Sea Scouts are back on Kellett Island

Dr. Raymond Ma - MH, a scout leader veteran and a past General Committee member of the Club, was going through some scout archives on sea scout activities in 2018 when he was struck with the idea of bringing back the 4th Sea Scout Group to Kellett Island.

Raymond shared the idea with John Woo, the Club’s Commodore that year, and was too happy to find that John had been an enthusiastic scout back in his school days. John strongly supported the idea as he felt that it was a good opportunity for the Club to support the community. The idea also quickly gained support from the Club’s General Committee in 2020.

Then the pair realised that it would be quite a journey to bring the 4th Group back as they needed to get consent from the former group leader who led the group in 1954!

After years of document searches, phone calls, and text messages, they connected with Dr. Yeung Che-To, Patrick, a scout member in 1954 of the 4th Sea Scout Group (Victoria). With his help, they finally reached the Assistant Group Leader, Mr. Lau Kwok-Kuen of the 4th Group, when it was inaugurated in 1954, and now moved to Canada. The blessing was given by the Scout Association of Hong Kong. Today, the 4th Hong Kong Sea Scout Group has been revived and meets at Kellett Island every Saturday morning.

Visitors to the Kellett Island Clubhouse often feel amazed by the images along the stairway to the Compass Room as they exhibit the remarkable waterfront transformation around the island before and after the clubhouse moved there in 1938.

Another new page was turned in 1952 when a causeway was completed giving access to the island by means other than water. Two years after the island became accessible within walking distance, the Hong Kong 4th Sea Scout Group (Victoria) was formed holding meetings regularly at the Club at Kellett Island right on the causeway. The group received much support from the Club thanks to John Montague Ebbs, then a committee member (later Commodore 1969 to 1971) and a Sea Scout Leader.

The sailors proudly displayed the Hong Kong flag at the opening ceremony held on the grounds of the 15th Century Palazzo Capitani (Captain’s Palace), overlooking the lake.

Bertille also participated in the pre-games event held at the official race venue from the 9th to the 10th of July. The event showed the varying conditions Malcesine had to offer with a strong breeze on the Saturday of around 12 to 16kts followed by marginal foiling conditions of around 7 to 10kts on the Sunday. The event gave an insight of what to expect at the games with 69 sailors participating from 19 different countries. Bertille finished 29th overall.

WORDS AND IMAGES: SAIL TO CHANGE WORKING GROUP

Anew class of foiling sailboats, the Waszp Class, has taken root at Middle Island over the past two years, and three of Club’s Waszp sailors— Thibault Minne, Bertille Voets, and May Proctor—traveled to Malcesine on Lake Garda in Italy, to represent RHKYC at the 2022 International Waszp Games from 9 to 16 July.

Due to the Covid pandemic, this was the first time in three years that the world’s best Waszp sailors gathered to go head-to-head on the same race course. There were more than 170 entrants from over 20 countries.

Thibault, Bertille, and May arrived a few days early to tune up their boats and do some pre-race training to get used to the conditions on Lake Garda. Lake Garda is famous for its Ora (south wind), which generally arrives in the early afternoon. Thibault and Bertille were using the larger 8.2m sail and May used the 6.9m sail.