Sailing Club at Bewl Water Reservoir - geograph

Bewl Valley Sailing Club was a

sailing dinghy Dinghy sailing is the activity of sailing small boats - usually for fun, learning necessary sailing skills (often also within family), and competition. RYA lists Five essentials of sailing dinghies as: * The sails * The hydrofoil, foils (i.e. t ...

and

windsurfing Windsurfing is a wind-propelled water sport that is a combination of sailing and surfing. It is also referred to as "sailboarding" and "boardsailing", and emerged in the late 1960s from the Californian aerospace and surf culture. Windsurfing gain ...

club that had approximately 920 full members (1,400 capacity), but entered into insolvency administration in 2015 and closed. Its former premises at Bewl Water are now occupied by the site's current tenant, the Markerstudy Group.

Description

It was affiliated to the

Royal Yachting Association The Royal Yachting Association (RYA) is a United Kingdom national governing body for sailing, dinghy sailing, yacht and motor cruising, sail racing, RIBs and sportsboats, windsurfing and personal watercraft and a leading representative for i ...

and was a registered RYA Training Centre. The club formerly organised safety boat cover for sailing and windsurfing every Saturday and Sunday throughout the year. The purpose-built water sports club house was leased by Bewl Valley Sailing Club and its facilities are shared wit
Bewl Bridge Rowing Club
an
Bewl Canoe Club
In July 2010, the club was awarded £10,000 by

Sport England Sport England is a non-departmental public body under the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. Its role is to build the foundations of a community sport system by working with national governing bodies of sport, and other funded partners, ...

that was to be spent towards purchasing new training dinghies.

Insolvency

On 16 July 2015 the club went into administration. Previously, on 20 June 2015 the club had issued a notice of intention to appoint an administrator.

Location

The former clubhouse is situated at

Bewl Water Bewl Water is a reservoir in the valley of the River Bewl, straddling the boundary between Kent and East Sussex in England. It is about south of Lamberhurst, Kent. The reservoir was part of a project to increase the supply of water in the a ...

on the north side of the

reservoir A reservoir (; ) is an enlarged lake behind a dam, usually built to water storage, store fresh water, often doubling for hydroelectric power generation. Reservoirs are created by controlling a watercourse that drains an existing body of wa ...

near

Lamberhurst Lamberhurst ( is a village and civil parish in the borough of Tunbridge Wells in Kent, England. The parish contains the hamlets of The Down and Hook Green. At the 2001 Census it had a population of 1,491, increasing to 1,706 at the 2011 Census. ...

Kent Kent is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Essex across the Thames Estuary to the north, the Strait of Dover to the south-east, East Sussex to the south-west, Surrey to the west, and Gr ...

. Bewl Water has up to 700 acres of sailing area if all of the estuaries and inlets are included. Most members sailed in the 200-250 acre area south of the club house and launch slipways. The surrounding Kent

High Weald High may refer to: Science and technology * Height * High (atmospheric), a high-pressure area * High (computability), a quality of a Turing degree, in computability theory * High (tectonics), in geology an area where relative tectonic uplift to ...

countryside is part of a designated

Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty An Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB; , AHNE) is one of 46 areas of countryside in England, Wales, or Northern Ireland that has been designated for conservation due to its significant landscape value. Since 2023, the areas in England an ...

. Bewl Water reservoir is the largest stretch of open water in the South East and when full can hold more than 31,000 million litres of water. The reservoir offers one of the few large recreational open spaces in

south east England South East England is one of the nine official regions of England, regions of England that are in the ITL 1 statistical regions of England, top level category for Statistics, statistical purposes. It consists of the nine counties of england, ...

located in a tranquil setting where there is virtually no background traffic noise. It can be accessed from the A21 Its former premises at Bewl Water are now occupied by the site's current tenant, the Markerstudy Group.

