Yet another DS practical question

The RYA are now actively wanting RTCs to teach "Digital First". This recognises that today's sailor uses digital information for navigating, tides, weather et cetera. There is no significant change to the DS (or other syllabi) but there should be an expectation that the instructor will focus on digital information. I am not sure how many are fully embracing "digital first" and have modified teaching to incorporate this initiative.
 
I did my CS a couple of years ago out of Largs. We had a DS candidate, a qualified CC and DS for miles building and another CS candidate. We didn’t do any night (although there wasn’t really any night anyway and we all had required night hours). Emphasis on being skipper for the day, building a plan, allocating crew duties, safety brief, engine and boat checks etc. lots of practical training on picking up mooring, marina manoeuvres, anchoring and mob drills. Lots of work, but good fun - learning is much easier when it’s fun so I imagine you will have a similar experience.

Flip cards and knot tying, briefing on helicopter rescue etc once docked and crew did all the cooking and vit’ling.

And remember the correct answer to the flip card showing 3 green lights in a triangle plus steaming lights is “ you are in a mine field do not move, switch the radio on and await for the almighty bollocking from the grey funnel line”. The book answer of keep well clear might well result in all sorts of light and sound signals that don’t appear in the books! 🤪🤪🤪🤪
 
ylop said:
Don't think about it as pass or fail this isn't a driving test where they are ticking boxes - you'll likely be fine if you already have reasonably recent theory and can sail. People who seem to run into trouble are people who thought they could skip the prior experience. If someone is trying to skip the Comp Crew stage and doesn't have enough prior knowledge then a good instructor/school would just issue Comp Crew to them too. We took my daughter to do CC alongside my DS when she was quite young and the school said sometime at that age they don't do enough to get the full CC cert, but they would still issue Start Yachting. She did actually get CC just fine, and whilst she's now a lazy teenager so needs poked with a boathook to do anything she's actually very good.

What surprised me (in a good way) from the course was it was much less about "sailing" or "manoeuvring" than about how you manage and look after your crew. With family aboard the dynamic may be different from a bunch of other experts - make sure you allocate them meaningful tasks and explain them well.
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And of course how you manage and look after the boat as well.
The emphasis is on safety rather than your ability to park the boat elegantly in a marina without using the bow thruster.
 
Sticky Fingers said:
Well, I've done my own DS sail 10 years ago, which required a night pilotage exercise, and I've crewed for three friends doing DS sail on three separate occasions, all of whom also had to do this. So whilst I don't know whether it's technically a "requirement", in my own experience that's definitely what's being requested of the candidates.

All of these pilotage exercises started at a known spot and ended up at a marina, so all about arrival at night. One in Carrick Roads ending at Falmouth Marina, one in the R Orwell ending at Ipswich, and two in the Solent, ending East Cowes and Port Hamble Marina respectively.

NB in all cases these exercises were done under power (in a yacht), not sail. So not 'sailing at night' technically.
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I did this on my Coastal Skipper.

And it was by far the most stressful part for me - sailing in unknown waters relying purely on what I had cleaned from the chart hours earlier and had written down.

Make sure you can read your own writing!!!
 
westernman said:
I did this on my Coastal Skipper.

And it was by far the most stressful part for me - sailing in unknown waters relying purely on what I had cleaned from the chart hours earlier and had written down.

Make sure you can read your own writing!!!
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Exactly, hence my tip about very clear big high contrast markings on waterproof materials, eg per wonky's examples. Nothing to stop you consulting the chart or your plotter but very distracting in my experience. Pilotage plan / sketch the winner.
 
wonkywinch said:
North Channel, transit & SBC into Portsmouth, into Haslar for the night is my guess for today.
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You also need to include time deltas so you know what to expect when.
If you expect to see something after 10 mins and 20 mins later you still have not seen it, then you are screwed!
 
westernman said:
You also need to include time deltas so you know what to expect when.
If you expect to see something after 10 mins and 20 mins later you still have not seen it, then you are screwed!
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I got mighty confused on my YM Prep Course. Navigating from Newtown to Beaulieu on a dark stormy night, thought I'd correctly identified West Lepe & East Lepe PHM and could see Lepe Spit SCM winking in the distance but there were a load of red and green flashing lights that weren't on the chart on my port side.

I thought I'd really screwed up, nothing was where I expected it until I realised these were the channel marks in the Beaulieu River which are not shown on the Imray or Admiralty charts covering the main channel.

Just as I settled down, a massive whoosh sound, my neck went really cold. It was raining so heavily the water had penetrated my lifejacket and set it off.

20250818_143511.jpg
 
Interesting to see you chart without the Beaulieu lights.

Below images not to same scale.

Navionics has the lights at all usable zooms.

1755556293892.png

They’re not shown on the smaller scale Admiralty charts, only the most zoomed in ones as far as I can see. This from Memory Map.

1755556220156.png
 
Sticky Fingers said:
Interesting to see you chart without the Beaulieu lights.

Below images not to same scale.

Navionics has the lights at all usable zooms.

View attachment 198037

They’re not shown on the smaller scale Admiralty charts, only the most zoomed in ones as far as I can see. This from Memory Map.

View attachment 198036
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Along the lines of this thread, planning for the passage was all old school YM training. Paper only and transfer relevant info to a whiteboard. I had no reason to think I needed to exam the sub charts for Beaulieu river which reminds me we couldn't have been going into Beaulieu on that voyage as I would have looked at the river charts as well.
 
Alicatt said:
Quite looking forward to the DS course on the Clyde, just hope there are no big black beasties coming doon the water from Faslane during the night ex.
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Did my DS on the Clyde - you don't have to worry too much about tides or traffic, which is convenient, but I did get confused by one distant light that turned out to be the sign for a Greenock kebab shop.

My one bit of advice for anybody doing DS (or comp crew, for that matter) is that you get out what you put in. Most of the best bits for me weren't part of the syllabus, especially with an instructor who had a lot of solo or shorthanded experience to draw on. And the moment you realise you've got the skills - and you will - is a great one.
 
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