We need to keep brushing up on what we've learned over the last year so this week end we headed off to Conwy in North Wales for a weekend of practical skill building. We were on board a Jeanneau 39i with a lady called Sarah, who was doing the last bit of her Day Skipper, and two guys who were on a start yachting course prior to going sailing in the Greek islands for Marks' 40th birthday. His friend Peter had come along for the sail but it soon transpired that he was not at all interested in sailing.
Mark seemed to get into it, but the weather was not exactly exhilarating with winds barely getting above force four. Our Skipper for the trip was Rob, who was perhaps 30ish, and had just come off a five day sail so was somewhat lacklustre. He was a competent skipper but lacked a little in the commanding stakes.
Never the less we enjoyed the weekend and felt that within a couple of hours of being back on the water all that we had learned in the last 12 months came back. There are still big gaps in our knowledge, but we've got the fundamentals and are now keen to go solo, or is that duo.Its time for Colin and Jackie to charter a bareback boat and sail by our selves.
That has to be the next step, and so we're looking at doing this sometime in September, probably back in Largs.
Conwy was fine but there's an issue with tides there. For instance we thought we had two days of sailing but because the marina has a tidal gate we couldn't leave till nine in the morning of Saturday and we had to be back before 1230 on Sunday so we only had a day and a half to actually sailing. In Largs there's no such restrictions.
We're almost 12 months in from when we started this adventure and we're almost there, almost ready to sail solo, with no tutor on board. That is very exciting, and this weekend confirmed that that is what we now need to do. I can't wait.