Top Tips for Your First Boating Trip

There’s nothing quite like taking off onto the open seas with the people you love and the whole ocean in front of you just ripe for exploring.

However, if you have never been on a boating trip before, you cannot just hire a boat and set off on your travels without first thinking things through and planning your trip. You don’t need to know everything about the Volvo Penta engine or how the boat is made, but knowing how to stay safe and stay on course is pretty vital.

With that in mind, below are some top tips for ensuring that your first boating trip is as big a success as you would imagine it to be:

Safety First

Despite what you might think, there is very little risk to a boating trip. However, it can be a good idea to do a boating safety course, or have an experienced boater do the trip with you, and of course, you should have a fully functional safety kit, life jackets, and any medications you need on board with you too.

Choose the weather carefully

When you are not experienced and you want to have a great trip, then it pays to choose the weather carefully. Of course, you can never fully predict what the weather will do, but if you look for a period of time that is likely to be clear and calm, then you’re more likely to experience smooth sailing.

Plan your itinerary

It can be tempting to head off into the sunset with no idea where you will end up, but in practice, this is a really bad idea. Why? For one thing, if no one knows where you are meant to be at any given time, you could end up getting lost and no one would know. For another, staying on the board 24/7 can get tedious, so you will probably want to plan in lots of port stops or island visits for your trip, and planning your itinerary in advance will make this so much simpler.

Keep applying sunscreen

When you are out on deck in the middle of the ocean, you are far more exposed to the sun than you often are on land, which means you need to be really good about topping your sunscreen up regularly, especially if you have been in the water too.

Slow down before you hit a wave

Many people who have never traveled by boat before think that going full throttle at waves is the best way to get through them unscathed. The opposite is actually true, and by slowing down for oncoming waves, you can keep the boat steady and your passengers safe.

Teamwork is the best

Take a few friends and family with you and give everyone a job from lookout to captain and you will be able to work together to seamlessly get where you want to be and have a lot of fun along the way.

Have an amazing time on the ocean. Stay safe out there!