Mister Rhino
Well-Known Member
I am on the south coast, but PM me if you are interested in crewing....
Getting into sailing
- Thread starter Mikedefieslife
- Start date
tcm
...
well that's another thing innit - he's in Norwich, miles from decent sailing. As webby says, the east coast is a bit iffy/boring much better on s coast, or wales, or scotland, all of which a good ole distance. The OP's overland adventure experience will come in handy after all...
Mikedefieslife
Well-Known Member
Yeah driving/riding down to sussex every week wouldn't be my idea of fun. I remember having to play Brighton away in one my lacrosse matched back when I still played. Horrible journey, and I didn't much care for Eastbourne (where I spent the night).
That being said, I've been meaning to leave Norwich for a couple of years now, but I have nice cheap rent here even if it does add 2 hours to every journey I make outside the county. Still, I always imagined that if I'm going to move it might as well be out of the country and at least enjoy some nice weather.
The good thing about my work is that I can do it from anywhere in the world provided I can get an internet connection for a couple of hours a day.
Currently fascinated by the thread about live aboards: http://www.ybw.com/forums/showthread.php?219743-Yacht-or-motor-boat-to-live-on-advice-for-newbie/
That being said, I've been meaning to leave Norwich for a couple of years now, but I have nice cheap rent here even if it does add 2 hours to every journey I make outside the county. Still, I always imagined that if I'm going to move it might as well be out of the country and at least enjoy some nice weather.
The good thing about my work is that I can do it from anywhere in the world provided I can get an internet connection for a couple of hours a day.
Currently fascinated by the thread about live aboards: http://www.ybw.com/forums/showthread.php?219743-Yacht-or-motor-boat-to-live-on-advice-for-newbie/
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tcm
...
Fab stuff. Except that your last choice was Norwich - or was that forced on you, somehow?
Plenty of internet most places these days. Choose a dream place and try that? No, not Thetford....
Mikedefieslife
Well-Known Member
It's a pleasant place ended up staying after uni. That being said I'm not here too often these day. Got in back in Feb after spending 6 months in South America, then did a tour of Ireland, and only recently cycled the Loire and Brittany. I love to travel which I suppose is one of the reasons why sailing appeals to me.
webcraft
Well-Known Member
You can't start at Day Skipper.
There is a minimum experience requirement (which is equivalent to having done the 5 day comp crew course) of 5 nights aboard, 100 miles and 4 night hours.
- W
jac
Well-Known Member
You could take that with a pinch of salt.
I wouldn't suggest that someones first ever trip on a boat was to do DS but if the OP does Dinghy Level 1 and 2 then blags a couple of weekends or even races on a mid sized boat (i.e. you can live on it and it has winches) then DS should be ok.
I would still suggest the DS theory first though as the DS practical is not intended to teach total newbies how to calculate a CTS.
johnalison
Well-Known Member
The East Coast may be iffy, whatever that means, but it has its own challenges, which is why our sailors have been the finest in the country for over a century.
prv
Well-Known Member
Jungle Jim
Well-Known Member
If it helps, here's my experience. I got into sailing at 50+ so your not too late. Like you did the Dinghy L1, liked it, did the level 2 and spent 18 months dinghy sailing which taught me loads about wind, tides, weather and what each one does to a boat. A few more RYA courses, like Seamanship Skills, basic navigation, stuff like that, taught me stuff applicable to dinghies and bigger boats.
I had a hankering for going further afield in something bigger and a weekend keelboat trip round the Solent with an overnight in Cowes (an exotic location for a dinghy sailor
) made me want to try a yacht. The centre offered yachting courses and advised that with my dinghy experience go straight for Day Skipper. I did the theory course and looked for crewing opportunities on yachts.
