A brilliant entry level, no-experience-needed sailing adventure aimed at teaching you the nuts and bolts of coastal sailing…

There’s something liberating about the thought of learning how to sail in Dubai: Taking to the high seas with the wind whipping through your hair, the land at your back, and your (crew)mates frantically trying to remember which sides are port and starboard.

Aspiring sailors can now get the right training with Wind Rises Dubai – no elite club membership required. The new sailing community, located in DP World’s Mina Rashid Marina, offers daily affordable sailing lessons in Dubai – for groups of two to six people – on its gorgeous FAREAST 28R racing keelboat fleet, making this once highly exclusive sport finally accessible to all.

Here’s how the odyssey at sea unfolds…

After arriving at Wind Rises HQ in Port Rashid, you and your pals will meet your instructor. Ours was Alex Kasatov, a charming 33-year-old Russian native who’s been sailing since ’99. You’ll then board a brand new 28-foot sailboat, and get a crash course in boating terminology. Before you know it, you’re casting off the line, steering through the marina and out to the open sea.

From there, you’ll channel your inner Jack Sparrow, and spend the next 90 minutes or so learning on-the-water sailing skills: setting sails, winching ropes, driving the boat, and reading the tell-tails. In no time at all we’re at the helm sailing ‘port to port’ alongside an enormous cargo ship – a term that means our left side of the boat sails past the left side of their boat.

There are many new nautical terms we attempt to grasp as a team. Within an hour, our newbie crew of four is sailing at breakneck speed, exhilarated as the wind tilts us alarmingly to one side. We’ve completed our first ‘tack’ (turning the boat 90 degrees), and pulled some ropes to assist with a ‘gybe’ where the sail switches from one side of the vessel to the other.

It’s not easy to know what you’re meant to be doing all the time but the trick, it seems, is just making yourself useful. Even if that’s just helping to fold a sail, tidy or clip in ropes – it all makes you feel part of the crew, and Alex seems genuinely impressed with us as we make our way back to shore. ‘Next time, I hope to take part in a regatta with you all.” High praise indeed.

Wind Rises Dubai offers sailing lessons for beginners from just Dhs300 per person on weekdays and Dhs380 per person on weekends. Bookings can be made online with four slots available every day.

Wind Rises Dubai, Mina Rashid, daily 8.30am to 10.45am, 11am to 1.15pm, 1.30pm to 3.45pm, 4pm to 6.15pm, from Dhs300 per person. Tel: (058) 106 5026. @windrisesdubai