Why don't beachcat sailors belong to yacht clubs?

Mary,

Here in Point Pleasant NJ, it's a matter of returns for vested dollars and lifestyle.

1:) No Dock Fee's 1,200-2000 Season
2:) No Club fee's 600-1,200 Season
3:) Newbies to the shore (WOOOOOOOOOOHAAAAAAAAAAA) with PWC's and boats speeding in no wake zone.
4:) Style of boating simply not interested in.
5:) No interest in sailing, power is majority here.
6:) One upmanship whether in boat, at club, simply being yourself.

The biggest factor is that club is not a beach lifestyle. How many members have simply tied up boat lit a fire and snuggled with a bottle of wine on the beach.
I will bet none.

Mike

Mary,
Sorry you didn't accompany Rick to Gulfport this weekend for the Taipan Nationals (Great Fun). I had looked forward to meeting you.
It would also have been a great answer to your question!
Gulfport Yacht Club is a small, quiet, laid back sailing club that has a mix of small (under 25') monohulls and beach cats. We race the cats, and anyone else that is game twice a month.
We have no one-upsmanship, no snobbery just fun.
Our dues, including dry-slip for mast up storage for ramp or beach launch is $400.00.
Those who have not tried such clubs don't know what they're missing.
Come up next year....you'll see. Ask Rick.
Thanx
John Maples
Commodore
Gulfport Yacht Club

Mary:

Out west here a large percentage of the folks who sail beach catamaran belong to yacht clubs. Just yesterday I was at a regatta at Cabrillo Beach yacht club and an INTER 20, NACRA 5.2, Tornado and various other multihulls who are all members at CBYC were racing in a really fun pursuit race. King Harbor Yacht Club in Los Angeles has an excellent beach catamaran group composed primarily of NACRAs.

Alamitos Bay Yacht Club has a very good contingent of catamarans with some twenty or so on the property in dry storage and many more triamarans. Hobie Tigers, foxes, NACRAs, and A class make up the dominant number at that club.

The costs to belong to clubs is actually cheap in Los Angeles.

You may NOT STORE YOUR CATAMARAN in your driveway in most Southern California cities nor in your back yard if they are visible from the street and there is no beach storage for 99% of the coastline. Your option therefor is to store your boat in a public mast up storage as they have in Marina del Rey with prices running from $85-125 a month. The mast down storage that is well away from the water is $65-80 a month. when you look at a club like Alamitos Bay Yacht Club in Long Beach the costs are really quite cheap in comparison to public storage:

ABYC Equity Membership : ~$1200
Mast up storage: $60 a month
Monthly dues $15-40 a month depending on your age.

Add to that the advantage of regatta discounts, hot showers, security, a dining room, a member SCYRA club affiliation and you have an unbeatable deal.

Mission Bay Yacht club in San Diego is host to the INTER 20 fleet and there are dozens of boats in mast up storage there.

In retrospect I think a majority of active Southern California beach catamarans sail out of yacht clubs to one degree or another.

Are there still "MULTI PHOBIA" clubs here in So Cal? You bet. But not many of them and you probably wouldn't want to hang out with them anyway.

MM

In our area, the yacht clubs are expensive and exclusive. Even the Eastport Yacht Club, which is probably the most down to Earth and multi-friendly has a waiting list and sponsor requirements. There are probably other options, but in 'Nap-town those are the "scene". It takes money, time, and brown-nosing. I think cat-sailors would rather just go sail. In Galesville, there is the West River Sailing Club, who started out as "Our Own Damn Yacht Club" in defiance of the blue blazers. Now, they are among those who don't care for us joining, with all the usual "too much storage space, blah, blah, blah". Beach cat sailors thrive when they have a venue that is friendly to the beach cat style - a place for mast up storage, push the boat in water, and no dress requirements for the club house if you have one at all.

