ORANGE BEACH, Ala. – Jeanne Fitzgibbons looks in the bay of the new Wind and Water Learning Center and beams as she points out sponsor logos on the sides of the sunfish sail boats.

The latest, she points out, is $5,000 from Orange Beach Marina LLC, one of the many contributors that made the center possible. It’s up and running for the 10th year of sail camp being offered by Orange Beach.

On Tuesday she’ll get to show off the new center during a 1-5 p.m. reception for the public including a ribbon cutting at 2 p.m.

“It’s been a labor of love all these months for many of us as far as what we were going to do and how we were going to do it,” Fitzgibbons said. “Don’t you love our sign? It’s kind of cool.

“This is our little piece of heaven right here.”

The sign was a combined effort between Fitzgibbons and Hot Shop resident artist Adam Burges.

“I told Adam ‘I can’t draw a stick man.’” She said “But he can. I wanted to do something that was art related and wanted to incorporate the sails with the wind and a wave with the water. So I went back and forth and finally got it all together.

“Adam took his drawing and scaled for up there and drew it out on a piece of sheet metal. It’s a very simple thing. Our guys at the shop cut it out with a plasma torch and sanded the edges.”

Another favorite part of the center for Fitzgibbons is the sponsor board.

“There is still green space up there,” she said with a grin. “I’ll be happy to add their placard up there.”

Contributions are still welcome.

“People can still send us money because as we go forward into the future the more commitment we see from the community, the more money we can put back in here and we can put money into buying more boats and do more things,” Fitzgibbons said.

The new building has a small office area, a large storage area for boats with extra storage overhead, a storage room and bathrooms with showers.

“Really, it’s a glorified barn,” Fitzgibbons said. “That’s really the concept. We don’t need an office and we don’t need a classroom. Our classroom is out there. But we needed a place to store the equipment and we needed a place for the kids to get out of the weather when those summer storms come up. And you need bathrooms.”

The popularity of the camp continues to grow. Of the 200 slots available, about 50 remain unfilled. Campers are signed up from Texas, Colorado, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee Kentucky, all over Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Florida, Georgia.

“Two of the kids that are coming from Kentucky, their family has been going to the Great Lakes for the last several years in the summers so the kids could take sailing classes up there,” Fitzgibbons said. “They have an aunt on Ono who heard about this. So for that weeklong vacation, they play to come here.”

A local grandmother, Fitzgibbons, has five grandchildren coming from three families and all are spending the week here while the kids attend sail camp.

But with the new learning center, the classes won’t be limited to the popular summer sessions. Fitzgibbons believes more classes can be offered March through October as services and equipment expand.

“The Yacht Club at the Pointe voted to give us two more boats,” she said. “A 19-foot Flying Scot and a 14-foot Capri. Having those, we now have slips for them to go in while we are using them. We can start looking at doing things March through October because we’ve got those two bigger boats. You don’t have to get in the water.”

New docks are also part of the new layout and a floating dock is on the way to park the bigger sail boats and the center’s two motor skiffs alondside.

All enabling more services and classes, Fitzgibbons said.

“We can take off in another direction and add to a March through October timeframe where there’s always something going on here whether it be sailing or paddle boards or kayaks, boater safety classes,” she said. “Especially for our kids that are here, we will have things even after the summer that they can come and be a part of and come and do.

“So don’t think of sail camp as ‘I’ve got to get into it or I won’t have a chance until next summer.’ If you are here, we are going to have things going on, other classes they can get involved with. Stay tuned.”

Coordinating all those new services and classes will be fulltime instructor and sail camp veteran Caroline Harris.

“It will now be Caroline’s job to grow this,” Fitzgibbons said. “She has been our lead instructor for the last three years and has been with us for years as a helper, a volunteer and everything back down the line.

“We can now start taking her passion and see how far we can go. That’s what it’s really about.”