About our training
The Pirate Castle can offer you a range of unique training courses in boat handling. As a founder member of the National Community Boats Association the Pirate Club has been at the forefront of moves to create a national training and licence to operate community boats.
Our staff have between them 60 + years experience of handling a variety of boats. Please see our biographies below. So whether you intend to work on a community boat or merely to gain grounding in boating skills and canal etiquette, this is the place to come to.
Our courses are run over weekends throughout the year. You will be able to stay on our boats during the course - mixing with the other people on the course and chatting informally with the trainers is all part of the experience.
Our courses are run from the Pirate Castle in Camden Town in north London. You might want to have a look around Camden Market or slip into the West End at the end of the day.
If you want the training to be run on your own boats we can do that as well. We have two travelling trainers on our staff that would be pleased to deliver the course at your own project.
Biographies:
Andrew Carpenter is our new Senior Trainer. He became involved in Community Boating in 1999. He has had wide experience of both wide and narrow craft, and is a registered trainer for both the RYA and the NCBA. Andrew’s other interests include Music, History and Natural History. Andrew has replaced Jim Marshall as the club’s skipper and narrowboat manager.Giles Higgitt has worked for the Pirate Club for over 20 years. He was employed as the skipper of the club’s community boat ‘Pirate Princess’, which he ran for 18 years. He is now the manager of the Pirate Club. The NCBA grew from a meeting held at the Pirate Castle back in 1984. Giles has always been interested in the proper training and licensing of steerers of community boats. He has helped to train skippers for other projects in London.
Jim Marshall, previously our senior trainer. Now mostly retired but returns to do occasional work for us and others. He has worked on the canals ever since leaving school. He has carried cargo, run trip boats, run horse boats, he has worked on the continental waterways on barges and more recently he has put his considerable energies into community boating. He is a travelling trainer for the NCBA. He is also well known for his writings in ‘Waterways World’.
We run the following courses:
The Certificate in Community Boat Management (CCBM) and The Complete Crew Course (CCC)
The CCBM
The Certificate in Community Boat Management is designed for those people who work with a variety of groups on the inland waterways. It is endorsed by British Waterways and supported by the Maritime Coastguard Agency.
This course draws on current best practice as supplied by member organisations of the NCBA, operating a wide variety of craft for use by community groups, often made up of disabled and disadvantaged people. It represents the minimum recommended level of training for steerers of community boats.The aims of the course are to give steerers of community boats on non-tidal rivers and canals training in boat handling, boat maintenance and the management of group safety and welfare.
Anyone over the age of eighteen can obtain a CCBM Certificate, It is however assumed that you will have some experience of working with groups and have previous practical experience of boating. Successful candidates qualify to operate boats, with a maximum of 12 passengers, on the inland waterways of the UK.
The CCC
The Complete Crew Course is a foundation course, designed to build the levels of skills and experience needed to crew a community boat.A qualified instructor will lead the course. The duration of the course is three days, usually delivered Saturday morning to Sunday afternoon.
The course will provide you with all the skills and knowledge needed to act as crew on a community boat. You will become the extra eyes, ears and hands of the person in charge of the boat.
You can take as little or as much time as you need to complete the course depending on your previous experience and aptitude.
The cost of the training courses:
Complete Crew Course:The cost of this is £123 per person. This includes three days for tuition and assessment, plus all certification and paperwork costs.
Certificate in Community Boat Management:
Beginner cost = £590. This includes six days of tuition, two days of assessment, and all certification and paperwork costs.
Experienced boater (ready for assessment) = £230. This just includes the two days of assessment, and the certification and paperwork costs.
If people are training for the purpose of becoming volunteers for The Pirate Club then some or all of this may be subsidized (you will always have to at least pay the certification and paperwork costs yourself) You will also need to sign an agreement stating that you are willing to contribute a certain number of days per year to skippering trips for us on a voluntary basis.