I suspect this is the same all over. The more exclusive clubs have no need for us, unless the only sailors in the area are multi sailors (ah, Heaven...). So, if we belong to clubs, they are the ones that are more down-to-Earth and value sailing and friendship above all.

Here's a true story - I was recently in San Diego for the first time. Loved it! Being as the LV Cup is under way, I figured I'd go over to the San Diego Yacht Club. Maybe given the Cup history, they had some sort of club tour for those interested in visiting. I was stopped at the gate. I said I was a sailor from the East and interested in seeing one of the important places of sailing. No dice. The only way I could get on premises was if I was a member or a guest of a member. Or, if I was a card-carrying member of the Annapolis Yacht Club they'd let me in. In other words, if I had a membership in another club as expensive as theirs they'd let me in. For fun I asked if being a member of the WRCRA would count - I guess he wasn't impressed by a small multihull racing outfit from Galesville. He seemed pained that I even mentioned it, but that was my point for mentioning it in the first place. Anyway, who needs that crap? Is that anyway to grow interest in the sport? Is that anyway to break down the barriers that people see when they view sailing as the sport of the rich? Of course not, but these clubs don't care and will have no interest in changing until there are no people with big checks lining up. So, beach cat sailors will join the clubs with a more grass-roots emphasis or they'll just go sailing wherever they find a launch spot.
Rant mode off.

Anyhow, Art Stephens told us we should be joining these clubs and taking them over from the inside. I agree to the notion, but I'm not sure it's that easy.

Looks like I was poking around the wrong places! Too bad we don't have much of those kind of possibilities out here...

Hi Mary,

I Totally agree with Mike,
Most yacht club members see us as outcasts, we use the same facilities but pay less.
They are looking down to us because we did not spend US 100.000+ or more,
And a envious about the speed we are making, when they are sitting on deck, they are in mine opinion only looking if the are being recognized by someone with a smaller boat.

Some of them do visit our part of the marina and have a honest interest in our sport.
Much often I invite them for a ride when possible, we show them what fun it is.
Many times they end up buying a cat themselves.

The owner of the marina we are sailing recently bought a old Hoby himself.

Nobody owns the water, it’s all about respect for each other.

I belonged to a "Yacht Club" for about seven years. I left my SC20 on the beach and was charged the same as a slip. When my boat was damaged by someone moving a trailer; I complained to the management and was blown off. When I filed charges with the police; all the non-member "guest boats" left the beach. When there were about 30-40 boats on the beach before the complaint and after there were about SIX; it became clear that the damage was done by some "guest boat" and there was nothing that would be done. So I was out about $2800 for repairs. Not to mention the "guests" playing on my tramp. When I called every sailor with a boat on the beach not one had a "guest boat" there.

When I filled out an entry form to race on the Fourth of July it was lost and when I was informed the entry time had passed??? No racing for a cat in an open to all comers event...

I keep my boats at a marina. They understand they are in business warehousing boats.

thommerrill
F25c 009 Charisma
ARC22 2234 Widowmaker
FMS SC20 57

Keith: I know what you mean about the area yacht clubs up there. Before my family moved down to NC, we were on the waiting list to get into the Tred Avon Yacht Club in Oxford MD. After my Dad's relocation, and subsequent move back to Maryland, they are now back on the waitlist, albeit on the end. We're good friends with some of the members there, so they have let me use the beach to launch the 17 there before, but I always get those "looks" from suspecting members as if I'm infiltrating an enemy compound or something. I've never come into the clubhouse nasty and sandy, nor have I ever been in anyone's way. I guess its just that I've got twice as many hulls as they do

Having been a member of a yacht club here in SE Wisconsin for 6 years, I witnessed first hand the attitudes of the Yacht club bunch...

It was not appreciated when we sailed up to the dock, tied up for an hour and grabbed a beer and a burger at the bar. Nobody complained when it was a 30-foot power boat doing the same thing. Oh yeah, they buy lots 'o gas.