I was lucky in that a local skipper took me out, we got on well, I became regular crew and I gained a lot of experience. I took the Yachtmaster Coastal exam last winter and although I still haven't done any practicals, in 3 years weekend and odd summer sails have probably covered 7-800 miles, visited most Solent ports, France three times (Scuttlebutt cruise here we come again next month!) and down as far as Falmouth. I still sail dinghies as well, they are both enjoyable in their own way, and both bring something to the skills of the other.
I started out wanting my own boat but crewing works for me at the moment, especially now I know what mooring fees on the south coast are like :ambivalence:. I would advise doing your L1 and 2 and then crewing on a boat (or several) before you buy. After that the world is the mollusc of your choice. Good luck and enjoy :encouragement:
I had a hankering for going further afield in something bigger and a weekend keelboat trip round the Solent with an overnight in Cowes (an exotic location for a dinghy sailor
) made me want to try a yacht. The centre offered yachting courses and advised that with my dinghy experience go straight for Day Skipper. I did the theory course and looked for crewing opportunities on yachts.I was lucky in that a local skipper took me out, we got on well, I became regular crew and I gained a lot of experience. I took the Yachtmaster Coastal exam last winter and although I still haven't done any practicals, in 3 years weekend and odd summer sails have probably covered 7-800 miles, visited most Solent ports, France three times (Scuttlebutt cruise here we come again next month!) and down as far as Falmouth. I still sail dinghies as well, they are both enjoyable in their own way, and both bring something to the skills of the other.
I started out wanting my own boat but crewing works for me at the moment, especially now I know what mooring fees on the south coast are like :ambivalence:. I would advise doing your L1 and 2 and then crewing on a boat (or several) before you buy. After that the world is the mollusc of your choice. Good luck and enjoy :encouragement:
corbu
Active Member
Another vote for skipping out comp crew. I got a few lessons from a friend, one to one is great for your first tacks and gybes etc. Read a few books, practiced tying knots and then straight to Day Skipper practical. Observing the people doing Comp Crew on my course I was really glad that I hadn't done it that way.
With regard to the experience requirements, my instructor seemed pleased enough that I could tie a bowline behind my back and that everything else would come over the week.
However, its all great fun whatever route you take.
With regard to the experience requirements, my instructor seemed pleased enough that I could tie a bowline behind my back and that everything else would come over the week.
However, its all great fun whatever route you take.
webcraft
Well-Known Member
I find that unlikely.
The Day Skipper course is for people who already have some sailing experience. If this is very limited then it is essential that they have done the theory IMO.
I am not presently planning to renew my instructor qualification because I have in the end become dis-satisfied with the way the (DS) qualification is currently approached.
- W
corbu
Active Member
I have really enjoyed the RYA training I have had to date, Day Skipper Practical, Yachtmaster Theory and Coastal Skipper Practical.
My experience before doing the Day Skipper was limited but of high quality. I had also taken the time to read about and practice the shore based side of things.
I didn't mean to appear flippant about the experience needed for Day Skipper or undermine its importance, but, my observation of those doing competent crew was that they didn't get a great deal out of it. My post was more to suggest getting some one to one when you first start can be very helpful.
On your last point, I keep in touch with earlier my instructors, both excellent and they feel the same way as you now. Is this a common feeling?
My experience before doing the Day Skipper was limited but of high quality. I had also taken the time to read about and practice the shore based side of things.
I didn't mean to appear flippant about the experience needed for Day Skipper or undermine its importance, but, my observation of those doing competent crew was that they didn't get a great deal out of it. My post was more to suggest getting some one to one when you first start can be very helpful.
On your last point, I keep in touch with earlier my instructors, both excellent and they feel the same way as you now. Is this a common feeling?
jimbaerselman
Well-Known Member
I've been writing some stuff for the Cruising Association. Here's an extract:
For the first 2 or 3 years I owned my boat, I sailed with some 10 or so different crew using this service. Two of them didn't return - I think one suffered too much seasickness, and another found that living conditions with four on board was uncomfortably intimate. The rest sailed with me for several years. Three subsequently chartered in the Med after taking Day Skipper exams. A couple now cruise their own boat - even asked if I could crew for them on their first big voyage!
