All our courses are engaging, interactive and fun! Whether formal training or simply looking to brush up, we take online learning to the next level.
Sailing EssentialsFreeA free course great for anyone who spends time on the water.
Essential Navigation & SeamanshipRYA course for beginners. Learn charts, tides, pilotage, and core seamanship with simple practice tasks.
Day Skipper TheoryMost PopularRYA course for inshore skippers. Plan day passages using chartwork, tides, weather, and COLREGs.
Coastal Skipper / Yachtmaster® TheoryComing SoonRYA course for advanced navigation and passage planning, secondary ports, tidal streams, and offshore weather.
SRC (VHF) Marine Radio CourseRYA Short Range Certificate radio course. Study online, then take the practical exam with an RYA assessor.Are you looking for something nautical related? Our directory is an extensive list of courses and places associated with the marine industry. Hop over and search now.
We believe every day’s a school day on a boat! That’s why we built Nautical Know-How, dedicated to answering your questions. Even better, if it can’t answer your question immediately, you can request it, and we’ll add it to our knowledge base.
Nautical Terms & TerminologyUnderstanding the language of the marine world is like trying to learn a pirate’s secret code while juggling fish. Let us explain why a sheet isn’t for your bed, why “heave ho” doesn’t mean throw up (most of the time), and why “dead reckoning” is surprisingly less ominous than it sounds.
Why do we have tides?Have you ever wondered what causes the tides? Check out this video, which introduces the forces that create the tides we experience on Earth.
What causes our weather?A video introducing the drivers behind our weather, part of our RYA Day Skipper & RYA Coastal Skipper / Yachtmaster® Offshore theory courses.
Buoyage FlashcardsFlashcards designed to help remember the buoys in the IALA system. If you want to learn them in detail, our module ‘Getting in and out of harbour‘, covers the IALA system and different buoys used.
Interactive Rule Book (COLREGs / IRPCS)Whether you’re a novice sailor or a seasoned skipper, we can help you navigate the IRPCS confidently and clearly. Our easy-to-use, easy-to-understand, plain English rule book with helpful interpretations of what each rule means.
The Salty Sea BlogFrom salty old sea dogs to fresh-faced deckhands, this blog is for anyone who finds peace, adventure, and a bit of mischief on the water. So hoist the main, set your course, and let’s sail into the stories, lessons, and musings that make life on the sea so irresistible.Marine navigation has its own secret language, and let’s face it—half of it sounds like someone making things up after too much grog. You’ve got your ‘dead reckoning,’ which isn’t nearly as ominous as it sounds, and ‘bearing,’ which has nothing to do with polar bears but everything to do with pointing the right way. Don’t even get us started on ‘knots’—why measure speed like you’re tying a shoelace? And then there’s ‘fix (not for your engine) and ‘DR’ (spoiler: it’s not a doctor). If you’re baffled, don’t worry—we’re here to help you decipher this nautical code so you can sound like a pro, not a landlubber who’s lost their compass.
A commonly used or formally designated route or corridor for vessel traffic. The informal phrase can describe a track used regularly by commercial shipping, while formal routeing measures include traffic lanes within a traffic separation scheme, deep-water routes, recommended tracks and two-way routes. Each has charted limits and specific navigational implications. A shipping lane is…
A shallow area or submerged elevation of the seabed that may pose a navigation hazard. A shoal may consist of sand, gravel, mud, rock or coral and can lie near shore or offshore. Whether it is dangerous depends on charted and actual depth, tidal height, vessel draught, squat, waves and the required under-keel clearance. Currents…
A raised threshold across a harbour, marina, lock or dock entrance that limits or retains water depth. A marina sill is commonly an underwater barrier designed to retain a minimum water level inside a basin as the tide falls. A sill also forms the lower threshold beneath lock or dock gates and can determine the…
A period when the horizontal tidal current at a particular location is weak or changing direction. Slack water can occur near the change between flood and ebb, but its time need not coincide with local high or low water because tidal height and horizontal flow respond differently. In rotary tidal streams the current may turn…
A sudden impact produced when part of a vessel’s hull re-enters or strikes the water with substantial relative velocity. Bottom slamming often affects forward flatter sections after they emerge in waves, while bow flare, wet-deck and stern slamming occur in other hull forms and conditions. The event creates short-duration pressure loads, noise and acceleration rather…
Sailing with the apparent wind between close-hauled and directly astern. The range includes close, beam and broad reaches. Fixed degree limits are only illustrative because a vessel’s no-go angle, speed and apparent-wind direction vary with design, sails, conditions and course. Reaching trim generally eases sails progressively as the wind moves aft and may use different…
A ridge, chain or area of rock, coral or other consolidated material lying at or near the water surface. Reefs may be biogenic, volcanic, rocky or artificial and can be exposed, drying or fully submerged. Sandbanks and shoals can create similar navigation hazards but are not necessarily reefs because unconsolidated sand alone is not the…
A vessel restricted by the nature of its work in its ability to manoeuvre as required by the collision regulations and therefore unable to keep out of the way of another vessel. The definition applies to specified or comparable operations such as laying or servicing a navigation mark or cable, dredging, surveying, replenishment at sea,…
Any condition in which visibility is restricted by fog, mist, falling snow, heavy rainstorms, sandstorms or another similar cause. In the collision regulations this is a qualitative condition rather than one fixed distance. Darkness alone is not restricted visibility, although it affects what can be seen, and obstruction by a vessel’s own structure is a…
A path on the Earth’s surface that crosses every meridian at the same angle. A rhumb line represents a constant true course on an idealised surface and plots as a straight line on a Mercator chart. Except along a meridian or the Equator, it is generally longer than the corresponding great-circle route between two points….
If you belive the Earth is flat, you're about to fall of the end...
If you belive the Earth is flat, you're about to fall of the end...
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