Cats are a focal point of ridicule to many monohull racers, especially with the rockstar crowd. "Dude, why dont you get a real boat!", "Yeah whatever, go play on the beach!" or "You could have bought a j/24 for that kind of cash!". Point is, I have a cat becasue I want a cat, It provides thrills that you just cant get on a monohull.

Snobbery plays a role, too. But hey, you dont join a yacht club if you are broke. You want your wine and cheese served in the aft salon, fine. I prefer ham and cheese on the beach between races.

I got bored with the garbage. Tired of being told cats were a stupid waste of fiberglass and resin. I quit and started my own program with my own boat. I sail with people now who have common interests and an appreciation of the fun that catsailing brings.

The only benefit to a YC that I can see is mast-up storage. As about 1/3 of my sailing is done at 'away events' between 80 and 300 miles distant, I'd have to take down the stick about as often as not anyway.

Fortunately I live in a place where no one hassles me about leaving the boat in the driveway. Hopefully the Californians will stay on their side of the hill and we can keep it that way.

several of the beachcat sailors here on St Croix belong to the yacht club, mainly for the security, but also the convience, we keep our boats on the beach year round...theres a big yard off the beach that we can do any repairs if needed....and the scenery aint bad either...

a few years ago, i pulled into a local club. about a two hoursail from my place. four of us had just sailed three hours upwind through a 25 knot blow. one my main halyard sheaves had broken and the halyard had cut through the top ten inches of mast. we were wet, cold, and tired. we asked to put in on a dock and we were told, no. i explained our situation and told the dock guy that our electric motor would not push the boat. he said that they did not take 'your kind of boat here.' i showed him my reciprocal card and explained to him, again, how bad off we were. i was still told that i could not stay. i asked how he would treat a flag officer from my club. (remember, i am shivering and dripping and basically looking like a bag of krap) he told me that the situation would be different. i asked if there was a flag officer from his club there as the vice commodore of my club (me) would like a place to put his catamaran. that is the only reason i was not welcome. because i was a cat sailor. no blue blazer. no cap.
now, basketcase is not your normal beach cat. i wet sail her off a mooring. she is a modified tomcat 6.2 with fixed wings. all up she is 20' long with a sprit by 26' wide and about 650 lbs, so a spot on the beach is not for me.
wy have sailled out of the aquatic park sailing club for seven or so years. it is a small club of about 100 small keel boats and a wharam and me. these people have welcomed my wife, son and i into there little paradise and treat me as an equal. last year i was voted in as commodore.
guess where we did not send reciprocals to this year.

here's our "parking lot" on St Croix

Man, its just NOT FAIR

So if you weren't a "flag offficer" you could just go drown yourself...what kind of people populate these pompous clubs. Whatever happened to the common law of the sea..."help those in distress"??? I never heard it said "only help flag officers"!!!

thom

http://www.osyc.com

check it out: a real yacht club for dinghies and beachcats. Recip privs with every GYA YC on the Coast.

Sorry about having to delete the graphic that was really wide, but it expanded the width of all posts and made it impossible to read the rest of the posts.
Try again as an attachment.
Thanks
Rick

setting an absolute table width would help that problem

I consider our club to be pretty catamaran friendly.

Here is how we would handle your situation:

• Offer you help if you needed it
• Ask if you intended to leave your boat at the dock for an extended period of time
• If leaving your boat AND you had a good reason to leave your boat, we would move it to an appropriate spot ot of the way
• We would find out when you were coming back and also see if you had proof of membership from your club
• We would also try to comfirm that your club was not just a paper organization

If we let everyone who wants to use our facilities just launch or park their boats at our club, we honestly would not have room for our members. While we try to be hospitable, we are not in the business of giving free service. Our members pay dues to use the facilities. Why should someone who doesn't pay at their own club use our facilities for free?

We DO have a paper yacht club in town. We charge them and their members for using our facilities. The few times we tried to be charitable they overran the place, parking their cars in front of people's boats and generally littering up the place.

