Where to start - new to sailing

I would suggest you go off and join a sailing club and go crew with someone, to start with, and gain some sailing experience.
Then with a bit of experience under your belt, you can go on a flotilla holiday.
As a taster to yacht sailing, and the experience to be had, here in Greece, I'd recommend you contact Sailingholidays.com who seam to specialise in the flotilla scene and I know a few people who have done it, and they loved it.
 
Cariadco said:
As a taster to yacht sailing, and the experience to be had, here in Greece, I'd recommend you contact Sailingholidays.com who seam to specialise in the flotilla scene and I know a few people who have done it, and they loved it.
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Can second that. Though I went on one of their flotillas with zero sailing experience.
 
I used to be ambivalent about sailing dinghies as a starter into the sport but have thought about it more.

Thing about dinghy sailing is that you learn to sail, which is very handy, also how to handle a small boat, ashore and on the water. You also figure out how to rig it, what goes where, a couple of knots and what a shackle is. Balance as well, not in the sailing sense but how to move on light hull. I was always pretty sure that sailing a small boat on and off a dock is almost essential if you are ever to have the confidence to attempt the same in a eight ton yacht. How much nicer to tell someone who might take you out “I've done a little bit of dinghy sailing, loved it”

The main thing though, the key important thing, the thing that matters to the point of incandescence, is that you have a taste of the buzz of real sailing. No keelboat quite has it, you pull the sail in and the boat cuts forward in an unalloyed act of cosmic sorcery that you can't buy in a superyacht. It's there but muffled to silence under the layers of expense and irrelevance.


Besides if the OP sails his Elan to the West Indies what a dipstick he would look if he can't rig and sail a dinghy off the beach, without turning it upside down.
130 quid and 4 days well spent, in my book.

.
 
ryanroberts said:
Can second that. Though I went on one of their flotillas with zero sailing experience.
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I'll 3rd that from a different perspective. Hilts86 doesn't mention a family situation and flotilla sailing is usually done with a family group or group of friends per boat but Sailing Holidays do a "pot luck" (quick google says's they've rebranded that to "share a boat") thing where they'll put random strangers together. Now I can imagine that doesn't always work: When I did it there wasn't much contention on the sailing front as I had a YM ticket and the other two couldn't sail but I can see how it might be difficult with the wrong mix of people. However, before embarking on a quest how to sail in the UK (coldness, grey skies, pouring rain) it's not a bad idea to get a picture of what you're actually aiming for. Especially if you then decide to do a 14 week fasttrack course in the middle of winter (which imho is the best way to do it..)
Professional Yachtmaster Offshore Course only £8,995 - UKSA
 
Hi Hilts86, along with the other advice, the best tip that I can offer is to never, under any circumstances EVER, ask which anchor to use.
Ever.
 
Pirx said:
Like you I live in Lancashire and I have a small ( 7 metre ) yacht on Lake Windermere. You would be very welcome to come for a sail and we could discuss all this whilst either drifting gently up the lake or possibly enjoying a decent sail. The boat is incredibly easy to handle single handed, almost as nimble as a dinghy but vastly more stable: you wouldn 't learn anything about tides and waves on the lake, but goodness you'd learn very quickly about wind shifts and sail handling. Once we are off the mooring you can do all the work and I'll handle the jib and admire the view - I'd expect it to take about ten minutes for you to get on top of it.
Most of my sailing has been at sea, and still is, but Windermere is a fine just-up-the-road compromise with good scenery. And you absolutely don't need to waste money on any special clothing !