For the first 2 or 3 years I owned my boat, I sailed with some 10 or so different crew using this service. Two of them didn't return - I think one suffered too much seasickness, and another found that living conditions with four on board was uncomfortably intimate. The rest sailed with me for several years. Three subsequently chartered in the Med after taking Day Skipper exams. A couple now cruise their own boat - even asked if I could crew for them on their first big voyage!
Mikedefieslife
Well-Known Member
Still doing the dinghy course for a bit of fun. It's not until September though so a couple of weeks out yet.
I think I'll get board waiting until January to do the comp crew in NZ. I want to get out on the water ASAP.
I have been told elsewhere to skip competenat crew (through a friend who had a chat with a RYA Yachtmaster), and try to go straight to a Day Skipper. So I did a bit of looking around and found that some schools do what they call 'intensive day skipper' courses.
Here one - http://www.eastcoastoffshoreyachting.co.uk/day-skipper-intensive-shorebased.html
EDIT: Ignore that. Looks like it's just the shore-based classroom training.
I can imagine there being a bit of weather in the north sea though at this time of year. Someone plugged the Hercules School in Gibraltar. I did take a look but they don't do any intensive day skipper courses.
All that being said, I don't know my halyard from my downhaul, so perhaps will need comp crew, or at lease a nice friendly skipper to take me out on their yacht a few times.
I think I'll get board waiting until January to do the comp crew in NZ. I want to get out on the water ASAP.
I have been told elsewhere to skip competenat crew (through a friend who had a chat with a RYA Yachtmaster), and try to go straight to a Day Skipper. So I did a bit of looking around and found that some schools do what they call 'intensive day skipper' courses.
Here one - http://www.eastcoastoffshoreyachting.co.uk/day-skipper-intensive-shorebased.html
EDIT: Ignore that. Looks like it's just the shore-based classroom training.
I can imagine there being a bit of weather in the north sea though at this time of year. Someone plugged the Hercules School in Gibraltar. I did take a look but they don't do any intensive day skipper courses.
All that being said, I don't know my halyard from my downhaul, so perhaps will need comp crew, or at lease a nice friendly skipper to take me out on their yacht a few times.
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Hacker
Well-Known Member
They are just about to do a 12 day one starting in Oct, see their Facebook page. Thoroughly recommend them.
tatali0n
Well-Known Member
I always figured that's why the typical Day Skipper Practical runs over four nights and five days.
My first and only cruising qualification so far is Day Skipper. The training centre had no trouble letting me, my Dad or my eldest son straight onto it. We did already have plenty of dinghy sailing experience, two of us being dinghy instructors, but I don't think that lends anything to the experience criteria
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tatali0n
Well-Known Member
I got into sailing in my early 30's, about where the OP is now.
I joined a local sailing club, bought a lovely old Mirror dinghy for a couple of hundred quid and spent the winter teaching myself not to fall out of it and generally having a blast on the 40ish acre lake, only scaring myself witless once or twice.
The following spring I booked myself onto the club's RYA Level 2 course. By that summer, I was racing, albeit not very well and mainly because there is only so much to do on such a small lake before it gets a bit repetitive. It was less about the racing, and more the lure of sailing a course somebody else had set as well as I could, negotiating my way around whatever got in the way as I did.
The following year, I booked myself onto the Level 3 course (then called Seamanship), mainly because it gave me an excuse for being out on the water every Saturday for six weeks ("I've paid for the course now, dear") along with every Sunday as usual ("But I always race on a Sunday, honey!")
From there, I got my dinghy instructor's ticket a couple of years later (because the club paid for it in return for my giving them time instructing - yet more excuse for Saturdays on the water) and a couple of years on more, my senior instructor's ticket (again, same reason)
Dad meanwhile got himself a Wanderer dinghy that we started trailing away on family holidays, which eventually turned in to a Drascombe Lugger, which we trailed away on both family holidays and any weekend we could persuade our respective better halves to let us both get away.
