LADYBUG EVENT
ACTIVITIES TO DO OVER MAY 3 AND 4TH , 2025
- To join the race as crew May 4th CLICK HERE – $275 and includes 1 Awards Ticket and membership in either WOW or Crew for the month of May, 2025
- To reserve spots on the Spectators Boat May 4th CLICK HERE. It is free for the first 38 reservations.
- In-water Boat Show – May 3rd
- Reserve one or more workshops May 3rd CLICK HERE
- Awards Dinner May 4th – CLICK HERE – $89 PP
(Listen to Flagler Broadcasting Interview)
Ladybug Event with Rose Ann Points –
Flagler Broadcasting Interview Transcribed
Good morning and thanks for tuning in. My guest this morning is Rose Ann Points, manager of St Augustine’s Sailing. Good morning, Rose Ann
Good morning, Liz. Thank you so much for having me.
Thank you for chatting. I’ve been looking forward to talking to you. There’s so much to talk about regarding St Augustine Sailing and a Ladybug Event that’s coming up, but we’re going to get to all that. But first, tell me a little bit about you, Rose Ann. Where did you grow up and how did your passion and love for the water begin?
What a great question. Thank you so much. I grew up in the northwest, in Oregon. And one day my husband came home, and he said, hey, I want to buy a sailboat, live on it and travel the world. So that’s how I actually started. We owned a powerboat up there. But when we moved to Florida to find our sailing vessel it was the first time that I had actually been sailing. So, my husband and I and our three children, we moved onboard and I started traveling.
Wow. You know, Rose Ann I’m waiting for the day my husband comes home and say, Hey, honey guess what? We’re going to buy your boat and live on the water. But that they never seem to come for me.
It was great. It was wonderful.
I’m glad that it came for you. And how did you find yourself here in Saint Augustine?
Well, after all, my kids grew up and decided to go to college and became landlubbers. I was pretty much by myself. So, I was like, you know what? I might as well come back stateside as well. So, I ended up in Saint Augustine after a few different locations throughout the United States. And I just loved Saint Augustine and that’s how I ended up here. It was just amazing.
Do your girls have a love affair with the water like you do?
My children do. Yes. So, I have one daughter. Her name is Tosta. Kind of like pasta, but with a T. And then I have two boys, Derk, who does digital photography, he is very very artsy. And then my youngest son, his name is Lance, and he actually works here. Well, they all do, but he actually works here taking care of all of the boats to make sure that they’re all nice and taken care of and pretty and sparkly for everybody.
Excellent. Cool. Where is St Augustine Sailing, Rose Ann?
So we are located inside Comanche Cove, which is right at the Saint Augustine side of the Vilano Bridge.
Right by my friends at Florida Water Tours.
Exactly. Yeah, right in that same marina. Yeah.
And what is the function of Saint Augustine Sailing?
We do offer private and also shared sailing experiences. We get people out on the water so that they can enjoy the water. If you have more of an adventure and you want to learn to sail, we teach people how to sail. After you learn how to sail, if you don’t own a boat yourself, we have a sailing club and different types of memberships that you can join so that you can, get continued education or be your own skipper. And then also if you’re even a little farther along than that and want to own your own boat, then we also help people find and purchase new or used vessels.
Can you help them if they’ve maybe never owned a boat before and they’re not quite sure exactly about all the ins and outs of boat ownership.
Absolutely. Absolutely. That’s part of what we do. Yes.
What kind of boat are good boats for these waters here in northeast Florida?
Well you see both boats, powerboats and sailboats. But my heart kind of leans towards sailing. So, I would say if you’re more of a day sailor and just want to go out for a couple of hours the water is really great because you can sail inside in protected waters, either up the Tomato River or down by Salt Run. It’s very protected. You probably are familiar with Saint Augustine Race Week and all the youths downtown racing and everything. So, it’s great place for sailing. If you want a little bit more, then a larger boat, 30 feet or above, is really great to go sailing in the ocean. And St Augustine is a wonderful place to go sailing. Because you have the protected waters inside and the waters offshore. If the water a little rough offshore you can still go sailing. Obviously if the Marine weather’s nice off shore, you can just like point the boat in the best possible position for the wind and you just go it’s a great sailing.
