A Year (Windsurfing) en Provence: March 2016

Monday, March 28, 2016

Windsurfing Antigua with my son!

My son's Grade 12 school ship was anchored in Antigua. After 7 months of living and going to school on a tall ship crisscrossing the Atlantic ocean, when asked what he wanted to do on Antigua, his answer was "go windsurfing".

So we arranged to rent some gear from Patrick at Windsurf Antigua. Phillip took a 5.0 and a 96l board, I was on a 5.4 and a 90l Naish Global wave. We had lucked out; the wind was stronger than normal.

Phillip had a great first run. He water-started and easily got going out. But then he jibed and struggled water-starting out in the big rolling waves. He was drifting downwind toward a shallow and sharp looking reef where the waves were crashing. It looked quite menacing. I circled back twice swapping my upwind gear with his. That bit of time and distance was all he needed and got going again back to the beach.

I'm happy to be following my son around! Fun windsurfing in Antigua

We then sailed back and forth for an hour, while the rest of the family watched from the windy beach. I used a waist harness for the first hour, then switched to a seat harness because I'd recently bruised my ribs. I'd forgotten how nice a seat harness can feel.

Some of Phillip's classmates from Class Afloat had arrived on the beach and were taking kiting lessons. (I really think all kite lessons should start with 2 hours of trainer kite flying - but that is just my opinion.)

My tracks - Prickly Pear island (to the right/north) was a nice spot to jibe

It was the perfect session. The next few days the wind dropped off, and Phillip's ship departed for the Dominican Republic, the Azores and then grade 12 graduation in Amsterdam.