Why Chicago Sailing Is A Great Skill To Learn

By Martha Miller


You can go surfing anywhere in the world. You can go climbing anywhere in the world. How about sailing? Thanks to sailing charters and schools, you can learn to sail and place your sailing escapade anywhere in the world as well. Here is why Chicago sailing lessons are a great adventure...

Imagine that you need to trim your sail in a heavy breeze. You grab the line, pull hard, and find it almost impossible to hold because of the tension created by the wind. Enter the sailboat winch! These mechanical helpers have shaped something like an hourglass. The middle part--called a drum--has gears inside. These gears, along with a winch handle (more on this later), multiply the mechanical advantage of the winch to save you a lot of back-breaking work!

Check to make sure that the line you want to take to the winch leads (points) up to the winch. You may find on some boats that the line leads down to a winch--and that can be dangerous. You can change the lead of a line with a block. Sail sheets (control lines) pass through blocks first before they get to the winch. Blocks that help point the line in the correct direction to the winch are often called "lead blocks" because of the "lead" or "redirect" the line in the correct direction to the winch.

Knowing how the sheets work is an important skill here. For example, if you were cruising upwind you would use a zig-zag motion called tacking to use the wind to your advantage as much as possible. Generally, this works better and is much easier on a crewed sailboat and working as a team.

The first few skills you will learn on your cruising trip will be to learn the sailor jargon as well as essentials skills. Moving on, learning all the different parts of the particular vessel you'll be learning to sail on. Although you should check out various types of sail boats on the net to see what's out there and what you could learn on.

Working with nature's powers and elements. During your cruising lessons, you will be taught how to work with the wind, weather, water and what lies beneath. In a way, respect for nature and what it brings you will be primarily emphasized; not taking each element for granted will also be appreciated. Using nature to your advantage and knowing when not to also plays an important role in your future cruising adventures.

New friends and trusting them. An adventure has an element of doing something that you will not normally do on any given day. Apart from the adventure of learning something new and doing something unfamiliar, you will meet new people particularly your skipper, instructor, and classmates. You will have to trust them during the learning process. It would be easy to do on dry land, but once you get out into the water and all your fears set in, this act will be quite difficult. Trusting a stranger with your life under vulnerable circumstances is an adventure in itself.

If you're learning the cruising techniques and skills make sure you choose the best option for you. If you want to get together with a large group of people then learning on a tall ship may be better for you. If you are learning to sail for the reason of buying your sail boat then learning on one of the smaller sail boat options may be best for you.




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