Welcome to SOCA

 

SOCA Sailing is an active club with members from Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire, Essex and surrounding areas. We also have members from Norfolk and Hampshire. Our members range from beginners to round-the-world sailors, with a number being boat owners.

We welcome new members:

Membership


take a look at the programme of events we hold and why not join us at one of our monthly meetings? Your first two visits are free to attend as a visitor.


SOCA is a RYA affiliated Sailing Club.

Affiliated to the Royal Yacht Association
SOCA is affiliated to the Royal Yacht Association

We meet in Welwyn Garden City, Hertfordshire. Our members mainly sail the East Coast (Essex and Suffolk) and the South Coast (Hampshire), however some sail in France, Spain and other foreign locations .

To get a feel for our association please join our Facebook group.

Website Last Modified 3rd October 2025

NEXT MEETINGS and EVENTS :-

Thursday  9th October 2025 at 7:30pm

Jeremy Batch has been booked for another of his interesting talks, the topic:- 
“Slightly pear-shaped: the story of Mapping and Surveying“.

“Earth is pear-shaped” became headline news in March 1958 when the Vanguard satellite’s orbit deviated from expectations, irreparably confusing a generation of schoolchildren and their geography teachers.

That the Earth is round had been known for centuries; that it might also be (very) slightly oval was long-suspected, although we disagreed with the French as to which way the oval went.  How did we work it out?
Who was Mercator, how (on Earth) did he make his projection, and why is it not always used?
How did the Swallows and Amazons make their map of the Walton Backwaters with nothing but a compass and a few sticks; how did the Romans give their aqueducts a slope of 1 in 3,000; and how did the Egyptians align their pyramids?
Plus: why, if points had been given for effort, the Prime Meridian really should have run through Paris; how a globe, bought for £150 at a Welsh antiques fair during Covid, then sold at auction for a quarter of a million; and how Gladys West’s model of the Earth allows your GPS to work.

SOCA Laying Up lunch.
Cowper Arms
Saturday 8th November at 1:00pm.

If you wish to attend please either respond via the
WhatsApp group or email commodore@socasailing.org.uk.

Meetings are held at the RNA club in
Welwyn Garden City
The second Thursday of each month starting at 7:30pm

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