Basic Keelboat Sailing 
(ASA-101)

Many people start sailing very young, either on their parents' or grandparents' boat or in a camp or school environment. However, just because you didn’t happen to be born into a sailing family is no reason why you shouldn’t have the opportunity to experience the joy of running downwind in a following sea or trashing upwind to a tropical paradise.

 

Our Four Day Basic Keelboat Sailing class will start you on the path to your sailing journey.  In this class, you will learn the basics of upwind and downwind sailing, the terminology necessary to understand what is going on around you and the techniques to safely get underway and back home again.

 

This class assumes that you have no experience at all and provides you with a solid foundation to go on to the next level.  The class is taught completely on one of our Island Packet 32 foot boats - no boring sitting in a classroom, wishing you were on the water.

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Taught over four days, we do our best to ensure that you get sufficient time at each station on the boat to feel comfortable acting as the skipper and as each integral part of the crew.  Your USCG and American Sailing certified instructor has been chosen by us for their technical knowledge, excitement about sailing and ability to communicate complex subjects in understandable language.

 

We’ll provide you with a copy of our training plan, unique to our school, with step-by-step instructions on how to work together with your crewmates. You’ll get a chance to lead the crew in one or more operations, like setting the main or head sails, tacking and gybing under control, and dousing the sails at the end of the day. Don’t know what all that means? Don’t worry! By the end of your class, all of this and much more will make sense.

 

If you want an even more immersive experience, you can stay aboard the boat the nights before and during your class. We want you to get the full experience of what “big boat” sailing is like, so check out our Sleeping Aboard page to see the details of this benefit.

 

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