Someone should write a song about that.
Yeah.
Yeah. So you work with people of all skill levels?
Absolutely. Yes. Yeah. So we get people that go out on a charter with us and they’re like, man, I wish I knew how to do this. And we’re like, Hey, we can help you with that, right. So we’ve had people that have never stepped foot on a boat to people that have learned how to sail, but they want to like to get a little bit more instruction on a particular topic or a subject; Or, I want to be able to to navigate, either via the charts or with a sexton for celestial navigation. Or, I want to be able to do passage making. We can help them with all of those types of things from from Zero to Hero, we say.
Zero to hero. I love that. How would you describe, Roseann, the peacefulness that you experience when you’re out there sailing?
Let me tell you, Liz, when you’re out there and the water is just like, just shh. And then you’ve got the wind just really lightly and especially when it’s sunny and you’ve got the heat down on your skin and the breeze on it. And there’s no noise, right? You just hear nature. It’s it’s beyond explanation. It’s just it your whole being just is totally relaxed. And you just enjoy it. Yeah. It’s just hard. It’s hard to explain. You have to experience it. You really you really do. To really. yeah. When you get it, you get it and it fills your heart with joy.
And it’s like therapy because it’s getting awfully noisy here in Saint Augustine, don’t you think?
Well, you know, there’s lots of tourists. No matter where you go, it doesn’t matter. You can’t get on the water. Get on the water. And Saint Augustine from the water is beautiful. You get to see so much marine life and wildlife and, you know, we love to talk about the history of the waterways and because when you’re on land, you hear all of the history of Saint Augustine. But there’s a lot also history on the water, which we love to talk about.
Cool. That’s that’s really a special part of living in Saint Augustine. So much history and. It’s so fun to learn about it. The learning never ends. There’s always something else to learn and to know about Saint Augustine.
You’re listening. Good morning, Saint Augustine. I’m your host, Liz Ryan, chatting this morning with Rosanne Points, the manager of Saint Augustine Sailing. And you’re having your second annual ladybug event that’s right around the corner.
What happened on May 3rd and 4th?
So on May 3rd, we have our boat show. It’s from 10 to 5 and then starting at 9 to 5, we have a variety of different seminars and workshops and demonstrations. That’s all open and free to the public for them to come and enjoy it. For the workshops and and the seminars. It’s best to register online again it is at no cost. But if you register, then we can manage the space a little bit better because some of our Ladybug Events are in our classrooms, some are on vessels, so we just can make sure that everyone can enjoy the experience.
What I’m really excited about, so thrilled is this year that we have Tracey Edwards as our keynote speaker. She was the skipper of the first all female crew in the 1989 Whitbread Round the World Race. And she actually her and and her team all female. They came in second. They even had a movie about her called The Maiden Factor. And if you haven’t seen it, it’s kind of in a style of a documentary, she talks about her life and how about the race. You got to watch it. It’s amazing. just to see the determination that she had and the women that were with her and how they just persevered. I mean, I think they said that they were on the water for like 159 days. Wow. Yeah. And she, and she came in second and nobody when she started that, they’re like she ain’t going to get anywhere, you know? And then then she just kept on and kept on. And, you know, at the end she came in second. But it’s, it’s amazing. So I’m so excited that she’s going to be our keynote speaker.
She is from Britain so she’s going to be joining us virtually. So this is the Zoom meeting where she’s going to be talking about her life. We’ll have a moderator. Also so you don’t have to be here on site to enjoy this exceptional interview that we’re going to be having with her. You can log in at home or anywhere . You will need to register with us on our website and in the confirmation will be the log in information. So you can stay at home. You don’t even have to be in Saint Augustine. It’s for anybody that wants to listen to her. She is so inspirational, not just for women, but for anybody really. She manages the Maiden Factor foundation. And this foundation goal is to empower girls through education around the world. So go to her her website and see how all the stuff that they do at the at the Maiden factor foundation. It’s just, it’s amazing.
