Sailing For Beginners: Learn To Sail with Rubicon 3

If you’ve dreamt of a holiday out on the water, but don’t know where to start, you’ve come to the right place. We’re specialists in helping those new to sailing come on a spectacular holiday on the water. We’ll help you learn the skills you need to spend your days out on the ocean, sailing under the glistening sun and then anchor in a secluded cove or pull into a lovely marina or port at the end of the day for a fun, sociable evening with the rest of the crew.

No previous experience needed

You don’t need any prior sailing experience and this can be the first time you have ever set foot on a yacht. Our instructors have a superbly professional approach, and they’ll help you gradually build your sailing skills and even earn a certificate from the Royal Yachting Association (RYA) while you’re on your holiday.

Ideal starter sailing holidays

For those of you new to sailing holidays and sailing generally, we recommend you start out on either a one or two week coastal holiday. There are various one week options that are ideal for you. There’s our one week Canaries Explorer, where we circumnavigate the UNECO biosphere of Lanzarote. It’s warm, sunny, short distances and with lots of amazing places to explore ashore when the sailing is done for the day. Not only is it a great holiday but you’ll also earn the RYA Competent Crew certificate.

Another great option closer to home is the Solent and Isle of Wight week, where we visit beautiful places such as the Beaulieu River, Cowes in the Isle of Wight and sail by iconic sights such as the Needles. Again, it’s easy sailing, flat water and short distances and it’s another one where you’ll earn the RYA Competent Crew certificate.

Get qualified on an RYA Course

Another great option to learn sailing and all the various sailing techniques is to take part in one of our RYA courses in the Solent. These are 5 days long and earn you RYA qualifications such as Competent Crew or even Day Skipper. While they are not a holiday as such, they have focused training and at only five days long, are a good way to pack in a lot of knowledge in a short space of time.

If you are totally new to sailing, you could signup to our Competent Crew course. This 1 week sailing course gives you the key skills you need to be a useful crew member on a sailing yacht.

If you’ve already been learning to sail for a bit and have the RYA competent crew certificate, then you can progress to one of our Day Skipper courses. The Day Skipper certificate is ICC recognised and allows you to charter a sailing yacht on something like an Ionian flotilla in the Greek Islands or even somewhere further afield such as the British Virgin Islands.

Preparing for flotilla holidays?

Once you have a minimum of your Day Skipper, a flotilla holiday in somewhere like the Ionian islands is a great way to build your confidence and experience. While you are the skipper of your own boat, you still have the other boats nearby and the lead crew to ask for advice. However, just remember that even at Day Skipper, your skills and experience are still minimal and you can quickly get into a bit of bother and develop bad habits.

Ideally, join one of our 12 day Coastal Passage Making courses or a 5 days Levels 3-4 Skills Builder to really put in place the proper foundations. Our instructors will really drill you in safe seamanship and the proper techniques to follow as you head out on your own. These are also great courses if you have your own yacht.

How to pick a sailing school

There are many sailing schools to choose from. Some are superb places to learn to sail and others, frankly, you need to avoid. There is nothing worse than being on a cramped yacht, with a bullying instructor and bad equipment. The whole sailing experience can quickly turn sour. We have become Europe’s #1 adventure sailing school through having the highest standards and through the huge real world experience we can bring to bear from our years of sailing expeditions.

More information

Rubicon 3 has full financial protection through the Protected Trust Scheme. Put simply, all client money is held in a separate trust account, meaning your booking is fully financially protected. None of these are flight inclusive holidays, so you do not need to worry about the ATOL scheme or similar. If you need any further information or more details about any course or sailing holiday, don’t hesitate to get in touch. We can also help you find the latest information from the Foreign Commonwealth Office. You can see our full booking conditions here.