A week in a force 6 wind
From the first day, we put on our overalls, our watch jackets (think about your equipment, essential in bad weather, but which can be lent to you by the school) and our life jacket (mandatory when sailing), direction, the rocky pertuis for a rainy mouth.
Throughout these 5 days, we covered around 100 miles with a force 6 wind at all times and gusts of 20/25 knots! The rain and the swell were also part of the party, malting the most fragile stomachs. A joy to sail nearly 6 hours a day in the rain to learn to sail. At the same time, with conditions like ours, learning is faster. We were able to sail as far as Saint-Martin-en-Ré, anchor in front of Boyard Ville or the island of Aix.
We sailed every day, no matter the weather. And two mornings, we had theoretical courses on the tide in particular, and the nautical charts. At noon, we enjoyed a lunch break at anchor and every evening we were back at the port of La Rochelle for the night.
Learn to sail independently
During our training course, we learned how to prepare the boat for its exit and setting in port (fender, lowering of the mainsail...), the various port manoeuvres (entry and exit), mooring techniques and knots (8 knot, mooring, dead turn, half key, capstan knots or cleat), or even rope recognition.
We sailed at different speeds: close, beam, wide beam, and full shears and used several kinds of sails: road jib, genoa and learned to take reefs (installation in the droppable forestay), followed a course, followed an alignment... Finally, we made several cape launches, managed several chest holds and made numerous tack changes and gybes.
With three, the learning is optimal and one turns much more quickly to all the stations. While one of us is steering, the other is managing the mainsail, while the last one is in charge of the winches to take up the sail again after each tack. As the week progresses, we manoeuvre more and more on our own and make the decisions that seem judicious to us. We are able to carry out port manoeuvres on our own or to recognise when our sail is not well adjusted. In case of doubt, we can count on our trainer, who watches our every move from the corner of his eye.
At the end of the week, we picked up a sail booklet with a description of our course and our apprenticeship. Level 1 validated!
What's next?
After the Initiation course, you can follow the other Macif Centre de Voile courses in order to gain experience and knowledge. There are several courses per level, from the beginner to the skipper stage. With this last course, we are able to sail a safe cruise and supervise a crew.
For those who wish it, it is also possible to follow thematic training courses to be trained on a precise technique, on land or at sea or to leave for an offshore training course of almost 2 weeks to confirm your knowledge.
"It is estimated that a trainee is capable of renting a boat after having followed between 4 and 5 courses. One can for example make an initiation, an improvement and two masters or then a master and a captain" explains Bruno Royou, our trainer. " Afterwards, we can follow thematic courses to be even more at ease and master at best a subject like port manoeuvring or fleet navigation" he adds.
"Everything also depends on the conditions of the internship. In more difficult conditions, we also learn faster than when the sea is nice because we have to constantly trim the sails, manoeuvre, etc." concludes Bruno.
