On Sunday morning we drove South to Oliva for the start of my Catamaran Course, a birthday present from Espe (I’ve loved Dart catamarans from a very young age, and use to dream of owning one). We were due 3 hours tuition on Sunday and 3 hours on Monday. Espe had looked into various courses but this one ended up being the most convenient. Others had stated that I’d have to take a normal sailing course before climbing aboard a cat. Likewise I had been declined the use of a cat in Thailand, as the owner stated that sailing a cat was very different to a single hulled boat. This place however, spent 45 minutes with me on the boat, and then left us to it for the rest of the time (the chap judged that I knew enough about sailing to handle the cat).

I was surprised how much came back to me. I’d learnt the basics of Sailing with my dad on the Norfolk Broads and subsequently had a couple of opportunities to sail in small boats, the most recent of which was with Natalie just north of London. In one sense it was good as we were free to play about, but this was a course and with 6 hours I expected to learn a lot rather than just practice what I already knew. This was something that really bothered Espe as the course was supposed to be a learning experience for me.

Towards the end of our time out, I was getting some good speed up and turning with the wind (I can’t remember the English term for this, trasluchar in Spanish), but on one occasion I sent Espe to the other side of the boat too soon (keeping the weight on the correct side of the cat is essential) and that was enough with the speed and wind to tip the boat over. Espe found herself falling gently into the water (almost getting trapped between the hull and sitting platform), while I found myself launched seaward from the other side with hull a good 6 foot out of the water while at the same time trying to release the sail to level the boat off.

Apart from a drawing some blood on my hand we were both fine after the capsize and exhilarated by the adrenalin. Unfortunately between us we didn’t have enough weight to right the boat so we sat around waiting for the Surf Center guys to come out to us (something they said they would do if the boat capsized). They didn’t come, fortunately two Red Cross people came passed on a Jetski to check if we were ok. With the extra hands we were able to right the catamaran with ease.

Sunday evening after finding a hostel we wandered up to the castle ruins in Oliva before retiring rather exhaustedly to bed. Today, we were let out in the Cat again on our own. The only “instruction” given was discussing how a catamaran can capsize and the reasons we had problems the previous day. There was a lot more wind and waves, and this combined with the capsizing memory left me with much less confidence. It was still a good crack and I left smiling. One thing that did annoy me though was that as I finished the course I was given an essential piece of advice that I should have been told at the beginning of day one…