What is your website?
It is www.sta, like Sierra tango alpha, dash sail, like you’re going sailing – sta-sail.com is our our website and if you go to the menu bar it’ll have a dropdown under experiences, lady event and then from there it’ll give all of the information to our our seminars or workshops or cooking demonstration CPR. So the whole nine yards, it’s all on those pages there.
Can the public come out and watch the ladybug events for free?
They can! We do take boats out, but you can still see the race from the marina. So if you go out to A dock or N dock at the end, you can see the race where we’re going to be.
Is that there at the marina?
Yes. Yeah. The Comanche Cove marina.
That is located at the base of the Vilano Bridge. I know the parking there could be limited do you have any advice about parking?
So, if there’s no parking left inside the marina, which they do have quite a few spaces here, you can also go across the street at the county’s boat ramp, which has a huge parking lot as well. And it’s also, free.
Okay. Where’s the proceeds go, Roseanne, from the Ladybug event.
So if somebody wants to donate we use that money to go towards scholarships for women that are in need, if it be financial or if they’re veterans or if they’re recovering from something, women that are trying to improve and their lives and trying to get a solid foundation to move forward with their lives. We offer these scholarships based on the money that we get from any donations from this event.
Terrific. And what does the scholarships do? How did they use them?
We have on a weekly basis in the classroom, on the dock education for sailing, Saturday from 9 to 11 and then 11 to 1 we have practical on the water applications. Then if you wanted to participate in racing here on the river we do that from 1 – 3. then we also have on Monday nights zoom online classes. And then once a month we have a woman panel discussion. So we invite women from the marine industry, like last month we had the sales manager from Jeanneau America, which is a sailboat manufacturer, she talked about technology and technology has improved the sailing industry, right? So we reach out to different women in the industry, to come and talk about a particular subject. Again, everything on Monday, you don’t have to be part of our women on the water to enjoy the free Zoom meetings. Those are all available to anyone who wants to log in. We do ask that you, register, but it’s, there’s no cost to register it, but it just gives us an idea of how many people are going to be there.
Where do you get the idea to do the Women on the Water program?
Well, being a woman myself, back to what I was saying. My husband came home and said, Hey, I want to sell everything we owned by a boat and travel the world. You know, I was powerboater. I just I had no idea how to sail or anything. And that was like, I hate to say it was like 40 years ago. I just didn’t have things available to me to go and learn before we left and all of that kind of stuff. And I just thought that I can help other people, especially women, to be in a position where they can feel confident with their own skills with themselves. Because, you know, sports in general, when you talk to different people they might say football’s this way or basketball or volleyball or just sports in general kind of creates not only this team kind of empowerment, but it also gives you strength as a person, as an individual. I can do this. wow, I did this. Okay. And then it helps you, be able to be stronger, empowering, you know, as your life continues. And that’s kind of thing I wanted to do with sailing because, you know, I, I love sailing, and this is what I have access to. I have access to a variety of different boats ranging from 22 feet up to 45 feet. This is what I have to offer. And that’s. You know, my passion. That’s what I want to do.
Do you have a favorite place around here to go Sailing was in.
It really depends on who’s with you. Like my husband and I. It’s kind of sounds funny because people talk to you like, what do you do for vacation? Well… we go sailing. So sometimes we go up to guana park and anchor and it’s really, really quiet and it’s a great place to anchor. And there’s it’s so peaceful, so quiet. And since it’s just nature around, it’s kind of a little darker than what you would have like if you were to get a mooring ball downtown. So sometimes we go up there and we anchor. If we want something more around like the nights of lights and things like that, we might spend the night on a mooring ball and I’ll cook dinner on board and then we’ll sit outside in the cockpit and look at the lights and things like that. Sometimes we go down to Fort Matanzas and anchor down there, you know, So those are kind of I would say those are three places that I would say that we go kind of depending on how we’re feeling the day that we want to go.
