Commodore’s Message

Commodore Lucy Sutro

I hope you have all had a wonderful Christmas and New Year's and I wish you all the very best for 2023. We now have just enough time to rest or catch up with work before we head into Chinese New Year celebrations. This is the year of the Water Rabbit and symbolises longevity, peace and prosperity. According to the Chinese horoscope, the Year of the Rabbit will be a good time for all the zodiac signs and an extremely lucky year for most of them! Excellent news.

We’re absolutely thrilled that the 2022 China Coast Regatta has been awarded Hong Kong's first and only Platinum Level certification by Sailors for the Sea. Clean Regatta is a certification programme administered by Sailors for the Sea, a nonprofit organisation that educates and empowers boaters to protect and restore our oceans and coastal waters. This is a fantastic achievement, and no doubt will be the first of many going forwards.

In last month's issue I mentioned the then-upcoming celebration to mark the 10th Anniversary of the RHKYC Charity Foundation. I am very happy to share that close to $800,000 was raised. This will go a long way to maintain and expand the Charity Foundation’s activities and my heartfelt thanks to everyone involved in ensuring such a successful fundraising event.

We were able to welcome another group of Love 21 paddlers to join us at Middle Island for a second year of dragon boat training. Thanks to enthusiastic volunteers from our paddle sports section and support from the Charity Foundation, we increased participation numbers and were able to provide access to one of our core sports so that 18 youth with Down syndrome and autism were able to participate in a 4–week dragon boat training. Pictures from this programme will be shared in the next Ahoy! but we are so happy to be able to promote the inclusivity of sports to all.

The pontoons at Kellett Island now have electricity for members use – please refer to the Marine pages within for further information.

The first sailing event of the year is the 3rd pursuit race of the Top Dog Series, the One Global HKRNVR Memorial Vase Race taking place on Saturday 7 January. In 1950, the HKRNVR Memorial Vase was presented to the Club in honour of the members of the Hong Kong Royal Naval Volunteer Reserves who died during the Battle for Hong Kong and it came with the request that an effort be made each year to set a course which represents an early wartime Naval Patrol.

Rowing and Paddle Sports is kicking off the year with a number of Introductory courses and land training programmes to prepare our teams for the season ahead. We finished last year with a flurry of races. Our Outrigger canoe team ventured overseas for the first time in three years winning the Ladies OC6 category at the Singapore Ocean Cup. Excellent wins as well in the OC1 category for Clarissa Becker and Christina Park who took Gold in the short and long course races respectively. On the Dragon boat side, we had 1st places finishes in both the Women and Mixed categories at the Hong Kong Championships. And lastly, at the Asian Rowing Championships in Thailand, three of our young members won medals; Lam San Tung and Chiu Hin Chun winning Gold in the men’s double and lightweight men’s single respectively and Winky Hui won Bronze as part of a ladies coxless Four. Well done to all!

Last but certainly not least, I would like to invite you to a General Committee Town Hall on Wednesday 8 February at Kellett Island. The purpose of this Town Hall is to hear from the General Committee about matters which have been discussed, decisions which have been made and finally to update members on matters of interest to the membership. Questions from members will be welcomed. The exact format of the evening has yet to be finalised but will be circulated ahead of the event.

Subscribers to the Kellett Island Developments Bonds

Recently, the Commodore unveiled an honours board listing those members who subscribed to the Club’s Kellett Island Development Bonds which made possible the Kellett Island Development Project 2014 to 2019.