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PostPosted: Sat Oct 20, 2007 8:57 pm 
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Joined: Mon Jul 16, 2007 7:58 pm
Posts: 429
Location: Indianapolis, IN
I just wanted to share my experience from today’s sailing and promoting the sport of sailing.

A local Boy Scout troop had contacted our sailing club about having a day dedicated to helping the kids earn their Sailing merit badges. The club commodore sent out the plea for members to volunteer to spend the day taking the scouts out on their boats and letting them take the tiller to demonstrate sailing skills. The weather here lately has been unusually warm for October, but this morning was pretty cool (about 50 degrees), and the wind was pretty strong, maybe 15 to 20. It was decided that it would be better to start the kids off in bigger boats (fixed-keel cruisers) to try to stay warmer and make sure no one got wet, and then go out in smaller boats after noon.

Four of the volunteers had big boats, so we divided the dozen scouts between them and headed out. I rode along with the commodore to help with the kids on his big boat. We cruised around the lake for about two hours, which was at least a half hour longer than their attention spans. Despite rotating them to different crew positions, by the end they were bored, throwing water bottles at each other and arguing about how many fingers they were holding up.

After lunch, the air was warmer and the wind was still up, but nobody stuck around to take the kids out on their smaller boats, except me with my Wave. Over the course of the afternoon, I took out all 12 scouts and 2 of their leaders (2 or 3 at a time). I gave each a turn at skippering and had each do a tack, jibe, beat, reach and run. They handled gusts, waves, and beach landings like champions. They came back soaked, but grinning ear-to-ear, laughing and eagerly handing their life jackets to their friends to go out and try it.

After it was all over they thanked me with genuine cheers and shouts of “Awesome boat!â€


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PostPosted: Sun Oct 21, 2007 6:21 am 
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Joined: Sun Jul 15, 2007 5:31 pm
Posts: 239
Location: Central Maine
Sounds like they had a great time.
My son is a Cub Scout, and I can relate to the limited attention span of that age group. Still, I would like to do something similar w/ my son's dens in the future.

Knowing how the kids are I am not surprised that they enjoyed the Wave over the larger mono's. The larger boats were likely more complex, had a a ton of 'wierd sounding' control 'ropes', and required seemingly alot of work to go not-so-fast.

The Wave on the other hand, while bieng a wet boat (a plus for kids as they love to get wet, 'who cares about the temparature'), is extremely stable, easy to understand, you can move around without upsetting balance too much (try that with any 13' mono), very forgiving, and surprisingly quick. I know, you can't compare it to a 16, but then again, you cannot get 4 people comfortably on that cat, and it scares even some experinced sailors.

I have taken several people out on my Wave, ranging in age from 4 to 70, and everyone comments on the surprising speed. The kids just love to hang off the shrouds and drag thier feet off the crossbars when they tire of taking the tiller, etc.

I hope to get a few people turned on to the sport through the experience on my little Wave.

So, congrats on a job well done! :D

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Jim

2007 Hobie Wave


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PostPosted: Sun Oct 21, 2007 7:45 am 
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Joined: Mon Oct 09, 2006 2:34 pm
Posts: 621
Location: NC
That's great. I wished I'd of had access to a cat when I got my sailing merit badge, I'd probably be much more sailing savy than I am right now. I got my sailing merit badge when I was 12 or so, on if I remember correctly, a beat up old sunfish. Granted, I enjoyed myself but I remember capsizing being a bit more fun than the actual sailing. Additionally, the young instructor showed less enthusiasm about sailing than my buddy and I. I never even really thought about sailing again until I was 21 and saw my first cat in person in my friend's dad's driveway. He told me he was thinking of selling it, I asked him how much, the price was right and the rest is history. Cat sailing has totally changed my life, or taken it over :lol: I'm not exactly sure yet. I can only imagine the difference of my 12 year old opinions if I had gotten on a fast, exciting cat instead of that mono-slug. I may very well of had 12 years of sailing experience now opposed to my actual 3. It's a great thing ya'll are doing helping out those little dudes, keep up the good work.

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James
86' Redline Hobie 16
Sail # 76909


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PostPosted: Sun Oct 21, 2007 9:58 am 
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Joined: Mon Jun 02, 2003 7:35 pm
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Location: 315 N. Hwy 79 Panama City Beach, FL 32413 850-235-2281
we need more people to take the time to give up there day of sailing to get kids on the water. We do it every chance we get, which isn't as much as we'd like. it always puts a smile on my face to read stories like this. keep up the good work and keep telling us about it, its going to going light a fire under our butts to do something like that with our time.

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Brad Stephens
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Last edited by sunjammers on Sun Dec 02, 2007 2:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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PostPosted: Wed Oct 24, 2007 5:48 pm 
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Joined: Mon Mar 12, 2007 8:09 pm
Posts: 57
Location: Chicago area
I had a similar experience this past summer. We take a group camping trip every year to Kelleys Island in Ohio and this was the first year with the Wave. Between the 4 families that were there we had 8 children and they were lined up all weekend long waiting their turns on the Wave. It is such a great "little" boat because I could get 4 little kids at once out on the boat for sailing, or use it as a great swim platform on those light drifting days :D
We had two days of monster wind and I had a blast sailing solo so everyone was satisfied. :lol:

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PostPosted: Wed Nov 28, 2007 9:12 am 
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Joined: Mon Oct 29, 2007 9:08 am
Posts: 190
Location: St. Charles, IL
Where in Chicago are you located IL? I'm out in St. Charles. Have you any favorite locations to sail?

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Dan St. Gean
'82 H 18
'96 H Wave


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PostPosted: Sun Dec 02, 2007 12:38 pm 
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Joined: Mon Mar 12, 2007 8:09 pm
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Location: Chicago area
I am in Downers Grove. My most common place and favorite place is at Weko Beach in Bridgman MI It is only 90 miles from my door, camping with our travel trailer, and only 10 bucks to launch for the whole weekend if we camp there. The sailing is very nice with a boat ramp that goes right into the lake, on windy high wave days just drop the boat on the beach at the end of the ramp and off you go. On good sailing days there will be upwards of 10 cats on the beach, and most times between 3 and 5, ranging from 14s, 16s, getaways, hobie 20s and of course a couple waves besides mine from time to time.

I have thought about going up to Wilmette but that seems like too much trouble considering how close Weko is.

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