THE BEST EAST COAST SAILING AND NAV SCHOOL IS BLACKBEARDS SCHOOL OF SAILING
AND NAV, ON BLACKBEARD ISLAND IN DARIEN,GA 912-437-4878







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Jere Lull wrote:
I am a self-taught sailor, competent on a smaller sailboat (21-foot
daysailer), been sailing for a few years.

I would like to enroll in a sailing school with the goal of eventually
being qualified to do a bareboat charter of a larger boat (prob a 35')
from Charleston, SC to Bermuda and back.

Can anyone recommend a good sailing school either in NC or SC that
will best enable me to achieve this goal?

Thanks,

Sam

Bareboating certification, as far as I can tell, is your charge card.
They let me take a 50' boat out even though my primary boat was a 21'
MacGregor, about as close as you can get to a dink in a boat that can be
slept in. (I've done about 30 weeks' chartering since.)

That's not what I've heard about bareboat charters at all. My
understanding is that one must prove he has experience skippering the
same size boat as he wants to charter.

Doing
specialized course work is pretty much wasted money except for your
personal comfort.

What do you mean exactly? All of the big sailing schools I've
researched offer a bareboat charter course. How else am I going to
get the experience I need (short of having a buddy with a 35' boat,
which I don't).

Chartering to Bermuda is, in my opinion, a waste even if you can find an
outfit that'll let you do it.

Why would an outfit refuse to "let me do it"?

After a few hours, it's mostly boring.

Our goal is to do quite a bit of international cruising. I'm sure a
lot of that is "boring" too, if you define boring as open-ocean
sailing. We don't. But whatever floats your boat.

There's a reason that the charter operations are where they are.

And that reason is...?