Lisa was kind enough to purchase for me as a Christmas present my first sailing class. It is being taught by the Pacific Sailing School. They are located in Rushcutters Bay along the Sydney harbor. Australia is a little confusing when it comes to certifications. For example, there are Yachting Australia or YA courses and there are Royal Yachting Association or RYA courses and certifications. Supposedly these two organizations have buried the hatchet and are doing some type of combined RYA/YA course and certification structure. The net-net appears to be that the RYA is known and accepted all over the world and YA never got those types of wings.
So my ‘gifted’ class is a YA class C1 and if I complete it and the C2 course and take the theory part of the RYA class, then I have the equivalent of RYA Competent Crew. Or at least I hope so.
I stared my C1 course today, 3/31/09, and it was suppose to be an all day today and then a couple of half days, but the afternoon portion got canceled and rescheduled due to bad weather (a rainy front seems to have stalled over this part of Australia). Pacific Sailing School teaches on a J24 yachts, which is normally crewed by 5. When I arrived in the morning, there were four other would be sailors, but it turned out they were in a more advanced course and I ended to getting a private instructor for the morning. His name was Tony and he did an excellent job and I learned a lot. That said, I need to crack open my copy of Sailing for Dummies to refresh all the stuff I learn.
The two of us hoisted the main and head sails and cruised around a bit after having gone over all the safety stuff that is part of C1 Lesson 1. It was pretty cool to get to do so much on the yacht since it was just the two of us.
There isn’t suppose to be any camping at Rushcutters Bay, but I’m thinking this is someone’s way of camping:
I hate meat pies! especially if they have mashed peas- yuck…But hope your sailing lessons are productive!