So, you see, there are reasons some clubs feel it is necessary to scrutinize attempts to use the property w/o paying. I am not saying that is the case in your circumstance, but it may have had something to do with it.

We also have yacht clubs that try to be exclusive. The idea behind those clubs is that they DON'T want new members. They want to exclude everyone. In most cases, the facilities genuinely belong to the membership and they have no intentions or motivation to share them with anyone except their own private guests. That's life. You got to look at those clubs as if you were beaching your boat in their own private back yard. NO, they don't have to welcome you. YES, they may even call the authorities.

Rudder Club of Jacksonville

The best yacht club that would be useful for me would be one where the boat could be sitting on the sand, mast up and yards from the water.

We used to have our own little club where the County of LA rented us beach space for $240/yr....Topanga South Yacht Club. No dues, no meetings but we had t-shirts! (and 50 cats on the beach at one time). Volleyball, weekly BBQ's....

Unfortunately, the beach eroded away leaving rocks and boulders in the landing zone. Sailors moved away or left the sport. I keep my boat in an RV yard close by now. The plus is that I can trailer to new places.

Wish I could find another spot like that but most of the YC's aren't on the sand!

Sheldon
P-18

Is that where all the cats used to be down by the Getty museum? I was wondering about that set-up.
Here in the BAy Area, there seems to be no place to keep a boat with the mast up except at a few marinas. The best I have found was in Alameda, and that was mast up on a trailer and you have to tow your boat to the launching ramp through an office building's parking lot! Either that, or they seem to be fond of the dreaded hoist around here.
I heard there was interest in getting some boats on the beach in Alameda, but I never heard any more about it.
It seems a shame to have all this wind and water and such a small cat scene!

I joined the local yacht club in order to get mast up storage near the water, and guaranteed access to the water. I felt mast up storage and guaranteed access were necessary to be able to fully enjoy cat sailing. It also didn't hurt that the folks I first met at the yacht club were very friendly. They only got uppity when I tried to park my cat on their property & use their docks without paying dues.

I had an option that was cheaper, but a much longer drive to the launch site. And I had a much more expensive option - buying lakefront property.

For me, the yacht club was an affordable compromise. I didn't need the yacht club to race my catamaran and in fact, at first I couldn't even race my catamaran at my own club, except in an annual distance race, but the mast up storage and lake access gave me the "time on the water" to improve. Once I joined the yacht club, though, I did get involved in various programs, including race management, and for a while we did have a catamaran fleet racing regularly.

Yep, right at the bottom of the hill below the Getty (now called the Getty Villa).
We had some fine times down there. Minimal charge by the County and close to the surf line...a bit too close. One year we lost 15 boats to a storm.
We had BBQ's every Wed all summer, with kids and parents abound. The lifeguard had his own boat there so the tower became our personal storage space.

There are still boats there but the heyday is long gone. I don't know if any of them even go out. Long live the "good ole days" which are now!

Sheldon
P-18

We searched most all of the Annapolis / B'more area for a club that could accommodate a bunch of Tornados a few years back. West River Sailing Club and others were plenty interested in a one design fleet coming to roost, but space issues were clearly a problem as were launch facilities for nearly all Annapolis clubs. Severn Sailing Association and Eastport were interested but there was no way you could get sail a Tcat out of there. Most clubs here just aren't set up for launching cats.

On the other hand, Podickory Point Yacht and Beach Club, north of Annapolis, has great facilities and plenty of space. We train out of there when we are not on the road. PPYC would love to have more cats there, so I don't see what the problem is in Annapolis. I will say that most cat sailors are pretty cheap in my experience and are not willing to pay for yacht clubs. It costs around $115.00 per month to be a PPYC member and keep your boat there. That's a fair chunk of change to fork over in one lump sum. On the other hand, you get a place to store your boat, electricity, fresh water, showers, a pretty damn nice clubhouse, pool, tennis courts, etc. Seems pretty reasonable to me. I really appreciate having showers and fresh water available.

