Welcome to the Star Craft Owners’ Club Website!
* Stop Press! Please see our Commodore's autumn message below. *
The Star Craft Owners’ Club, started by a group of devoted owners in 1993, is dedicated to the preservation and enjoyment of these classic wooden motor cruisers, built between 1946 and 1975 by William Bates & Son in their boatyard at Chertsey on the River Thames.
One of the primary goals of the club website is to connect with past owners and other Star Craft friends in hope that you might share your stories and knowledge of these boats. We wish you an enjoyable visit to the website and that you find some of your old wooden friends. We urge you to share your memories!
Star Craft inspire enthusiasm and loyalty, not only in those lucky enough to own them, but also in the craftsmen who built them and in many who have simply watched them go by on the river. On 3rd June 2012 no fewer than seven Star Craft were proud to take part in the Queen's Diamond Jubilee Pageant on the Thames.
We have even moved into the modern world and have a Facebook Group set up whereby club members can post and upload photos, a great way of keeping in touch with fellow members. Click on the Facebook icon at the bottom of the page.
So once again, welcome to the website – and perhaps to the Club itself!
Nicky Pinkney, Commodore
November 2020
One of the primary goals of the club website is to connect with past owners and other Star Craft friends in hope that you might share your stories and knowledge of these boats. We wish you an enjoyable visit to the website and that you find some of your old wooden friends. We urge you to share your memories!
Star Craft inspire enthusiasm and loyalty, not only in those lucky enough to own them, but also in the craftsmen who built them and in many who have simply watched them go by on the river. On 3rd June 2012 no fewer than seven Star Craft were proud to take part in the Queen's Diamond Jubilee Pageant on the Thames.
We have even moved into the modern world and have a Facebook Group set up whereby club members can post and upload photos, a great way of keeping in touch with fellow members. Click on the Facebook icon at the bottom of the page.
So once again, welcome to the website – and perhaps to the Club itself!
Nicky Pinkney, Commodore
November 2020
Commodore's Autumn Message
Well the boating season is now well and truly over – any residual hopes of late autumn outings stymied by the lockdown. But I hope that most of you managed to get out on your boats during the summer; Mike and I found our outings on Karinda to be highly restorative – and a good way of meeting up with friends on a socially distanced basis.
2020 has of course been such a strange and difficult year in so many ways, and the absence of SCOC gatherings probably doesn’t rank very near the top of your list of concerns. We can only hope that we will be able to get together somehow in 2021 – and that in the meanwhile you have stayed well and reasonably comfortable, and not too dismayed by the prospect of further Covid restrictions.
Very best wishes,
Nicky Pinkney, Commodore, Star Craft Owners Club
2020 has of course been such a strange and difficult year in so many ways, and the absence of SCOC gatherings probably doesn’t rank very near the top of your list of concerns. We can only hope that we will be able to get together somehow in 2021 – and that in the meanwhile you have stayed well and reasonably comfortable, and not too dismayed by the prospect of further Covid restrictions.
Very best wishes,
Nicky Pinkney, Commodore, Star Craft Owners Club