Visit to Wesh windsurft park - Leucate

On our family drive back to France from Barcelona, we passed by Leucate. This windsurfing town, famous for its windsurfing speed strip now boasts the first windsurfing rail park. I managed to convince the family to make a slight detour so we could visit.

It also turned out to be windy so I was super stoked that I might get to sail. On our way to Leucate, we drove by several beaches jammed with windsurfers, kiters and learn to sail operations. We also saw a few well stocked windsurfing shops.

When we finally got to location of the Wesh centre, I was excited to find a fully stocked windsurfing rental operation. I quickly got a wetsuit, harness, 5.8 and 100l Naish concept board, and headed out to the water.

My kids hung out in the car playing video games and my wife chatted with many of the French windsurfers at the beach hut.

I sailed for 2 hours and then started feeling guilty about leaving the family on the beach. It was the first time in months I'd abandoned them, so they readily forgave me when they saw the size of the smile on my face.

My loving family captured a duck jibe from shore

Unfortunately the ramp and rail were not set up. In fact the ramp looked to have taken a beating over the winter. I'm not sure I would have tried it anyway. I did do a bunch of nice upwind 360s in the straps and got some downwind 360s as well.

The Wesh centre ramp

The location is a nice protected bay, where the Tramontine wind comes out to the sea. It felt a lot like the walk down to Doug's in the Gorge, but with a Bonaire waist deep area and very small chop. The warm weather, good vibes, muddy water, dry hills, parking lot full of RVs, windsurfing gear trailers and seeing the French TGV trains going across the other side of the bay probably were some of the many things that reminded me of being at the Columbia River Gorge. 

The path looks like the one to Doug's

I enjoyed sharing my copy of Windsurfing Mag with them. I happened to have the "Ripping up Rails in France" issue, so I left it with the Wesh crew. That turned out to be very handy and good karma, as then next day we realized that my wife left her ID at the cash. Luckily they had our postal address on the magazine cover and could mail it to us!

All the facilities are right on shore

It is very cool that in France there are so many windsurfing rental shops right on the beaches.

A great session!

Mistral today - I'm glad I've got a 4.2

After a week of waiting for a good day, the Mistral (north wind) happened as predicted. Topping it off, it was 21c and sunny.

I started out on my 4.7, but rigged down to 4.2. I'm glad I had that sail, but still didn't really have much success in the trick department. Survival sailing was the best I could do, with a few good jibes.

I am really pleased that the foam nose protector that I glued to the front of my board is sticking in place. I would have had one very ugly nose crack if it wasn't there!

Wind stats during my time on the water, 11:00 to 13:00.
Later in the day, gusts were hitting 49 knots

Is a 2 hour session in that kind of wind wimpy? I kind of thought so, but some of the other sailors that rigged up and headed out at the same time as me, were already de-rigged and gone when I got back to shore.

I think that's me, captured out on the Le Jai webcam

I have lots of Shadowbox and GoPro data and look forward to posting some of that soon once I go through it all. A failed loop attempt and a possible 13ft high jump off chop should be interesting to review.

A better location to sail the Turfdog

We were supposed to get a day of Mistral (north) wind, so I headed down to Marseilles to check out the beaches there. I took my board (Fanatic Skate 108), 4 sails from 4.2 to 6.2, and my new Turfdog as the low wind fall back position.

When I arrived at 11am, the water was glassy. None of the north wind had materialized. So I waited a while, drove around looking at the parking lots and grassy areas, and finally decided to rig. While Marseilles is a city of 4 million people, the beaches are empty in early April, so empty parking lots were easy to find.

7 knots of wind is actually enough to get going in a flat parking lot, so I started having fun on the Turfdog. A bunch of guys came by to check out what I was doing, and I had some nice conversations in my broken French. One guy even asked if he could try the Turfdog and I was happy to share. In 5 knots of wind I kind of even did a slow motion Vulcan, but I'm not sure I'm going to count that.

I did enjoy making figure 8 loops doing tacks and jibes while going back and forth in the empty parking lot next to the beautiful blue Mediterranean.

Parking lots and lots of grass at the Marseilles waterfront

Then the wind started building. Soon it was white-capping out in the water, and I was getting too much speed in the parking lot. The Turfdog's front wheels can generate quite a speed wobble. I headed to the grass, and found it was ok too. I can see that is where the Turfdog is good for practicing freestyle. Eventually I was getting pretty tired and when I found I could "grass start" from a sitting position using a 4.7, there was definitely too much wind to be on land. Unfortunately it was now close to 2pm and I had to head to the airport to greet a guest. North of Marseilles at the airport I could see people out ripping it up at Le Jai. In hindsight I wish I'd headed there.