It sounds like a whole lot of fun. It is.
It’s a great way to just to unplug and recharge. You know, rejuvenate yourself and it’s peaceful.
Yeah. So back to the ladybug event that’s coming up May 3rd and 4th. Roseann I know it’s free to the public. People can come on down and check out all the things that are going on. But if you want to get involved, how do you register?
And so if you go to our website, www.sta-sail.com and go to the Ladybug page, then there’s boat show, workshops, the race and awards dinner, and you just click on any of those icons and then it’ll take you to register.
Is it exclusively for women.
No, no no. It’s open to everybody. Everybody.
How did you come up the named Ladybug event.
Well I don’t know if this is true or not, but a girlfriend of mine said that she was getting an insurance policy, and because she has never been married and she didn’t have any children that the insurance person said, that’s a ladybug insurance policy. So I don’t know if that’s true or not, but that’s what she told me. I thought, wow, that is, you know, a powerful woman, right? That her whole life she’s done it herself. She stood up for her self and she’s just taken life into her own hands. And that is what inspired me to call it the ladybug. I don’t know if that’s strange that’s the story.
I love that story. That’s really neat. I never heard that before. What would you say to somebody, Roseanne, who is apprehensive about sailng? They feel like maybe they’re not physically strong enough or maybe they’re not a strong enough swimmer and they’re really nervous about it. What would you say to them to help them make that first step.
Okay. Okay. Well, we do have in our WOW program hacks for women. So we show you how to do things smarter than harder… like, putting your whole back into it, right? How to raise the sails easier, how to handle the sails easier, how to do these things so that, you know, you don’t have to be bench press 200 lbs to be able to handle it. And in regards to swimming when I moved aboard my vessel myself, my sailboat, it was called Tranquility. When I moved about aboard Tranquility, I didn’t even know how to swim. I was like terrified. And I didn’t want to get in the water and but I put on a little life vest, and you got in, and once you get in the water and you see, I went snorkeling, and you see what what life is like under the water. Like you see all the marine life and then, you know, it’s the hook, right? It’s the hook and it keeps you there. but, you know, you can always learn to swim. They teach you how to swim in a swimming pool.
Absolutely. It’s a good skill to have when you live in Saint Augustine.
Yes. Yes.
For sure. Okay. Well, as in for people who may have just tuned in, could you just give us a quick recap of the ladybug event?
Sure. Sure. so the ladybug event we have a boat show for new and used boats that’ll be on G Dock in the Comanche Cove. Marina will have demonstrations, seminars, workshops throughout the day, starting from 9:00 on. And then Sunday will be our, race. We’ll have a one design race and there’ll be spaces available for spectators. If they want to come out and watch it. Then we also have our awards dinner. after the race around 6:00 inside the marina on the patio next to our office. And it overlooks the harbor here. So it’s going to be pretty, pretty neat.
Terrific. And it’s free to the public to come on out and watch it is, yes. Okay. And your website one more time www.sta-sail.com
Well I learned a lot from talking to you today Rosanne thank you for joining me.
No, thanks Liz for giving me an opportunity to be here and to talk about sailing I can never have enough time talking about it.
What do you think you’ll do with the rest of your Sunday, Rose Ann?
I know it’s going to sound absolutely hilarious. But I’ll probably go sailing.
I never would have guessed that one. Rose Ann. Yeah, okay. Thank you so much. And we’ll see you May 3rd and 4th.
Absolutely. Thank you so much again, You have a good night.
My pleasure. Thank you for listening. And remember all our episodes of Good Morning. Saint Augustine can be downloaded as a podcast. Go to Flagler Broadcasting dot com, click on the podcast page and scroll down to Good Morning Saint Augustine. Thank you for listening. Enjoy the rest of your Sunday in a beautiful, ancient historic city.
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