What Is Sailing Choices and What Does the Website Offer?

Sailing Choices is an independent sailing holiday planning and advice site, started in 2012 by an agent who draws on years of working afloat and several years office-based putting together sailing holidays for UK holiday operators. It is aimed at everyone from experienced sailors to people who have never sailed before, and it covers bareboat charters, flotilla holidays, skippered charters, crewed charters, cabin charter, and learn-to-sail courses. The site positions itself as a one-stop resource for impartial information on planning, booking, and enjoying a sailing holiday — including practical detail such as where you can fly from and places to moor up.

What the site helps you decide

The core problem Sailing Choices addresses is choice overload. Its own framing is blunt about it: too many sailing holidays, too little time, and a bewildering range of yachts. The questions it sets out to answer include:

• Should you go bareboat, join a flotilla, or take a skippered or crewed charter?
• Do you have the right qualifications?
• Do you want tuition?
• How do you get there, who should you book with, and what should you take?

If you already know what you want, the site offers direct routes to categories such as flotillas, bareboat, and other sailing holidays. If you don't, the stated alternative is to trawl the web and check hundreds of sailing holiday companies and yacht suppliers — which is exactly what the site is trying to save you from.

The holiday types it covers

Yachts come in various sizes, so the site's claim is that there is something for everyone regardless of experience, dreams, or budget. No previous experience is stated as necessary.

How the booking side works

Sailing Choices operates as an independent agent rather than a single holiday company or yacht supplier. Two practical consequences follow from that:

• Wider choice than a single operator. It offers yachts from many yacht suppliers and holiday companies, though deliberately not all of them — it says it sticks with quality providers.
• Pricing. Booking through the site is stated to cost no more than booking direct, and possibly less. The claim is that you get the same discounts you would get booking direct with the operators, sometimes more. There is also a stated extra discount on future holidays across all the holidays offered, not just with the provider you used last time.

Note that the site does not publish specific prices, deposit terms, or payment details in the material available here, so those need to be confirmed directly.

Who it is for

The site explicitly serves two groups that are often split apart:

1. Old hands and complete beginners — from people who have sailed for years to those who have never sailed.
2. Independent planners and package seekers — those who like to make their own travel plans, and those who prefer everything arranged.

The stated motivation is to encourage people who haven't tried sailing to do so, and to help anyone find the best holiday for their experience, dreams, and budget.

Practical takeaways

• Use it as a comparison and orientation tool first: it is designed to help you choose between charter types before you commit.
• If you are short on time, the site invites you to call rather than read — the operator says they can talk faster than they can type.
• Treat the impartiality claim as the site's own positioning. It is an agent that earns from bookings, so it has a commercial interest in the providers it recommends, even though it says it only works with quality providers.
• Because pricing and availability are not published in the source material, verify current costs, qualifications required for bareboat charter, and travel logistics with the site or the operator directly before booking.