History

Bewl Valley Sailing Club was founded in 1967 but no sailing took place until 1977 due to

being under construction, lined with clay and then filled from the

River Medway The River Medway is a river in South East England. It rises in the High Weald AONB, High Weald, West Sussex and flows through Tonbridge, Maidstone and the Medway conurbation in Kent, before emptying into the Thames Estuary near Sheerness, a to ...

and local bore holes. In 2008, the Mariners of Bewl (MOB), an integrated sailing club for the physically disabled and able bodied elected to combine with Bewl Valley Sailing Club.

Club racing and open events

There was organised fleet racing on Sundays for

Lasers A laser is a device that emits light through a process of optical amplification based on the stimulated emission of electromagnetic radiation. The word ''laser'' originated as an acronym for light amplification by stimulated emission of radi ...

, Solos and

Flying Fifteen The Flying Fifteen is a British sailboat that was designed by Uffa Fox as a one design racer and first built in 1948.Sherwood, Richard M.: ''A Field Guide to Sailboats of North America, Second Edition'', pages 106-107. Houghton Mifflin Compa ...

s in addition to Slow and Fast Handicap fleets. Other classes of boats regularly sailed at the club included the

RS400 The RS400 is a light-weight sailing dinghy designed by Phil Morrison and manufactured by RS Sailing. The dinghy is sailed by two people and has a main, a jib and an asymmetric spinnaker A spinnaker is a sail designed specifically for sailin ...

, Topper,

Optimist Optimism is the attitude or mindset of expecting events to lead to particularly positive, favorable, desirable, and hopeful outcomes. A common idiom used to illustrate optimism versus pessimism is a glass filled with water to the halfway poin ...

and

Enterprise Enterprise (or the archaic spelling Enterprize) may refer to: Business and economics Brands and enterprises * Enterprise GP Holdings, an energy holding company * Enterprise plc, a UK civil engineering and maintenance company * Enterpris ...

dinghies. Bewl Valley Sailing Club hosted a number of inland open meetings each year including events for Solos, Phantoms,

Comets A comet is an icy, small Solar System body that warms and begins to release gases when passing close to the Sun, a process called outgassing. This produces an extended, gravitationally unbound atmosphere or coma surrounding the nucleus, an ...

Laser 2000 The 2000 ''(formerly the Laser 2000)'' is a performance sailing dinghy designed by Phil Morrison and currently sold by RS Sailing. It combines a traditional GRP hull and foam sandwich deck moulding with a modern asymmetric rig including a furling ...

Laser Vago The Laser Vago is a British/ American sailing dinghy that was designed by Jo Richards as a one-design racer and first built in 2005. Production The design was built starting in 2005 by LaserPerformance in United Kingdom and in the United ...

Wanderer Wanderer, Wanderers, or The Wanderer may refer to: Arts and entertainment Film, television, and theater * The Wanderer (1913 film), ''The Wanderer'' (1913 film), a silent film * The Wanderer (1925 film), ''The Wanderer'' (1925 film), a silen ...

s and th
London Windsurf Association

General sailing

In addition to general sailing on Saturdays and Sundays, the club was open on Wednesday evenings from May to August and on each of the four summer Bank Holiday Mondays. During the month of August, the club house was open every day and safety boat cover was provided, except during Youth Week during which there was no club sailing for ordinary members. Members also organised Away Cruises on tidal waters such as to Bradwell in

Essex Essex ( ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the East of England, and one of the home counties. It is bordered by Cambridgeshire and Suffolk to the north, the North Sea to the east, Kent across the Thames Estuary to the ...

. The Midweekers, an informal group of members met each Wednesday to sail or take part in another outdoor activity.

Social events

Family week ran for more than 20 years. The event was organised voluntarily by club members and offers a full programme of water and land based activities including evening entertainment in the club house. Each summer some 250 family members camped onsite during the first week of the school holidays at the end of July (22–28 July 2012). The club held two camping weekends during 2012 (4–7 May & 25–27 May). In addition the club held its annual Family open day on Saturday 21 July 2012, when there were to be opportunities to "have a go" at Windsurfing & Sailing.

References

{{Reflist

External links

KCC Bewl Water outdoor centre

Yacht and Yachting Club Page

RYA South East Region

Bewl Water Reservoir water level
Yacht clubs in England Sport in Kent 1967 establishments in England