We have found Annapolis / Balmer clubs to be extremely cooperative and cat friendly. A few years ago, when the Baltimore Sailing Center at Rocky Point was operating, one of the baltimore clubs gave us open class starts in their races. They were very friendly and quite impressed with the speed of our boats. Eastport Yacht Club co-organized the 1997 Tornado National Championships with CRAC. Their RC expertise was extremely helpful and professional! Eastport has given us starts in their regattas over the years. And anyone who races in the Annapolis area certainly must know of the welcoming attitude of the Cambridge Yacht Club, who include us every year in their annual summer regatta. Miles River Yacht Club used to give us starts and hosted the area C Alter Cup elims twice if I'm not mistaken. For the last two years, cats have been welcome in the Annapolis to Oxford Race.

I don't think it is fair to say that we are not welcome. I think it is true that we have unique space and launching issues. In Annapolis, most clubs were built without considering such needs. This was reasonable at the time the clubs were built. Projects that I have worked on, such as the Tcat nationals, were well received by local clubs. Seems to me that for the most part, local clubs here ARE interested in promoting sailing.

If cat sailors were really interested, they could have a cat club in Annapolis. PPYC could become a cat oriented club just by having lots of cat people join. It's that simple. And there is a club of sorts in Galesville. There ain't no facilities, but there's a bunch of boats on a piece of property there and that's a start ain't it? Didn't most of the existing clubs start out that way?

-Greg Scace

Greg,
You said one of the problems is that catamarans have unique space and launching issues. I am curious as to what these unique space and launching issues are. At the clubs you are talking about, do they have fleets of dinghy-type monohulls up to 20 foot? Do they drysail? How do they launch their boats? Do they use hoists, or ramps, or both?

Where did the mantra come from that catamarans have to have a beach? Never mind, I know where it came from.

Anyway, when the Shark catamaran fleet started at Mentor Harbor Yacht Club on Lake Erie in 1962, most of the people who got the catamarans were monohull sailors who were members of the club. Our club had a large amount of beach area right on the lake, but it never even occurred to us to sail our cats off a beach. We launched our boats just like the monohull sailors did, using a hoist or a ramp. I think most of the Shark fleet sailors used the hoist rather than the ramp. We had a four-way bridle that just attached to the hook on the hoist, and you just lowered the boat into the water. It was so easy. We were always launching into completely calm, protected water. We put up our sails after we got in the water. And then we just had to sail down a little canal and then out through the channel into the lake.

Most of the major Shark regattas were out of yacht clubs on the East Coast, and at most of them we launched by hoist or ramp. And when Tornados came in, in the late 1960's, I think they were doing the same thing.

Now, obviously, in the case of the Hobie regattas in the 1970's when there were maybe a hundred boats at every regatta, a hoist is not feasible. But when you have a fleet the size of a normal monohull fleet at a regatta, why shouldn't you be able to use the hoist (or ramp) or whatever that club provides for launching monohulls?

As far as the dry storage space issue, this came up with a club that we belonged to once. We had a Hobie 18. We found out that they were charging us 50 percent more for dry storage than they were charging for the Flying Scots -- this was with both types of boats on trailers. So I took a tape measure and measured the square footage of the footprints of the two types of boats on trailers. It was identical. After I presented my evidence, they apologized and reduced our dry storage fee.

Just a couple thoughts from the past.

I guess my point before about Annapolis local clubs was more on the big ones and the scratch it takes to join, different from whether they like us and give us a start. Clubs on the Eastern shore or Baltimore are not exactly local to Annapolis, ok maybe Baltimore... Also, beach cats weren't exactly welcome at the Oxford race this year (not Oxford's fault), but it sounds like that has changed for the better for next year.