Then we did the Day Skipper theory over one winter about three years ago, because it was offered cheap through our sailing club. About half way through, Dad got it into his head that we should buy a yacht, so we found and bought a 26' Westerly Griffon which we keep on the Bristol Channel, because it's local (as opposed, arguably, to being sensible
)
With respect to moving up from a dinghy to a yacht, the advice and support both here and from the Westerly Owners Association was invaluable. As was, I firmly believe, my dinghy experience.
The following summer we did the Day Skipper practical to finish the ticket mainly because it was five days sailing in Cornwall and was an excuse to the wife ("But honey, it'll teach us to be better and safer sailors, and we've paid for the course now"). I enjoyed the course, but the main benefit was five days on a slightly bigger boat in slightly less tidally vicious waters and having an experienced instructor accompanying with our sailing. Little else by that point was new to us.
Surprisingly, I'm still happily married.
In fact, a couple of weeks ago, I left Dad behind for a few days and took my long suffering, eternally patient wife on a trip from Swansea to Tenby and then back aboard the Westerly. The trip out was a bit rough for her, a little over ten ours of beating into what became a squally F5 with wind over tide, but on the trip back, after a day's rest and touristy shopping in Tenby, we picked up a pod of about a eight or so dolphins as we were reaching back along the outside of the Helwick Bank a couple of hours after dawn, the light still low and golden.
They escorted us for over half an hour, dancing and playing in the rolling, quartering sea that was pitching us around as it stacked up against the bank, close enough for either of us to lean over and whisper in a cetacean ear. The wife was almost childish in her glee and delight. I think I've got her hooked on this sailing thing
Mike, I think you're going about it the right way with the dinghy course. If you enjoy it, there are some good lake-based sailing clubs up your way, you could do worse than look at joining one of them and take up dinghy sailing properly. The boat and sail handling skills you'll develop by spending time on the water will be invaluable going forwards.
And it's fun. Aside from the Westerly, I still keep an Enterprise dinghy at the local sailing club I originally joined, and race it there whenever I'm not away cruising with Dad
I joined a local sailing club, bought a lovely old Mirror dinghy for a couple of hundred quid and spent the winter teaching myself not to fall out of it and generally having a blast on the 40ish acre lake, only scaring myself witless once or twice.
The following spring I booked myself onto the club's RYA Level 2 course. By that summer, I was racing, albeit not very well and mainly because there is only so much to do on such a small lake before it gets a bit repetitive. It was less about the racing, and more the lure of sailing a course somebody else had set as well as I could, negotiating my way around whatever got in the way as I did.
The following year, I booked myself onto the Level 3 course (then called Seamanship), mainly because it gave me an excuse for being out on the water every Saturday for six weeks ("I've paid for the course now, dear") along with every Sunday as usual ("But I always race on a Sunday, honey!")
From there, I got my dinghy instructor's ticket a couple of years later (because the club paid for it in return for my giving them time instructing - yet more excuse for Saturdays on the water) and a couple of years on more, my senior instructor's ticket (again, same reason)
Dad meanwhile got himself a Wanderer dinghy that we started trailing away on family holidays, which eventually turned in to a Drascombe Lugger, which we trailed away on both family holidays and any weekend we could persuade our respective better halves to let us both get away.
Then we did the Day Skipper theory over one winter about three years ago, because it was offered cheap through our sailing club. About half way through, Dad got it into his head that we should buy a yacht, so we found and bought a 26' Westerly Griffon which we keep on the Bristol Channel, because it's local (as opposed, arguably, to being sensible
)With respect to moving up from a dinghy to a yacht, the advice and support both here and from the Westerly Owners Association was invaluable. As was, I firmly believe, my dinghy experience.
