live aboar

When I was the one in charge of a sailing school boat I was very pleased that most customers preferred dinners in pubs (and sometimes quite good restaurants) at their expense, plus paying for me. Used to get back at the end of a week or two weeks with most of the nasty tinned rubbish that the school owners had put on board as victuals untouched.

A little bit of cooking on board is necessary: hot teas/coffee etc underway are sometimes important for crew morale, but I see no need to spend much time cooking on a Day Skipper level course.
 
Re: Do any schools run RYA training courses where you don\'t live aboar

Max, I sympahise with you entirely. There are two solutions I know of, but both can be expensive:

1. Divorce.

2. Buy a boat with an automatic dish-washer and always berth within delivery distance of a take-away or pub/bar/restaurant. Then, invite people to come and crew for you as long as they make all the tea and do the washing up, and have a proper contract drawn up.

From personal experience I chose Option 1, but got to keep the kids. I now bribe them to load the dishwasher make tea etc. The first part wasn't too expensive as she ran off to Cuba with a Canadian yachtsman. The second part is the expensive bit - keeping the kids. Mind you, they are really useful things to have on board. Sail changes, stuck halyards, nipping ashore to grab the lines, spinnakering, and all sorts of things. /forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif

Then get own boat tuition.
 
Re: Do any schools run RYA training courses where you don\'t live aboard?

I agree with DogWatch, I'd recommend going on a flotilla with tuition thrown in. My wife and I have been on flotillas where a couple has done day skipper on their first week and sailed with the flotilla the second. Everyone we've seen who has done so has thoroughly enjoyed it.
 
Re: Do any schools run RYA training courses where you don\'t live aboard?

If you want a Day Skipper qualification then you have to spend five nights on board - it is a requirement that cannot be waived. The course is about far more than sailing - it is about being able to skipper a yacht, which involves being in a confined space with other people for a prolonged period of time. Doesn't sound to me, quite honestly as if you have the temperament for that.

If you just want to go sailing with your girlfriend then why do you need a DS qualification? Get a boat, get some (day) sailing tuition on your own boat and just go sailing in your own style and company. Of course, you could do a Day Skipper on your own boat with an instructor - you just need to find one you can live with for five days and who you are prepared to pay the going rate to. You would still have to sleep on board during the course though.

The people who have been advising you that there is some way to get a DS qualification without sleeping on board are, I am afraid, quite wrong on this. There are however schools that do a five day course split over two nights and three nights, so the individual periods of purgatory are shorter.

Not sure about the flotilla with tuition route, but if it is in the Med the qualification will be non-tidal.

- W
 
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