Do you have your Level Two, a bit of experience and the desire to go further? Then the Powerboat Intermediate Course may be for you. Adrian Porter investigates.

The Level Two Powerboat course is without a doubt one of the most full on courses a powerboater will do. In just two days you are bestowed with all the basic skills to help you go from clueless land hermit to a vagabond of the sea, quite able to make short hops from one destination to another.

But the Level Two, however comprehensive, is still a relatively short course and is only the start of your education as a boater. As time stretches on, the novelty of new knowledge fades and is soon replaced by experience and confidence. It is about now, perhaps a season or more after your Level Two, that your complacency of familiar waters wears thin and you feel the niggle to go out further, explore new destinations and start making longer passages. It is time for you to build up your knowledge and develop as a boater. It is time to do your intermediate course.

A course to cruise through

On a surprisingly sunny morning in October, I walked into the familiar classrooms belonging to Powerboat Training UK, the same school I’d come to do both my Level Two and my VHF course. I was introduced to Terry McFall the instructor and two fellow students who were eyeing the camera around my neck with suspicion.

With the obligatory cup of warm caffeine in hand, Terry started by explaining that the Intermediate Course use to be known as the ‘cruising course’ as that is exactly what the two days are all about – to go cruising. Building on the skills learned during the Level Two, the Intermediate was to include a bit more about navigation, use both traditional and modern means to plan a long journey, as well as a number of practical skills out on the water. He also explained as that with any course he teaches, the best place to learn is out on the water, so we’d be spending as much time on the water as possible.

Pilotage and tides

But that doesn’t mean all the time will be spent outside the classroom, and to kick off Terry spread out a few charts of the local area out on the table and told us to make a pilotage plan. The plan would take us from the school’s dock in Cobbs Quay Marina, out to Poole Harbour, around the three islands (Brownsea, Furzey and Green) and then back to the school. We set about the task as a group, channelling the skills we’d learned from previous courses.

Throughout the planning, instructor Terry asked us a number of questions and discussed our answers with us. From symbols on the chart, to understanding Latitude and Longitude and the principles of GPS, Terry was simply finding out what we knew so he knew how to structure the rest of the course and what knowledge might need a bit of ‘polishing’ before moving on to more advanced know-how...

For the full article, buy the November issue of Sports Boat and RIB, available from 3^rd November. To buy the current issue, click here.