.25 km of Kiting, 113 km of Windsurfing

Reporting from Hatteras!

Day 2 in Hatteras was light wind so I tried a bit of kiting after the rest of the crew had their morning fill kite boarding and kite foiling. I got up right away on the 12m kite and had a nice run on the twin tip Naish board. 250 metres according to Google earth! Then I dropped the kite while turning and couldn't get it back up in the suddenly declining wind. By the time I'd walked back upwind it was glassy and the other kiters were all dragging their kites back too.

250m of kiting (yellow arrow)

I then managed to get quite a bit of work done and investigated getting the lights working on the trailer. I bumped into Rich who I know from Bonaire which was fun. Back at the house we all enjoyed a hot tub and another good dinner together. I was on the winning euchre team which was a nice way to end the day.

Day 3- My friend Bob from the 2009 HiHo came early in the morning to sail with us. Sadly the water near him is now often in a wind shadow from the new bridge construction. So he was happy to come sail from our launch. He's 74 and a great inspiration to keep at this fun sport!

Construction near Bob's place in Rodanthe

I wound up having a 4 hour session before lunch. The air was 18c but I was a bit chilled by the end in my 2mil wetsuit! Here is the board and sail breakdown by hour.

• 6.2 Duke - Fanatic Freewave 116 - a lot of work overpowered even with lots of downhaul and 2cm neg outhaul which made it less back hand heavy
• 4.8 Idol - Skate 108 - weed fin - blasting using just 2 fingers on the boom! But leg cramped up after 1.5 hours (said goodbye to Bob - figured the wind would drop, rigged the...)
• 5.6 Idol - Skate 108 -  weed fin - a bit of work as I was overpowered
• 4.8 Idol - Skate 108 - 26cm fin - awesomely comfortable and could go upwind!

Speed chart of the 4 different board sail combinations.
The 4.8 Idol and Skate 108 with the stock fin was the fastest.

Max speed was 46 km/h. I was planing 73% of the time. 

99 km of windsurfing, 3 km (arrow) at a time
Wind from the N/E

I stopped for lunch and the GPS watch said 99.17 km. Well I knew I had to go out again. 

The wind had indeed dropped to 20 knots so I went out on the 5.6 Idol & Skate with the 26cm fin and was very comfortable. The wind started dying even more after 40 minutes so another 14 km and thus 113 km total for the day. Whew. I was in my shorty wetsuit for that 2nd session and didn't fall in once in the 40 minutes otherwise the session may have been shorter.

Another 14 km after lunch

Sun setting on my 113 km day!

The crew had returned from kiting and we enjoyed some beers in the hot tub. Dinner was a nice meal at the shark themed Pangea Tavern where Andy stuck a new pin in their map as he is the first to visit from Sydney, Australia.

Dinner with the crew

Card Shark for the Euchre champions!

Tomorrow looks light, warm and sunny. Friday should be some good wind again!

Hatteras day1 - Float and Ride

We arrived in Hatteras at 1am Monday morning, after 17 hours of driving! A great crew of 4 enjoyed the ride in the Traverse, and there are 7 of us in the rental house. Some road trip shots below, the windsurfing report starts now!

I never would have gone out windsurfing in 10-12 knot winds 10 years ago. Even less so in the Atlantic Ocean. But since spending time on the International Windsurfing Tour, I'm crazy for the waves. So I rigged up my 6.2 Duke and got on the 116 Freewave and headed out near Frisco, NC. Here are some photos in reverse order.

Oh yeah, a good late afternoon session

It was a good session in the small waves. Thanks Chuck for the photos.

A pre-session photo

Windsurfing in and out - view from the east, as the wind was S/E.
Convenient parking!

Really only got planing once - but the little wave rides were worth it

While recently watching the Sylt PWA event and the IWT/PWA Aloha Classic, I heard the commentators talk about "floating and riding". This is where you take a bigger board, and slog out upwind, and then catch waves. You maybe get planing on a wave, but at least you get to ride it with some turns. 

I was channelling my best imitation of float and ride IWT windsurfer Jeff Albright, and spent more time out there than I expected. Lo and behold, I did get planing once toward the end of the session even though that wasn't the goal. The air was 20c, the water a pleasant 21c. The only issue was the grapefruit sized jellyfish that I surfed past every 10 seconds / 10 meters or so!

Here are some more photos from our drive, in reverse order:

Stopping in Breezewood for Arbys. Trying to imitate the image below.

Ed Burtynsky's 2008 image of Breezewood. Click for more to this story...

