What is sailing?
Sailing has been around for centuries using the power of the wind to travel and transport goods and commerce around the world in the past until the steam engine took over. Despite this sailing is still around nowadays is used and seen more as a hobby, a relaxing time and even a sport for many people these days. Sailing varies a lot, it goes from going on holidays in the beautiful sunset on a big comfy yacht, going around in beautiful places across the world, going to places with large sandy beaches with sun’s rays shining all around us. Sailing is also a relaxing activity that helps one detach from their daily routine of work, hassles and stress. It gives one the ability to relax and unwind embracing and feeling alive just you and the sea, embracing the nature using your senses, listening to the calming splashing of water alongside the boat, feeling the wind and sun on your face, observing the beautiful scenery of the horizon of the sea, smelling the sea and feeling it cleansing you from the inside.
DID YOU KNOW?
Sailing is also an Olympic Sport and is considered one of the Modern Olympic sports starting from the 1900s for the first being held during the 1900 Paris Olympic games.
It has been progressing even more going from having bigger boats with as much as 12 sailors on one single boat, to several diverse smaller single handed or even double-handed boats competing amongst each other in the Olympics representing every country from around the world, the best of the best competing for gold.
With even a huge number of different classes of boats each race in their perspective class such as the Laser sailboat that has been present since 1996 giving a competitive edge to the sailors sailing this beast of a boat, considered to be a difficult and yet popular boat to sail and handle especially when the wind gets strong it gets tougher for the sailors.
Like the Laser there are many other physically demanding boats such as the two man boat the 49er a 49 feet boat with a sail as tall as 7metres with an even bigger sail called the gennaker that just covers up the boat 2 times over, all this controlled by 2 sailors, in the previous Olympics the 49er FX a 49er class with women took place as in previous years there was only a men 49er class.
Although sailing may be seen as an expensive and highly committing investment in both money and time, it may not always be the case, there are many sailing clubs all around the world in particular near lakes or the sea, sailors are usually very friendly and approachable and one may even offer you a ride on their sailing boat or even come to an agreement with the club owners or managers, while sailing usually takes a whole afternoon to rig up the boat and enjoy a quick sail it may still take a bit of time however after that quick sail it makes it all worth it to extract one’s self from your everyday struggles and drift off in a nice peaceful place.
Sailing also has a lot of health benefits:
· Sailing is a relaxing hobby as it removes the stress off one’s mind
· It also gives the person certain skills such as improved concentration and better judgement and decision making skills
· Sailors who sail all year round when it gets cold and frisky, one might think its easier to contract a cold however with proper clothing one improves their immune system by exposing one’s self to the harsh weather while sailing,
· This sport is also quite an active sport helping in one’s cardiovascular system and improving endurance and muscle strength.
· It improves one’s communication skills, especially on a bigger boat as communication is important on a boat whilst also helping one’s self to organizational skills in sailing are enhanced which in turn affects your daily life, by becoming more organized and most importantly motivating yourself to enrich your quality of life.
This was a short introduction to this vast and amazing activity, if you are intrigued and wish to start sailing or know more about sailing in general, there is a lot of information online for just one click away, and if one wishes to try-out sailing follow a local sailing club and check it out for yourself, wishing you the very best of luck and fair winds!
