Re: Boating Class
Even though I asked, we have been to two classes. The first class was in May of '09, but at that time we really had no intention of going on any ICW's here for a few years. We were only interested in the St John's River, of which that class covered very little of. But, for the first time, we went on the ICW in Daytona area this past May and liked it. We had a couple with us that had spent a lot of time on the ICW there and that helped us while out there. Anyway, we wanted to take the class again due to our interest in the ICW now. This class was good, but they packed a whole lot into an 8 hr class and that's a lot of stuff to learn/remember for older folks.......like us in our early 60's.
One thing I do have to mention about both of these classes, there were two very controversial subjects that were brought up/talked about: having a firearm onboard and wearing lifejackets. Another controversial topic was drinking while boating. It really doesn't appear that anybody in the USCGA drinks alcohol, so thats is what they push in boating. As for us, we always have a cooler with beer in it. We have a few, but don't get smashed drinking and then drive a boat.
As far as the firearm issue goes: We don't have a firearm onboard our boat, but there was a boating tv program that had a rep from a rifle/shotgun manufacturer discussing and showing those firearms onboard small craft boats and why some boaters have them on their boats. I did notice that the Instructors (USCGA) really didn't want to talk about it.
As far as the lifejacket issue goes: the USCGA persists on everyone wearing a lifejacket at all times when on a boat. We have them onboard, but don't wear them and we see very few-to-no boaters actually wearing them.