PPYC would likely get more cats if they lowered the cost and advertised the availability. I'd keep a boat there, but I really don't care about the pool or tennis courts or paying for them. The cost to put my 18 on the beach would be almost what I pay to keep my 25' mono in a deep water slip, which seems silly. I live around the corner from PPYC but I sail with the "club of sorts" in Galesville. (No pool or tennis, who cares, but we have two Tornados! We also have Joe the Bartender!) With Sandy Point next door to PPYC, trailer friendly boats have an option/choice for Bay access, but it's not a club.

Maybe we are just all cheap!

Howdee:

Re space and launching issues - A tornado is 20 feet by 10 feet. They take up a fair amount of real estate compared to a laser, 470 or other small dinghy, but maybe not too much more than a flying snot. Clubs in Annapolis were really short on space for dry storage. Severn Sailing Association had floating ramps for launching dinghies. The launch basin was protected by a seawall and had a relatively small opening out into the mouth of the Severn River. While I personally prefer launching off of ramps, the basin is very small for maneuvering Tornadoes after launching. Eastport Yacht Club has hoists, which I hate. Eastport's main issue was lack of dry storage space.

Another space issue was the problem of inactive members storing boats. West River Sailing club had seen a big decline in racing activity over the years and has inactive fleets. But many of these inactive people are still members who have friends and social life at the yacht club. It is politically difficult to boot them in favor of vibrant, new groups, although the vibrant new groups certainly would bring new life to an old dog.

I know that Tcat sailors at Cabrillo Beach YC use bridles and a crane, and we did so when we sailed the 2000 Nationals there. I found it to be time consuming and difficult. Perhaps I'm just not good at it through lack of practice. I used to not like ramp sailing, but I prefer it to all other launching now since it is so easy to roll boats on asphalt and since there's no sand to get in all the running gear. As far as Eastport went, the cranes were in relatively exposed water. I wasn't too sure how I was gonna keep a Tcat from getting damaged when launching in wind and seas. Perhaps lack of experience on my part.

Hi:

Belonging to a YC costs money. No doubt about it. In the case of PPYC, a negative is that PPYC is a for-profit club that exists to make money for the owners. In a perfect world I'd like to swear allegiance to a racing club whose facilities were owned by the members. PPYC doesn not have existing racing programs. That doesn't mean that they couldn't. CRAC certainly has the expertise to set one up, including junior programs. I've come to believe that if we cat sailors want to belong to a club and have a club cater to our interests, we're gonna have to find the place best suited to our boats, then get active and by doing so guide the club toward our interests. While PPYC is for-profit, it is still the best raw facility around. While it doesn't have a racing program, we could start one. Then PPYC would become a great resource for cat sailing. You guys are doing almost the same thing in Galesville. The facility is pretty rudimentary in that it is a vacant lot. But you guys have a racing program that is growing. If you all could buy that lot you'd have the beginnings of a real cool club. Maybe it would never be perfect (I understand that the reason that lot is vacant has something to do with running water issues), but I imagine the other clubs in Annapolis started in a similar way, just earlier in time, when things were cheaper.

I've always wanted to find some bit of land in some depressed part of the Chesapeake (read Eastern Shore) and buy it up with a group of sailors, to start a club. I've come to realize that while doing so could help insure that the club wouldn't disappear due to land use issues or ownership issues, those issues ain't show stoppers. Other clubs with very active multihull communities such as Miami YC and Cabrillo Beach YC are built on leased or rented land. It's really the members that make the club, and not necessarily land ownership. Such a club could exist in Annapolis if we so chose. I can see myself getting involved in such an effort once our Olympic campaign is over.

-Greg

If you are truely interested in getting some property on the eastern shore, I may be able to help. My father is the VP of the largest land developer on the Eastern Shore. He knows about property in places that many people don't even know existed. I launch my cat from my grandparents rocky shore with a makeshift ramp made up of old 2x12"s. However, the opposite shore of the creek would make for a PERFECT place to launch and store boats IMO. Only problem is Boone Creek is prone to sandbars at low tide See attached photo.
(the beach I am referring to is in the background, behind my baby)