The following summer we did the Day Skipper practical to finish the ticket mainly because it was five days sailing in Cornwall and was an excuse to the wife ("But honey, it'll teach us to be better and safer sailors, and we've paid for the course now"). I enjoyed the course, but the main benefit was five days on a slightly bigger boat in slightly less tidally vicious waters and having an experienced instructor accompanying with our sailing. Little else by that point was new to us.
Surprisingly, I'm still happily married.
In fact, a couple of weeks ago, I left Dad behind for a few days and took my long suffering, eternally patient wife on a trip from Swansea to Tenby and then back aboard the Westerly. The trip out was a bit rough for her, a little over ten ours of beating into what became a squally F5 with wind over tide, but on the trip back, after a day's rest and touristy shopping in Tenby, we picked up a pod of about a eight or so dolphins as we were reaching back along the outside of the Helwick Bank a couple of hours after dawn, the light still low and golden.
They escorted us for over half an hour, dancing and playing in the rolling, quartering sea that was pitching us around as it stacked up against the bank, close enough for either of us to lean over and whisper in a cetacean ear. The wife was almost childish in her glee and delight. I think I've got her hooked on this sailing thing
Mike, I think you're going about it the right way with the dinghy course. If you enjoy it, there are some good lake-based sailing clubs up your way, you could do worse than look at joining one of them and take up dinghy sailing properly. The boat and sail handling skills you'll develop by spending time on the water will be invaluable going forwards.
And it's fun. Aside from the Westerly, I still keep an Enterprise dinghy at the local sailing club I originally joined, and race it there whenever I'm not away cruising with Dad
Mikedefieslife
Well-Known Member
Went out sailing Lazers today. Was a fun if semi-frustrating experience. Wind changed direction a fair amount and there were small gusts as oppose to a good steady breeze. Still I enjoyed it, even if my main sheet did constantly get tangled, either around my feet, around the pulley, or around the tiller. Did not like the design of that at all.
Not really applicable to a yacht but capsize recovery was probably the most fun.
Not really applicable to a yacht but capsize recovery was probably the most fun.
D
Deleted member 36384
Guest
A good Competent Crew will sail rings round a bad Day Skipper, not a lot of the former and plenty of the latter. While an RYA recognised sea school is one way to do it there are other ways.
I am a big believer in teaching yourself and sailing is very much a skill that lends itself to self teaching. Assuming you want to cruise and not race, get a cruising style dinghy and sail it pretty intensely for a season, practising all sorts of manoeuvres under sail. Once you can handle the dinghy a larger yacht will be easier, although there are obvious differences associated with mass, momentum and windage. Like the dinghy spend a good chunk of time doing manoeuvres, you don't need to sail far to do this, any fool can sail in a straight line. So, in 2 seasons you can be an expert at handling dinghies and offshore yachts up to about 12.5 meter. For handling a yacht under power I would strongly recommend a sailing school that offers intensive weekends of pontoon bashing and do a couple of those. Navigation is easy to learn from books if you have had a decent education and own a decent plotter. I learned in dinghies and just sailed every day for most of a summer. It pretty much worked for me. A good sailing instructor is also worth its weight in gold.
I am a big believer in teaching yourself and sailing is very much a skill that lends itself to self teaching. Assuming you want to cruise and not race, get a cruising style dinghy and sail it pretty intensely for a season, practising all sorts of manoeuvres under sail. Once you can handle the dinghy a larger yacht will be easier, although there are obvious differences associated with mass, momentum and windage. Like the dinghy spend a good chunk of time doing manoeuvres, you don't need to sail far to do this, any fool can sail in a straight line. So, in 2 seasons you can be an expert at handling dinghies and offshore yachts up to about 12.5 meter. For handling a yacht under power I would strongly recommend a sailing school that offers intensive weekends of pontoon bashing and do a couple of those. Navigation is easy to learn from books if you have had a decent education and own a decent plotter. I learned in dinghies and just sailed every day for most of a summer. It pretty much worked for me. A good sailing instructor is also worth its weight in gold.
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