Day Skipper … Ya

Jigsaw puzzle, ice cream, toys, not sure what descriptors help me here

This will be a pretty quick post, and I still have to finish my posts about the boat relocation sailing trip – there are a couple of more to go there, but for now, I wanted to put in a quick post about my Day Skipper training.

Well why not add more colour

I am down in Albufeira, which has the most strange colourful marina that you can either love or hate.  For some reason, it just reminds me of ice cream.  Pastel ice cream.

Osprey - the beneteau (sp?) 44. The learning ship!

I arrived here and met one of the people doing their Competent Crew simultaneously to my Day Skipper, Wes from Australia.  And my god, the two of us got just plain silly and giggling by the end of the night.  He just makes me laugh.  And he can’t draw a map worth s*&t.  This morning, I heard him get up and I ended up heading to the showers about a 1/2 hour later and there he was sitting outside, waiting for the guys shower.  He had been sitting there the whole time.  I asked him what was up and he said somebody was in the guys shower and he’d been waiting the whole time.  That seemed odd to me that there would only be one shower for an entire marina.

Crazy funny silly Aussie Wes

So I entered the woman’s and there were many showers, so I stuck my head out, laughing and told Wes that.  Back in I went.  I heard some more noises and thought I had better check again and when I stuck my head out there was Wes sitting again waiting.  “There must be someone in there” he said.  “The door won’t open.”  So I came out and tried my card and the two of us couldn’t open the door.  Then I tried the women’s and I couldn’t open that door either.  Finally to make a long story short, once you swipe the card you have to push the door in before you pull it out to release the load.  But I thought it was so funny that he had been sitting there for all that time.  Good thing we Canadians and Aussies can laugh at our selves.

John with his rescued MOB cap ... heave 2 ... well done Wes

So today after a thorough briefing of the boat, we went out for our first sail.  Force 4 winds, and I was sailing the boat on a close haul and beam reach getting up to 7.5 knots.  It was good fun and I was quite pleased with myself.  Tomorrow I start as the skipper with my two man crew and the instructor.  Should be fun and a great learning opportunity.  It is bloody hot down here though.  I’m sure more stories will come but for now, hang on to your hats sailors, Sara’s at the helm!