Scary Putting This in Writing

[Mark Stillwell]

Lots of good ideas. I'm also a planner, so I like your detailed written plan. :-)

As a few others have suggested, join a sailing club to meet sailors and learn from them as you take your ASA courses. You'll develop friends to share your travels and bare boat charters with. You might even find a group off to the BVI who is looking to fill a vacant cabin!

Several suggested sailing dingy's. As you already have some boating experience, you might consider a little larger boat. We began with a Starwind 223 as Suz and I usually had a kid or two with us.

Good luck in your adventure!

[a64pilot]

Not the right thing to do but the first time I ever got on a sailboat with the sails up was when we were Surveying the boat we have, I had never sat foot on a sailboat before, I was a died in the wool stinkpotter
I have a sailboat cause I can't afford an Ocean crossing Trawler, Nordhavens and the like are out of my league.
But I had lots of "big boat" experience, without that I think insurance would have been a problem, insurance didn't care that it wasn't a sailboat.

Thing about learning on a sailboat is most of it is logical, if what your about to do doesn't seem right, it might not be, and you have time, lots of it. OK so it takes you 20 min to dock and the local Pro can do it in three, who cares, and if the wind is blowing too hard, drop anchor and go in in the morning when the wind is down. I once spent the night anchored within 50 yards of my slip cause I wasn't going to attempt docking in a 15 kt crosswind, I still won't.
You can always go around, do not be afraid to bail out and try again, try to always leave an out

[vtomanov]

sailing is usually not about planing it is about not planning at all and just let the live to go on... if you want planning concentrate on your full time job...

[MarkJ]

Clbegis,

Dallas has some lakes. Can you be crew on somone elses small boat while the race??
Racing teaches a lot.

Or on a long weekend drive to Galviston and race on someones boat?


My next thing is about your plan timeline. Can you make it 1 year sooner?
See if you can.

Then make it 2 years sooner.

Then....

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by vtomanov

sailing is usually not about planning it is about not planning at all and just let life go on... if you want planning concentrate on your full time job...

Hmm, it depends on what kind of sailing you're doing. If it's a spontaneous sail around the bay, then sure. If it's a 200 mile passage across tidal water, then it takes a great deal of planning.

[Ramblingman]

IMHO - This has been a great thread with great contributions.

We each learn and do things differently and of course, after reading lots of great advice you will have to distill what works best for you.

I grew up on sailboats from age 4 and learned about sailing on a 22 footer and my dad and I built my first 8' sailing pram at age 6. I will say that in my mind, experience sailing small boats is hard to beat. You learn quickly from mistakes and really feel what sail and boat trim can do. I agree with all that an easy to tow sailboat is a great way to go. I'll put a minor plug in here and even suggest getting a kit from Chesapeake Light Craft and build a sailing dingy like the Passagemaker. Build it over the Winter while you take some online and classroom lessons. While learning to sail you will also get a lot of boat care skills, and knowledge of a boat that few get unless you build one. The kits are easy, you could even take the course and build one at the CLC shop and tow it home but that's a bit much with you 1200 miles away.

In the mid 80's I sailed all over the lakes you mention and more, Grapevine is nice daysailing too. I took my Holder 14 all over there, Lewisville, Texoma, some other small lakes in Dallas and on the Chesapeake when I moved back here. You'll find lots of time to sail in Dallas with its not too bad weather and build your experience.

Go charter, a weekend, a week and do it several times. See if you really like cruising short term.

When I taught at Annapolis Sailing School in college we had a nice mixture of courses, week long and weekend on Rainbow 23's. Weekend and week long on Annapolis 26 and Morgan Out Is. 41's. Lots of people took the week long day sailing course then the weekend cruising and some bumped to the week long cruise. About half the folks decided they liked weekending, about a third liked daysailing only and the rest never came back or went long term. You might want to look at what schools offer in this mixture.

You take classes and get a lot of knowledge but sailing is one of those things that requires bruises and scrapes to really learn and do.

It's one thing to read about and have someone explain things like apparent wind, it's another to feel it.