A bit earlier in the drive we went through the remnants of some lake effect snow...

Snow in upper NY on Nov 3rd

And it was cold!

And from the start of the trip.

Ready to roll

14 hours became 17 hours with stops and traffic in Washington

Looks like some great wind on Wednesday...

Latest session ever in Canada?

I don't think I've ever windsurfed on or later than October 26th. Checking my blog, the latest was last year October 20th with Vanessa.

The wind was 9c from the south. The water was 10c, so very close to my 18c combined minimum.

Vanessa caught a photo of me heading out and posted it to Instagram.

Thanks Vanessa for the Instagram post

The wind of course shut off just as I had slogged upwind. I wondered to myself if I headed right back in, whether I could count this as a session - I'm at 66 sessions for the year. Then a puff came along and I planed for over a kilometre!

GPS Trail - I can see the one time I fell in - lower right side.

I was on the 7.0 NP V6 and the Fanatic Ray 122. I jibed, got going again for another 500m and then again a huge lull. So I called it a day and will count this as session 67!

I got planing twice!

I finished de-rigging sails at the Launch Pad and put aside the gear I'm taking to Hatteras next week. The weather looks warmer there!

Packing up for Hatteras 

Brrr... Time for the Santa Hat!

9c or 10c isn't that cold but I was still happy to have my neoprene Santa hat on. The water was 12c and there was a 9-13 knot south wind.

I thought for a moment about taking the 5.6 Idol, but I'm happy I took the trusty old 6.5 NP V6 for the foil. I got up on each of the 6 runs I did in 35 minutes. I fell on the planing jibe attempts but was very happy with how dry my Ripcurl Flashbomb 3/2 kept me. 7.5 km distance and maximum speed was 32 km/h. Next time I'll be wearing booties though. My feet got pretty numb.

Thanks to my lovely wife for the photos!

Smiling!

Cruising comfortably

Stopping to turn the GoPro on

The one GoPro photo! (dead battery!)

Hi dear!

GPS trail with some nice upwind/downwind angles

On the way back I saw a cute mink run into the Launch Pad storage locker. I'm hoping he isn't making a nest there!

Weather station data 8-13 knots. 9c outside.

The camp heated up quickly so I was getting changed in a nice 20c room after my session. I think that October 19 may be my latest day ever on Georgian Bay! Hoping to get one or two more in this season.

Baja 2019 PSC Pritchard Clinic

Friday
I arrived in San Diego which after 8 or 9 visits feels wonderfully familiar. I connected with TWC friends Andree and Jill and we went to check out the Mission Marina wind and kitesurf area and then up to the Surf Divas Shop in La Jolla. A fun lunch and then some swimming in the Pacific for the ladies. I found a nice 2 mil short sleeved suit which I’ve been searching for for a while.

Welcome to San Diego

The Pacific Inn

La Jolla seal lookout

No chance of rain

I returned the rental car and we headed to dinner at Queenston in Little Italy.

Saturday
Nice plane ride into camp and a quick lunch was ready for us. Saw the Gem Hall clinic folks leaving as Matt and K-Mac rolled into camp.

Ready for our flight

The Mexico / US border from the air

Arriving in San Carlos

I took out an RRD 106 single fin. Windsurfed for 2 hours which worked well. Changed to Goya 105 tri fin which was the first tri fin board I’ve enjoyed. It really felt like a skateboard under my feet. 2:45 of windsurfing in total!

Quite tired heading to bed looking forward to a full week!

Sunday
Intro to camp. The usual mix of great folks from around the world. 3 Torontonians, 1 Montrealer, 2 Texans, 1 Minisotian; 1 Colorodian, 2 Bay Area, 1 Floridian, 1 German, 1 Austrian, 1 Swede, 1 Aussie with dreadlocks. (If I remember correctly?)

This was the first time in a clinic that I heard at least two of the participants say they used to kite but wanted to go back and get better at windsurfing since it is more fun, both in flat water and the waves. Interesting.

I took out Goya Custom 118 which was a bit narrow and wobbly for the very light wind. I had to do some upside down waterstarts with the 5.7. I changed from a Chinook reduced diameter boom and 28 inch lines to the Streamlined carbon boom and 32 inch lines which was easier on my hands.

Then a super fun SUP sail session with the old white Sup and a 4.7. Man I love SUP windsurfing.

We ate dinner inside and I missed having family members with me like the last few times I’ve been here.

