sailing lessons
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Knowing there’s always more to learn!
When I was writing last week’s post about the trip that ended (for me) in Key West, I had a few people ask me, “What made that trip worthwhile?” I tried to answer that question . .while I was writing about the importance of keeping up with the weather. It became too much and too Continue reading
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Headed for a hurricane!
Keeping up with the weather is critical in the sailing world. I know that sounds obvious, but it’s really true. As we all know, things with the weather change, sometimes very rapidly and you have to have a plan for when things change. In late June I joined a boat, we were supposed to go Continue reading
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Next Steps
Disclaimer: This post contains an affiliate link to Amazon.com. If you buy using the link you do not pay any more for the book, but we will get a portion of the purchase price. So, the biggest questions I have gotten after the holiday season are, 1) Did you go see your boat over the Continue reading
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Charter successes
The last post I talked a bit about how it was confidence building to get the sails up and sail on our own. But the whole trip was really a confidence booster. We had opportunities, even though we didn’t sail much, to practice a lot of other skills and really show ourselves that we can Continue reading
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Wind (?) on the open water
We got to the spend the week on a sailboat in the Pacific Northwest. I’m pretty deliberate about saying we spent a week on a sailboat, because to say we sailed for a week would be a bit of an overstatement! In typical Lever fashion….we were lacking wind or when we had it, it was Continue reading
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Certified…or Certifiable Sailors!
We wrapped up our American Sailing Association 101 and 103 courses, with the Victoria Sailing School, a couple of weeks ago. What this entailed was taking our last practical lesson, which was on a J/30, so it was about eight feet longer than the other boats we’ve been on and taking our two tests. First Continue reading
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Moving On!
We have finished our practical lessons on the J/22. Our last lesson in the basic keelboat and coastal cruising line will be on a J/30. It’s made by the same company, but is about 8’ longer. There are also some other differences, including the sail set up as well as steering and anchoring. I’m looking Continue reading
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Trade Offs
Last week we transitioned from the Basic Keelboat practical lessons to the Basic Coastal cruising lessons. So we’ve moved on from, how does a boat work to, if your sailing here’s some more advanced techniques you need to be aware of to operate a boat safely. It was an interesting transition. We know the points Continue reading
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We had wind!
We’ve had a few sailing lessons now, the first one did not have any wind, so it was more of an exercise in learning the parts of the boat, running the motor, when there was wind, trying to figure out where it was coming from. The next two lessons had wind! So, we could sail! Continue reading
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Sailing is fun…when there’s wind!
Grandad said, “When I tell you, push the tiller until the bow is pointed at that point, I’ll trim the mainsail from there. We can’t sail into the wind, so this is called tacking.” I said, “Yeah, if we pointed the bow directly into the wind, we’d go backwards, right?” Grandad, “No, we can’t sail Continue reading
The Great Wander 