Sailing is one of the finest outdoor activities. You can learn to sail at good sailing schools or outdoor centres and then sail or race on your own, with your partner, or with your children.

Small boat sailing can be either competitive, as in collegiate dinghy racing, or purely recreational as when sailing on a lake with family or friends. Small sailboats are commonly made from fibreglass, have wood or aluminium spars, and generally a sloop rig (two sails: a mainsail and a jib).

Racing dinghies tend to be lighter, have more sail area, and may use a trapeze to allow one or both crew members to suspend themselves over the water for additional stability. Family daysailers tend to be beamier (wider) and have greater accommodation space at the expense of speed.

You don't have to be in fantastic physical shape to sail, although there's no doubt that a couple of hours of sailing makes for good exercise.

Contrary to popular opinion, dinghy sailing is not an expensive or elitist pastime. Plenty of beautiful second hand boats can be bought for no more than a couple of hundred pounds. The necessary safety gear such as buoyancy aids are also not expensive.

Enjoy chartering a sailboat or motor yacht and travel to various coastal or island destinations. This is a great holiday activity, but it also can be a corporate event. There are two main kinds of charter: bareboat and flotilla.

Bareboat charters involve a person renting a boat and skippering it themselves. Most bareboat companies also offer courses to teach basic seamanship and prepare people for bareboat chartering. These companies also sometimes provide skippered charters, meaning that boat comes with a skipper but no additional crew.

Flotilla sailing is a carefree holiday in style, where you sail your charter yacht at a leisurely pace, enjoying the company of other flotilla guests and the support and guidance of a professionally crewed flotilla lead yacht.

Several factors determine the cost of a charter, including the size of the yacht, its age, its pedigree, the number of crew, and the destination. The worldwide range of charter prices (per person per week) is estimated to from €1000 up to and in excess of €25,000.

If you just do social sailing without leaving the jetty or marina, you'll probably stay dry unless it rains. In case of foul weather you can always retreat to the club house.

Only if you practice sailing as an active water sport would you get wet. Always bring a complete change of clothes for each outing. The day you forget your extra clothes is the day you get wet.

T-shirt and jeans and are fine on very warm days only to protect against sunburn. Beware, wet cotton cools you a fair bit. Some wear jeans over a wet suit to protect the delicate wet suit from deck fittings and other hazards.