The windsurfer has been on the roof
and not in the water for too long!

I definitely need to get out on the water soon, but the weather looks sunny and windless for the next week.

Taking the Turfdog out for a run

Here is a video from my first session using a Turfdog terrain board to windsurf on land. I'm on a 4.7m sail in 5-10 knots of wind. Yes, the lack of wind lately has made me desperate.


Turfdog windsurfing on land from Canadian Guy on Vimeo.

Upwind 360s worked surprisingly well, gybes not so much. In this video you can see me get going nicely and then fail on my heli tack attempt. Apparently people have found this board helpful for learning vulcans. We'll see about that. My only gripe about the board would be the footstraps. They are a bit twisty and uncomfortable. However, they do simulate the fear that I had years ago on water when it was hard to get that back foot into the straps.

The ground was not very smooth or level. Next time I want to find a flatter surface! Unfortunately all the grassy playing fields near me are in valleys surrounded by trees. Yes, I'm wearing protective gear.

In the background of this photo, you can see Mont Sainte-Victoire, which was one of Cezanne's favourite subjects in the south of France.

The Turfdog

Here's what the Turfdog board looks like from the side. When you are going, the front wheel caster is facing toward the back, like on a shopping cart. Steering feel is quite realistic, sail forward and back to turn up or downwind. Your back foot also steers like a skateboard, or like using the rail on a windsurfer to carve.

Nice scenery in France! (That is a coal fired plant)

Stay away from the warships

I almost got skunked after my first drive to Le Ciotat, but just kept driving till I found the wind that had been predicted. I didn't really know where I was going, as the Kite and Windsurf Guide didn't have any launches listed near La Seyne-sur-Mer. I was just driving along the coast road until I saw a bunch of guys unloading gear from their vans.

I stopped, and started chatting (in my limited French) with Michel and a few of the other local sailors. They said it was a good spot, no rocks, no booties required, and nice in this easterly wind direction. There were palm trees and mansions on the other side of the road. Everyone seemed to be rigging 108 litre boards and 6m sails. I did too.

But then they all sat and waited for the wind to build. It looked like there was just enough to get going, so I was the wind dummy. In fact, a 5.4 might have been enough, but I was short for time and didn't feel like re-rigging. I sailed upwind of the old fort and checked out the full view of Toulon harbour.

WAY COOL! There were 10 warships, and an aircraft carrier. There were also ferry boats, yachts, sail catamarans and freighters. This massive harbour was then backdropped by mountains. Later, Michel told me that it is important to stay away from the warships. I figured that out when an additional warship came into the harbour. I quickly turned around when I could clearly see the machine guns mounted on the escort boats that were honking for traffic to stay away.

Better earth image to come soon...

I'm nailing my downwind carve 360s and duck gybes, but vulcan attempts 109-114 were useless. I'll blame that on the big fin I chose.

Friendly group at the launch!

Water was 12c, wind 16c. The guys on the beach were all very friendly. Merci Michel et les mecs sur la plage pour votre hospitalitie. A good start to the season.

Stop taking pictures and get home!

The kids weren't even too mad when I picked them up a bit late from school!

I signed up for the Defi Wind 40 km French Windsurfing Race

Apparently they already have 550 of 1,111 possible entries. If you want to do it, sign up soon!  I wonder if Robby Naish will be #1111?

The best part of signing up, is that you need a doctor's certificate saying that you are fit enough to compete. My doctor here got me my certificate in around 5 minutes, and then we chatted about his windsurfing and sailing past.

1,000 racers in 2010, I'm planning on being one of 1,111 racers this year!

Does anyone want to come and join me?  Check out the site at: www.defiwind.com.

Snowboarding

One of Dad's better jumps
Landed it too.

Ok, so I didn't get to windsurf in February. It has been two months now since my last session, and I'm starting to get all the magazines, newsletters etc. indicating a new season is around the corner. I'm excited.

We went to the Alps a number of times, and my boys and I are snowboarding together, and my wife and daughter are skiing. The French Alps have great snow, wonderful food, and mostly sunny skies.  Some of the slopes are only 90km from the Mediterranean. I guess it would be possible to ski and windsurf in the same day!

I did a few experiments with the Shadowbox on the snowboard. It is neat, but definitely more suited to windsurfing (or at least I'm better at windsurfing so the data from that sport is more interesting.)

I've reconfigured www.baston.fr to start emailing me wind reports. My board is back from the repair shop. I'm looking forward to my next session.

Family fun

Wow, 8 person chair lifts

Shadowbox recording of my snowboarding session,
overlaid on Google earth summer image.