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Catamaran courses in the Gold Coast
Flat shallow water to learn in, and a bar entrance to find out what you have learned.
The Broadwater is flat and shallow, which is close to ideal water for learning a catamaran — the draft is an advantage rather than a worry, and the lack of chop means you can concentrate on the boat.
Then there is the Seaway
The Gold Coast Seaway is a serious bar entrance on an ebb tide against a swell, and handling a catamaran through it is a genuinely different exercise from handling a monohull. For anyone who intends to take a multihull offshore, it is instructive water.
The industry is on the doorstep
Coomera and the Broadwater hold one of Australia’s largest concentrations of marine trades, including multihull builders and refit yards. If your interest in catamarans extends to buying one, the expertise is unusually close to hand.
What the Gold Coast teaches
The Broadwater is protected by South and North Stradbroke Islands, giving flat water and a long sailing season. It is close to ideal beginner water, and the reason so much training is based here.
It is also shallow and tidal, with marked channels that must be followed. Students learn to read a channel and watch a depth sounder much earlier here than in deep harbours.
The Gold Coast Seaway is the entrance to open water and can be genuinely serious on an ebb tide against a swell. Schools treat crossing it as a taught skill, not a formality.
Schools listed in Queensland
These are the dedicated sailing schools verified in Queensland. We do not yet hold verified course lists for every one of them, so this is not a list of schools teaching catamaran courses — it is where to start asking. If you run one of these schools and want your course list on file, tell us.
Southern Cross Yachting
RYA training centre at East Coast Marina since 1996, with one-day to five-day courses, charter preparation and coastal mile builders.
Mainstay Sailing
RYA-accredited courses run in the Whitsundays.
Whitsunday Sailing School
Teaching in the Whitsundays for over 30 years, liveaboard, from beginner through extended coastal passages, with commercial crossover options.
Sunshine Sailing Australia
Based at Mooloolaba Marina, running sail and power training on the Sunshine Coast, in Brisbane and in the Whitsundays.
Fraser Coast Sailing Academy
Australian Sailing accredited Discover Sailing Centre running Tackers and junior programs with the Maryborough and Hervey Bay sailing clubs.
Paper Sailors Rock
RYA centre at the Royal Queensland Yacht Squadron, with shorebased and practical courses, own-boat tuition and radio certificates.
Not sure this is the right course?
Three questions — your experience, the boat you want to sail, and your goal — give you a starting course and the schools that teach it near you.