Monday
After breakfast we had video analysis of our light wind sessions.  It was super foggy and light.
I headed out after lunch on my favourite RRD 108 and a Goya 5.3.

Our Tents  with the fog in the distance

Emirita in the kitchen

Dry land simulator practice

Matt coaching

I caught the wave of the day and maybe my life.  All the way from the Bombora way outside into shore with a half dozen nice turns and a smooth jibe at the end and planing back out upwind. My whoops and yelps were heard back at camp! Another 2:45 session with just a quick break. Only planed a few times but it was all about the waves. Kev-O waxed poetically about how I caught that big wave as K-Mac said sorry for missing it on video.

A Baja fog and then another lead into an amazing sunset with a yoga session before dinner.

Tuesday
Morning stretch session. We watched each participant's efforts from the day before. Then at the end; A nice surprise. My wave of the day was actually caught on video and was shown last!

I'm super grateful to K-Mac for shooting the video, Kev-o for safekeeping all our videos and Kristian for sharing it with me. It makes for a great memory, especially since camp host Clark who normally does outstanding photos of PSC windsurfers was back in the US with an infection.

Excited that K-Mac got my wave on video. It was bigger in my mind...

After a slow post lunch start I had a great 2.5 hour sup sail session with a 5.0 Goya sail. Some great waves and company from curious seals.

Two BMW bikers arrived on their GS 1200s and promptly went surfing. Pretty cool.

Surf bike

Welcome to camp

Wednesday
No video from Tuesday so we watched old PSC contest videos. Then a 1 hour SUP paddle session in the windless waves. I was on the RRD ?XL whopper. I stupidly caught my first wave which Joey was already foiling on and felt like an idiot colliding with him. Such a kook. My sincere apologies were later graciously accepted but I still felt so stupid.

A lazy Hot Dog lunch and a late day 12km bike ride with Brad from Texas. We found the hole to ride through in the badlands!

Bike ride

Bike ride elevation changes

You are here

Dinner was lobster with the nice bottle of J Lohr I brought from San Diego. Much discussion of the IWT and my plans for retirement after dinner.

Not really roughing it!

Thursday
It was still overcast and windless at breakfast. Inspired by two campers who hiked to the Mesa the day before, I got a posse together and Joey took us to the trailhead. 1:48 minutes later we had climbed the 5km, 500m Mesa.

Van ride to the start of the hike

Hiking hazards

On our way

Getting closer

The Canadians up top - elevation 534m

Hike elevation chart - 500m total climb

Hike map - 10 km return

The view back to camp

Panoramic view

Heading back down

One of us didn't have proper hiking shoes AG!

After lunch I tried for a half hour and failed completely at surfing. I did better at SUPing a while later. Still zero wind.

Dinner was great steak and off to bed.

Friday
Huevos rancheros for breakfast and then some goodbyes with potential weather sending a few guests home early.

I headed out on the SUP board with a 5.0 and had a great 2 hour session. Got some nice duck tacks while riding in ahead of the wave. A truck full of Federales in full camouflage gear checked us all out for a while!

After lunch the wind built and the camp got busy rigging. I went out on a 5.5 Goya and a Quattro 109 thruster. I felt like is was shredding waves to pieces for the first hour. The fins did pick up too many weeds but the board felt great.

Then I decided to head down to the Chili Bowl for the first time this week. I got one exciting ride and spent the next 45 minutes getting back upwind. Initially I didn’t think I would make it at all and then some nice groundswell lefts took me back upwind. Yeah.

GPS trail of my trip down to the Chili Bowl and back

Super Baja Fish tacos and then video and more goodbyes.

Saturday
Departure day. The camp already felt quiet after Matt and K-Macs truck left at 4am with two campers. I was the first one out at 10am to try the high tide waves. I took a 5.3 Goya and the wide 116 Quad custom. I scared myself a bit with a few big sets coming through. After an hour windsurfing and a few big waves my arms were spent.

Heading out for my last session

The launch was actually kind of scary at high tide

Not my best wave, but the best photo!

The rest were all heading out as I came in.  After a quick lunch and getting to see Eric from previous trips, it was time to fly back in the small planes.

A few of us met in the Gaslamp district for dinner and vowed to return. The next morning it was the same group at the airport waiting for our flights back to reality.

Great ceviche at Gaslamp fish house

Good night San Diego

Checking out the aircraft carrier before heading home

8 more days on the water to add to my nice 65 total for the year. Thanks again Matt, K-Mac, Joey, Treve, Kevin, Andree, Jill and everyone for a great week.