Bewl Valley

If I wanted to join a country club with a slipway I would.  But there aren't too many in this country thank goodness!

Originally posted by Peaky Hang on there. It was reported elsewhere that the lease in 2008, when Southern Water were landlords, was £85k. You can be fairly sure that that was below market rate, due to long standing good will, it not being core business for the water board and general naivety on the part of a former nationalised industry. In 2008 the landlord changed, a new deal was signed in good faith by both sides and now membership has dropped to a level were fees can't be paid. Hard to blame the landlord solely for that. In 7 years the rate has gone up £1 a person a week, hardly an outrage. The fact that a club of 1000 members can't find anyone willing to be commodore tells a story untold. Didn't Bewl shut for a while in the droughts a few years back? That can't have helped.

yes, all that but it's still a shame.

If the BVSC results guru would like to drive to the Sussex coast to sail he/she could submit returns for us. In return we could teach him/her about tide.

Theres no reason why young sailors can't be subsidised . Find it amazing that people will happily pay 10 - 15+ K for a new dinghy and then begrudge a fraction of that to have somewhere nice to sail. 10 pounds a week for membership  and boat space is excessive ; really !!!!!!! I think you only have to look at the average weekly attendance at most sailing clubs to see it aint working at the moment. Carry on and Bewl will be the first of many 

Like Jim, I know of very few people able to spend 10k or more on a boat. If I look at the two clubs I'm involved with there are only 4 or 5 brand new boats across some 600 memberships And those boats were around 6k. I would say most boats in the dinghy compound and out on the water are in the £500-2500 range. Both clubs have pretty stable membership numbers and membership fees sub £100 and a good deal of volunteer members organising training, socials, maintenance etc.
I have family members who are or have been members of clubs in the mould of what Limey recommends and interestingly all of those clubs have in recent years lost members and become increasingly about supplying the local well off retirees with somewhere to dine. The soul has been ripped out of them and the few remaining boats littering the shore are simply a reminder of what the club used to be about.
There are alternatives to the commercialisation of leisure time and they offer a far more rewarding and enjoyable experience.

Edited by craiggo - 24 Jun 15 at 10:24pm