Learn to sail
Go Sail Virgin Islands
An ASA sailing school on our doorstep in St Thomas. If you want the certification before you own the boat, this is where we send people.
Why we point buyers here
A good number of the people who come to us about a catamaran have chartered before but have never held a certification, or have sailed monohulls for years and never a cat. Both are worth fixing before you own a boat rather than after. Go Sail Virgin Islands runs American Sailing Association courses out of St Thomas, in the same water you will be sailing, which is the part that matters — the trades, the current in Pillsbury Sound and the approach into an unfamiliar anchorage do not read the same in a textbook.
They run learn-to-sail vacations rather than classroom weeks: you live aboard, you sail the USVI and the BVI, and you come away certified. Class sizes are capped at six students aboard, and the International Proficiency Certificate — the one charter companies outside the US ask for — comes with the ASA courses rather than as an extra.
What they teach
Courses run from first-time sailing through bareboat cruising and on to advanced coastal work, plus dedicated catamaran instruction. The catamaran course is the one we most often suggest: handling twin engines on a 45-foot cat in a crowded mooring field is a specific skill, and it is much better learned with an instructor aboard than on your own boat in front of an audience.
- Group courses for cruising couples and solo sailors
- Private courses for a family or a group of friends on your own yacht
- Catamaran-specific instruction
- Advanced and review courses for sailors coming back to it after a gap
They sail both catamarans and monohulls, with queen cabins, en-suite heads, air conditioning and provisions aboard. Instructors are American Sailing certified with decades between them.
How it fits with buying a boat
There is no obligation in either direction and we take nothing from it. We suggest them because a certified owner is a happier owner, insurers ask the question, and a week aboard teaches you more about what you actually want in a boat than any amount of time on a dock. Several owners have come back from a course and changed their mind about size, layout or rig — which is a much cheaper place to change your mind than after a deposit.
If you are weighing a Lagoon and want the training sorted first, tell us and we will help you sequence the two so the boat and the certificate arrive in the right order.
Not sure which comes first?
Call us and we will talk it through — training, charter, or straight to ownership. We have no stake in which one you pick.