Learn How To Sail - with Penny Whiting

I love this video. I just bought a 35ft sailboat and consider myself a beginner needing the basics, even though I had sailed before. Videos are always nice because you can rewatch, rewind which you may need to do here. My big takeaways are that I now know how to tie a bowline around a line, what a lot of the things on my boat are for, how to read the tell tales, how to adjust the sails, and how recover a man overboard.Docking, leaving and returning is probably the most stressful so please do another video. I was surprised your crew tossed your mooring lines into the sea (They were still attached to the dock - but I have never seen nor been recommended that) and i would have liked to see how you came back.One other point is the cleat hitch...which seems if you get two sailors you get three opinions on.I loved this though and now watching it again.Come to Seattle and teach us!

It’s a lame old 80s video, but it’s very informative. I had a little previous experience with sailing, but not much. After watching this video a couple more times and some more hands on practice, I’ll be much more confident in my sailing abilities.

I purchased this video to use as a teaching aid for a beginning sailing class. The author is from New Zealand where the sailing lingo is quite different from here in the US. So much so that I felt it would completely confuse a beginning sailor rather than facilitate his understanding. The video was more of a commercial for her film's sponsors and a pitch to come to her sailing school than a teaching aid. The only bright spot was that the photography was well done. It would have been nice to know that all of the action takes place on a 45 foot boat, not the kind of vessel most beginners learn on.

"learn how to sail"... okay, I have never sailed before. I have been wanting to sail for quite awhile. I have watched many video's of people sailing (not instructional videos). I have read parts of several books on it. More importantly I have studied diagrams of the terminology of a sailboat and sailing maneuvers previous to watching this video. If you are like me and never sailed, but also never read anything at all on sailing, I honestly think the video might move a little bit to fast. There is so much terminology and concepts to know, and she quickly goes from one to another, expecting you to remember everything she has said as she builds upon it all. I am not saying it is a bad video, but it does move quick and in my opinion you would be much better off (well, you would get more out of the video) having read a little bit of something up on some basic terminology before watching this video. That being said, this video very well gave an actual view/idea of the different parts of a sail, a sailboat, how to sail, etc... I think after viewing it 2 more times I might be actually ready and confident enough to try my hand with a tiny dinghy sailboat.

Her accent makes it hard to stay interested.

It was good. A bit dated but you still learn the basics. I would recommend.

I first saw Penny's video on YouTube and went to find it on DVD. A dream of mine is sailing in retirement and with limited knowledge I'm reviewing all I can. This video was very basic and informative and completely enjoyable. Penny does a good job teaching to the layman and you can tell she really enjoys sailing and educating. A good video.

Absolutely the best free learning to sail video I've ever had the pleasure of watching. This video has it all. Full instruction to get you ready to get out on the water. Very informative and well taught. Penny has the soul of a teacher and is completely in her element here. This video will not disappoint.