Sailing school
Solent Sail is an RYA recognised sea school running courses at all levels from beginner to Yachtmaster including refresher and specialist catamaran courses.
Our base in Portsmouth Harbour is a perfect starting location, with fast access to the Solent and a wealth of training opportunities
All courses are on a 40′ cruising CATAMARAN which is perfect for completing an RYA qualification with a little more style and comfort. Our aim is to give you more confidence in sail cruising and boat handling covering all aspects of pleasure boating on a yacht. Our courses are also ideal for people wanting to get ready for a catamaran charter in the Med or Caribbean.
Our use of catamarans reflects the fact that people are buying and chartering multihull yachts and need practical training in using them. It also makes for a much more stable teaching platform and offers much more space on board. However our courses are still limited to just 5 students, so bigger boat does not mean less time on the helm.
Start Yachting courses, refresher weekends and catamaran familiarity courses take place over a weekend (Friday evening to Sunday afternoon). Competent Crew and Day Skipper courses take place over 5 days minimum, but that can be over two or three weekends (so no time off work).
If you don’t have one already, you will need an RYA logbook for any RYA courses. These are available in the local chandlers or on-line here.
Scheduled courses are shown below. Typical course content is shown here:
Solent Sail refresher weekend
– pre-planning meteorology and victualling
– navigation, pilotage, rules of the road
– close quarters handling under power
– deck work, maintenance and repairs, engines
– sail passage making, night cruising
– helmsmanship and watchkeeping
– emergency situations like MOB
RYA Competent Crew
Experience living on board a yacht and taking it from location to location each day.
You are part of the crew and over a week you learn to handle sails, steer, keep a lookout and assist in every aspect of running a yacht whilst visiting interesting places and having a great time.
RYA Day skipper
– pilotage
– boat handling
– seamanship
– navigation
– crew management
At the end of this course we make sure you can skipper a yacht in familiar waters by day.
RYA Yachtmaster Coastal
A more advanced week covering
– passage planning
– preparation for sea
– yacht handling under sail and power
– adverse weather
– emergency situations
Skipper a yacht anywhere, by day or night
RYA Start yachting
– learn parts of the yacht
– ropework and knots
– rules of the road
– man overboard techniques
– equipment and precautions
– meteorology
– use of the tender
Solent Sail catamaran conversion
– close quarters manoeuvring
– sail raising, trimming, reefing and dropping
– anchoring techniques
– picking up buoys
– dealing with man overboard
– entering and leaving marinas
Feel confident at the helm of a big catamaran
If you have a group of 3, 4 or 5 individuals that want to do an RYA course, we can arrange one over dates to suit you. The cost would be based on a 5-day charter plus instructor as per our information page.
And if you want private catamaran familiarisation course (day or weekend), it can also be arranged to suit your needs. Costs for this are the same as the one-day or weekend charters plus instructor as shown on our information page.