Learn to Sail

One of the biggest and best sailing schools in Canada offers lessons for students aged 6 to 69.  Operating with a fleet of twenty boats and highly trained instructors, programs are aimed at students of all skill and interest levels.  Graduates from learn to sail choose their own outcomes, some opting to be content with a life of day sailing, while others choose a more high performance, competitive path.  Programs are offered in a variety of different formats and time schedules.  The Learn to Sail Program registration form is available for details regarding dates, times, and prices.  For more information call Devin Rubadeau, Head Coach, at 764-2203.

Children are divided into classes based on age and experience. 

Sailors under the age of 10 learn in Sabots (French for little wooden shoe) and Optimists.  Class sizes are small and long with award winning sailing instruction, games and crafts may be offered, and safety education is emphasized. This program often is full by early spring, and sees a regular return of students from previous years. 

Youth aged 10 and up enter Beginner White Sail 1 or 2, Intermediate White Sail 3, or advanced Bronze Sail 4 or 5, depending on previous experience.  All programs follow the Canadian Yachting Associations Learn to Sail curriculum.  As well as learning how to sail, students can also expect to learn about boat safety, knots, basic meteorology, sailing terms, and a slew of other boating related principles.

Adult learners participate in a unique program designed to take advantage of life experiences, working schedules and lifetime fitness goals.  Adult learners have opportunities to sail in two-person training boats as well as in COSA members’ boats during their final class.  When adult learners reach a competent skill level, they may take out a special membership that permits graduates to use club boats in off-instruction hours.

LTS Club Membership-Adults
 

Do you want to join the sailing club and enjoy sailing on your own time - but don’t own a boat?  The Learn-to-Sail Club is a special membership for participants of the Learn-to-Sail Adult Program each season.  Once competency and Head Coach approval have been reached, sailors may join the club for approximately $200, and during non-instruction time, use one of the club’s 8 lesson boats to practice sailing skills.  The LTS Club Membership is good for one year and meets the needs of people who don’t yet have a boat and are trying to determine which boat is right for them.

Learn to Windsurf
 

Once thought to be the exclusive sport of hard-bodied adolescents, windsurfing is a sport that can be enjoyed by adults and kids (of all body types).  Instruction begins on land and students have a chance to practice balance and sailing skills, in calm water and shallow water before returning in to more challenging wind and waves on Lake Okanagan.

Youth Development
 

Once sailors reach basic boat competency, youth often opt for a special developmental program where they receive advanced coaching and an opportunity to participate at local, regional and provincial regattas.  Practices are on a weekend morning while regattas are a varied schedule throughout the months of May to September.

Sailing Academy
 

COSA offers the first and only Sailing Academy in North America.  Adolescents enrolled in the Academy have the opportunity to earn high school credits for doing what they enjoy.  High school credit, recognized by the province of BC and all universities and colleges, is given for successful completion of the program.