Displaying items by tag: recession

13th January 2011

Downturn Hits Dining at Royal Cork Yacht Club

The Royal Cork Yacht Club has announced that its dining facilities will close until late spring at the earliest due to a slump in business over the last year, the Irish Examiner reports.

http://www.irishexaminer.com/ireland/historic-yacht-club-forced-to-close-dining-facilities-141975.html

The club recently put its chef on temporary lay-off and made its restaurant manager redundant following a "significant downturn in all club dining support during 2010".

But club admiral Paddy McGlade is hopeful that the restaurant will reopen in April, noting that is it normal practice for the restaurant to close during seasonally slack periods.

He added that it would be "inappropriate" for the club to use its cash reserves to keep the restaurant open in the present climate.

The Crosshaven-based club is the home of ther biennial Cork Week, one of the biggest events on the Irish sailing calendar, scheduled to return in July 2012.

The Royal Cork Yacht Club has announced that its dining facilities will close until late spring at the earliest due to a slump in business over the last year, the Irish Examiner reports.

The club recently put one staff member on temporary lay-off and made another redundant following a "significant downturn in all club dining support during 2010", the newspaper reports.

But club admiral Paddy McGlade is hopeful that the restaurant will reopen in April, noting that is it normal practice for the restaurant to close during seasonally slack periods.

He added that it would be "inappropriate" for the club to use its cash reserves to keep the restaurant open in the present climate.

The downturn is affecting a lot of sailing clubs who must wait some months yet before the main 2011 sailing season starts.

The Crosshaven-based club is the home of ther biennial Cork Week, one of the biggest events on the Irish sailing calendar, scheduled to return in July 2012.

Published in Royal Cork YC

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About Conor O'Brien, Irish Circumnavigator

In 1923-25, Conor O'Brien became the first amateur skipper to circle the world south of the Great Capes. O'Brien's boat Saoirse was reputedly the first small boat (42-foot, 13 metres long) to sail around the world since Joshua Slocum completed his voyage in the 'Spray' during 1895 to 1898. It is a journey that O' Brien documented in his book Across Three Oceans. O'Brien's voyage began and ended at the Port of Foynes, County Limerick, Ireland, where he lived.

Saoirse, under O'Brien's command and with three crew, was the first yacht to circumnavigate the world by way of the three great capes: Cape Horn, Cape of Good Hope and Cape Leeuwin; and was the first boat flying the Irish tri-colour to enter many of the world's ports and harbours. He ran down his easting in the Roaring Forties and Furious Fifties between the years 1923 to 1925.

Up until O'Brien's circumnavigation, this route was the preserve of square-rigged grain ships taking part in the grain race from Australia to England via Cape Horn (also known as the clipper route).

At a Glance - Conor O'Brien's Circumnavigation

In June 1923, Limerick man Conor O’Brien set off on his yacht, the Saoirse — named after the then newly created Irish Free State — on the two-year voyage from Dun Laoghaire Harbour that was to make him the first Irish amateur to sail around the world.

June 1923 - Saoirse’s arrival in Madeira after her maiden passage out from Dublin Bay

2nd December 1924 - Saoirse crossed the longitude of Cape Horn

June 20th 1925 - O’Brien’s return to Dun Laoghaire Harbour