Oak Flats Sailing Club

About Oak Flats Sailing Club

Oak Flats Sailing Club has outlasted almost everything around it. Founded in 1949 on the southern shore of Lake Illawarra, it is the second-oldest sailing club in the Illawarra, behind only the Illawarra Yacht Club at Warrawong, and in February 2025 it marked 75 years with 60 to 70 people — founding members among them — gathering to watch club historian Kevin Gillis OAM, then 94, present a slideshow of the decades. The generational depth at that party told its own story: as the club noted, there were blokes in their eighties who had sailed there when they were ten, and one old-timer even recognised his dog in a faded black-and-white photograph. Small, family-oriented and stubbornly enduring, the club is described by its own people as a real get-together place.

These days about half a dozen boats hit the water each weekend, a long way from the hundred-boat fleets of the club's peak, and COVID-19 ranks among the toughest membership challenges in its history. But the ambition is plain: rebuild the base and make sure the club is still there in another 25 years. Community Bank Oak Flats sponsorships help keep it afloat, and the club's record as a nursery of talent gives the rebuilding real purpose — club historian Kevin Gillis observes that a lot of sailors trained at Oak Flats ended up as professionals, and past member Wulf Wilkens crewed aboard Celestial, the boat that won the 2022 Sydney to Hobart and was provisional overall winner again in 2024.

Services

• Sailing club

Service area

Deakin Reserve, Oak Flats / southern shore of Lake Illawarra