Sailing / watercraft question

After reading through a thread recently, I was intrigued by people who participate in sailing and boating in SL. I have found a few boats that i might be interested in purchasing, to get involved in this.

However, I have a couple questions:

Can I just rez a boat in water anywhere, and sail all over the grid if that is my desire?

Or are there certain areas only that I'd be able to rez a boat and sail around in?

Thanks.

You can rez a boat in any build-enabled place, and can use it anywhere there aren't bans and security orbs unless a parcel is set no entry. Once you are seated autoreturn doesn't bother you - so if you are sailing in a rez-allowed-but-5-minute-autoreturn sea you can rez, sit, then you are ok.

I recommend the Flying Tako. Try Mohrr sim to begin with.
Gray sim is home to the Tako.

The latter: you won't be able to rez just anywhere.

One place you can rez is in my channel in Vyzmanavin. Look for the floating orange guides. (No charge, so I believe it's not against Forums policy to mention it.) But there are many places, scattered around the edges of the various continents.

My advice is to Search for Groups devoted to sailing (with obvious search terms)--they are likely to have lists of free places to rez your boat(s).

(and hopefully other Forums denizens will chime in with other locations where boat-rezzing is invited.)

Check this out! http://unitedsailingsims.com/

If you look at their Directory page, not only will you see a map of the huge USS sailing area, but also listings for yacht clubs etc..

There are two ways of sailing in SL: by the wind, or by "walking", which is exactly like driving a car or other land vehicle. The Tako (there used to be a vendor for free Takos on the docks at Nantucket sim, and may still be; they were one version back) is an excellent boat to learn to sail by the wind. Sailing by the SL wind is surprisingly similar to RL sailing, and as such can be tricky. You may want to take a sailing class - Starboards Yacht Club runs free ones weekly. Starboards also runs class boat races every week.

If you can build in an area, and there is Linden water present, you can sail. In addition to the USS sims, there are sailable areas scattered around the grid - not only in LL's "mainland" areas, but also within island archipelagos.

See you on the water!

Just pay attention to the little icons at the top of your screen. Those tell you if you can rez or if scripts work in that area.

Because I was tired of hunting for the nearest rez area when I fell off my boat (or stepped off somewhere to explore the shoreline), I programmed a little HUD button that searches the current sim for the nearest parcel with rezzing ability and marks it on the map. Check it out on XStreet (link on request).

Also, Rika Watanabe is selling something similar as a MystiTool plugin.

Boating is much more fun that way.

Check out my group Nautilus City Yacht Club. It lists locations of our marina and other places around Nautilus City where you can rezz boats. Also prime location for sailing into the Blake Sea between Nautilus City and the USS islands.

Another trick: If there is a buildable area on land, but reasonably close to water, you can rez the boat on land, get on, and edit its position to place you in the water. I do this when I want to go boating in Bay City. I rez on the lawn at Mari's store in Imaginario, then move my hovercraft or other boat over the sea wall and down into the canal.