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jackWednesday was our work summer outing, which turned out to be very fun. We went an activities centre little sailing like at Mepal. (I unsurprisingly keep a romantic attachment to sailing)
Sometimes such things turn out to be just a bit complicated, and I think it may have been for people who'd never been sailing at all, but I was familiar enough from a day or two I spent on a school trip; not of how to sail effectively, particularly, but enough to not worry if my life jacket was sufficient, or if I could recover from a capsize.
We were half a dozen of us sailing, and about the same doing archery+climbing. There was one instructor for sailing, and six little one-person boats (toppers). Nowadays those are mass-produced plastic hulls with mast+sail, boom, keel, and rudder fitted on. They're intended for kids, but can hold an adult if you can duck under the boom.
You have one hand for the rudder and one for the mainsheet (rope connecting the back of the boat to the end of boom). Steer with the rudder, pull on the rope, lean out to counterbalance the sail. If you're capsizing lean further out, or let out the rope, and either way don't panic.
The instructor gave us about that much instruction, and sent us out to figure it out. It feels exciting and liberating to just go, without a lot of reading and qualifying first and worrying it might get messed up, and everything is so small scale it's guaranteed to go right :)
Deborah had sailed before. Of the rest of us James and I had both done something similar once, and he had also been on a larger sailing boat. But everyone managed to get it working kinda-sorta. I feel if I was out for another day (with attendant less time getting set up, and a night between to ponder the theory), I definitely would have been competent :)
I had boldly said I'd been swimming outside on Monday, and it wasn't cold, so it should be fine in the lake, but I was pleasantly surprised to be right. My previous experience had been sailing in (a) autumn and (b) salt water, which was much less enjoyable.
The boats were a lot less temperamental than I'd feared, so it was normal to capsize once or twice, but not more than that. And they're so little, they're easy to right, although it definitely helps to have someone steady it as you remount, if you're heavy.
It was very fun, I should try to go sailing again. (I know many people have gone sailing, at least at some point. Has anyone gone nearby?)
Sometimes such things turn out to be just a bit complicated, and I think it may have been for people who'd never been sailing at all, but I was familiar enough from a day or two I spent on a school trip; not of how to sail effectively, particularly, but enough to not worry if my life jacket was sufficient, or if I could recover from a capsize.
We were half a dozen of us sailing, and about the same doing archery+climbing. There was one instructor for sailing, and six little one-person boats (toppers). Nowadays those are mass-produced plastic hulls with mast+sail, boom, keel, and rudder fitted on. They're intended for kids, but can hold an adult if you can duck under the boom.
You have one hand for the rudder and one for the mainsheet (rope connecting the back of the boat to the end of boom). Steer with the rudder, pull on the rope, lean out to counterbalance the sail. If you're capsizing lean further out, or let out the rope, and either way don't panic.
The instructor gave us about that much instruction, and sent us out to figure it out. It feels exciting and liberating to just go, without a lot of reading and qualifying first and worrying it might get messed up, and everything is so small scale it's guaranteed to go right :)
Deborah had sailed before. Of the rest of us James and I had both done something similar once, and he had also been on a larger sailing boat. But everyone managed to get it working kinda-sorta. I feel if I was out for another day (with attendant less time getting set up, and a night between to ponder the theory), I definitely would have been competent :)
I had boldly said I'd been swimming outside on Monday, and it wasn't cold, so it should be fine in the lake, but I was pleasantly surprised to be right. My previous experience had been sailing in (a) autumn and (b) salt water, which was much less enjoyable.
The boats were a lot less temperamental than I'd feared, so it was normal to capsize once or twice, but not more than that. And they're so little, they're easy to right, although it definitely helps to have someone steady it as you remount, if you're heavy.
It was very fun, I should try to go sailing again. (I know many people have gone sailing, at least at some point. Has anyone gone nearby?)