I don't think it matters where you start. Just get on any boat, anywhere, and let it all happen. Once you get involved all sorts of oportunities will appear. My experience of people new to seafaring has been that it doesn't matter if they know anything to start with: if they are happy on a boat and enjoying the experience they very rapidly learn how to do things and make themselves useful. Us humans is good at this - it's how everything began.
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That is much appreciated and I will be sure to take you up on the offer as soon as lockdown is over. I spend quite a lot of time in the lakes walking, camping and my friend has a motorboat on Windemere so I can send the wife off water skiing and you can give me a crash course in sailing :)
 
I congratulate you on your plan. IMHO it's the most intelligent approach to getting started. Many on here are advocating dinghy courses as a starter, while others say just go straight to cruisers, but in my experience Keelboat Courses are the best path into cruising. You get to keep your bum dry, (mostly) while while learning to handle a small dayboat, which is bigger than a dinghy but smaller than a yacht. Multiple repeats of manoeuvres; coming alongside, picking up buoys, MOBs , sailing backwards, spinnaker with no tears (either wet or fabric-rending:) ), anchoring, mooring, tying up to a pontoon/quay, lee-shore rescue etc are all covered, in a manner closer to the big-boat experience than would be found on a dinghy. Combined with the Theory Course, (which you should do first) , by the time you progress to the fourth level, Seamanship Skills, you will have better skills than a person pursuing Day Skipper qualification on bigger boats. See the Keelboat Syllabus in the link below:
RYA SYLLABUS (Keelboat Sections only)
There are plenty of sailing schools in North-West England/Wales offering these courses. Here is a good one: Sailing » Plas Menai
 
doug748 said:
I used to be ambivalent about sailing dinghies as a starter into the sport but have thought about it more.

Thing about dinghy sailing is that you learn to sail, which is very handy, also how to handle a small boat, ashore and on the water. You also figure out how to rig it, what goes where, a couple of knots and what a shackle is. Balance as well, not in the sailing sense but how to move on light hull. I was always pretty sure that sailing a small boat on and off a dock is almost essential if you are ever to have the confidence to attempt the same in a eight ton yacht. How much nicer to tell someone who might take you out “I've done a little bit of dinghy sailing, loved it”

The main thing though, the key important thing, the thing that matters to the point of incandescence, is that you have a taste of the buzz of real sailing. No keelboat quite has it, you pull the sail in and the boat cuts forward in an unalloyed act of cosmic sorcery that you can't buy in a superyacht. It's there but muffled to silence under the layers of expense and irrelevance.


Besides if the OP sails his Elan to the West Indies what a dipstick he would look if he can't rig and sail a dinghy off the beach, without turning it upside down.
130 quid and 4 days well spent, in my book.

.
Click to expand...
As a Keelboat Instructor, I would like to point out that while both a small dayboat and a large cruising yacht have keels, the term "keelboat", in sail-training circles , refers to a small dayboat or perhaps a slightly larger competitive sailing boat generally without accomodation.
 
RJJ said:
A cheap little boat may have much in common with a dinghy, but drier. You can manhandle the sails and tiller at the same time, you can probably do an uncontrolled gybe if you want, it's good advice.
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May well be cheap to buy, but probably harder to sell, keeping it in the water and maintaining it will be ten fold more than a dinghy, if you go as far as buying one!
Joining a dinghy club or doing a course to learn to sail is by far the cheaper option.
 
laika said:
I'll 3rd that from a different perspective. Hilts86 doesn't mention a family situation and flotilla sailing is usually done with a family group or group of friends per boat but Sailing Holidays do a "pot luck" (quick google says's they've rebranded that to "share a boat") thing where they'll put random strangers together. Now I can imagine that doesn't always work: When I did it there wasn't much contention on the sailing front as I had a YM ticket and the other two couldn't sail but I can see how it might be difficult with the wrong mix of people. However, before embarking on a quest how to sail in the UK (coldness, grey skies, pouring rain) it's not a bad idea to get a picture of what you're actually aiming for. Especially if you then decide to do a 14 week fasttrack course in the middle of winter (which imho is the best way to do it..)
Professional Yachtmaster Offshore Course only £8,995 - UKSA
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Married with no kids. I’m not in a desperate rush and had planned to develop over a few years, plus the amount of time I’d need to take off work and cost make it a none starter unfortunately.
 
Have a look at Glasson sailing club if you want to get a small boat and run it on minimal budget. About 300 a year to keep a small cruiser and pleasant trips to piel island, barrow and iom. Some relaxed racing at Fleetwood too for casual crewing experience.
 
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