Sailing is a marvellous pursuit if you've never tried it. The exhilaration of using only natural forces to get from A to B and the thrill of moving fast through the water with no engine, the wind in your hair and the spray in your face, is to be recommended for anyone.
Competitive sailing combines the need for fitness, agility and stamina, and good judgement. Whilst I can no longer claim to possess the first three of these, I still enjoy racing.
I learnt to sail on the River Thames at Hammersmith. All my family were members of the London Corinthian Sailing Club and we sailed a variety of boats ranging from Mirror & Cadet dinghies through Fireflies and Enterprises to the old Classic-rigged International 14's.
Sailing on a river
is more challenging than on a lake or other water, because the influence of the
tide has to be taken into account in addition to the wind. You might find a
marginally better patch of wind in the strongest part of the current and find
that other boats in less wind and weaker currents are leaving you for dead.
Certainly the River Thames at Hammersmith & Chiswick is a wonderful
training ground for good sailors - little wonder that several of the country's
leading sailors learnt their craft on the Thames, Jeremy
Pudney & Una Jane Winfield, both of whom have won The Prince of Wales
Cup, the World's most prestigious International 14 trophy, to mention but two.
I gave up sailing when I left London and didn't participate
for many years, but more recently got back into it at Elton Sailing Club in my
adopted home town of Bury. Elton Reservoir is owned by the BWB and so is not
drained of water in times of drought. This has resulted in us being one of the
few sailing clubs in the North West who have been almost completely unaffected
by the recent dry summers. On the other hand, BWB are continually threatening
to carry out maintenance work on the embankment and reducing the water level by
up to 5' which creates havoc not just with the sailing but also to fish stocks
and wildlife which depends on the reed banks on some parts of the reservoir.
The scenery surrounding the reservoir is very attractive and is, in fact, a
nature reserve in large part. Many local residents walk there and a
considerable number of anglers use the water as well, so the whole area is a
hive of activity at weekends particularly.
Elton SC sails a number of fleets, including Lasers,
Enterprises, Scorpions, & Graduates, but many other varieties of sailing
dinghy are raced there, including Solo's, Toppers, an Albacore and even an
International Moth take to the water from time to time. My own boat is a
Phantom, a large single-hander with an awesome mainsail that dwarves a lot of
larger 2-handed dinghies, and which suffers from a Portsmouth number of 1054
(compare 1077 for a Laser). I don't get it onto the water half as much as I'd
like (still completing the finish on a new rudder at the moment), and will
probably never be very competitive in it, but it's good fun to sail,
particularly hairy in a good breeze!!
For more information on Sailing generally, please follow one of the below links.