2022-06-23 Another day at the Event Site

Checking out the wind - and building up courage!

The forecast today was for good wind early and then slowly dying off during the day.  In spite of that it took us all some time to get organized.  Big Air Jim and his crew were at the beach by 9:00, and I was one of the last to arrive at 10:15.  No one was out yet, but there was a lot of rigging going on.

I think the trip has been hard on a lot of us.  It looked very windy, but no one was in a big hurry to get out.

Eventually a few ventured out.  Then there was a re-rigging frenzy to put on smaller sails and/or foils.  In the end everyone was on the smallest sail they had to foil and most were wishing for a smaller sail.  Blaine sailed for several hours but says he never hooked in with his 3.8.   Kent was beat up on his 3.8.  Cynthia foiled 3.0 and Jim was on a 3.4.

Big Air Jim

I think almost everyone got out for several sessions.  In spite of the forecast, the wind blew pretty consistently all day!  I had four separate sessions on my 3.5m wing.  Cam was on his 4m all day, although at times he said he was quite over powered.

Cam is now Jumping!  Oh Wait....
Blue Helmet, Blue Wing, but not Cam's board......

Bernd was out on his 7 and did several sessions.  Andreas was on his 6 and Ross on his 5.  Ross did 40km mostly riding waves around the bridge.

Bernd
Handré was windsurfing most of the day and did 60km.  He said he did his first planning jibe ever!
Handré - over 60km...

Cynthia was an animal, doing both Wind Foiling and Windsurfing.  She was out for most of the day!

Cynthia
Brad and Blaine got out and had a lot of fun.  Kent was out trying to go fast.  He tried a new shim on his foil, but it didn't work in the waves, and caused him to blow up every time he turned down a wave.  He took the shim off and went out again.  Taking Dale Cook's advice he was pushing the foil trying to go faster and said he had some spectacular crashes - paying the price.  In fact, he had a $500.00 fall, when he lost his prescription sunglasses.
Kent, heading out to beat himself up some more...

I got very close to completing a couple of jibes.  I got around and switched the sail while foiling, but crashed when I tried to change my feet.

Andreas took out Cam's wing board for a try.  He did really well getting out and standing up, but wasn't able to get it on a foil.  He did really well for a first try.

Andreas - Inverted

The wind finally started to die off around 4:30 or 5:00.  Of course Dale Cook came out as usual and made it work even though there was hardly any wind.

Brad, Blaine, and Gerry went to China Gorge for supper, Cam, Cynthia and Big Jim went to Three Rivers, and Kent, Ross, Andreas, Bernd, and I tried to go to Solstice, after waiting a half hour for our table, we found out they had only reserved a spot for 2, (instead of six), so we went to the Ferment Brewhouse and had a great meal.

When leaving the restaurant, we passed three E-Bikes on the sidewalk, each with a trailer holding a wing foil board and several wings!  You don't see that every day!  You can't do that with your Windsurf or Wing Foiling gear!

Three E-Bikes - hauling 3 sets of Wing Foil Gear!

We gathered at the Condo afterwards.  Handré, and Bernd will leave first thing in the morning.  It sounds like Blaine, Brad, Cam, Cynthia and Big Air Jim will all leave tomorrow after sailing, and Kent and I are deciding if we will leave on Saturday or Sunday.  Lucky Ross is staying, and Karen will be joining him next week!

It is hard to believe our trip is almost over.  Looking forward to more sailing tomorrow.

Handré completed his first planning jibe!

Andreas - carving hard!


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

2022-09-06 Fall Gorge Trip - Day 1

Image
2022-09-05 Travel Day Kent left Wabamun Monday morning at 7:00am.  I left my place at 7:30.  We met in Cranbrook around 2:30.  I had gone through Drumheller, so no traffic until the section on Highway 9 south of Drum where there were a lot of RV.  The on-coming traffic on HWY 3 was incredible - bumper to bumper, particularly through Frank to Sparwood.  Fortunately my direction was quite light traffic and not many slow vehicles!  Lucky!  Kent said he had a similar driving experience going through Lake Louise. The smoke seemed to get worse the further south we got, and peaked out at the border where it was really thick and when you opened the window, you could taste it? We probably could have sailed at either Baynes lake or at Sandpoint, but it looked a bit marginal and we were in "Travelling Mode". We got to Ritzville around 8:00, checked in to the Best Western and then went to the local Mexican Restaurant, which was highly recommended by the hotel staf...
Read more

2022-09-08 Low Wind Day

Image
Not a whitecap to be seen, but if you look closely just behind the sailboat on the far shore you can see Blaine with his Red and Yellow sail. The forecast for today was not great for wind.  Brad and Blaine headed to Dog River for coffee and then went "Shopping".  (Blaine ended up with a new front foil wing).  Kent says Blaine is going down a dangerous path, he now has two sets of foils, one oriented for high speed and another for playing in the waves.  Each set will end up with multiple front and back wings.  How will he decide what to use?  (KENT'S COMMENT-  Blaine is fxxxx'd.   He has a good wing set but went out and bought one wing that is slightly better than any wing in his current quiver.   Now he will have to replace the rest of the quiver.) Kent and I drove to Sailworks, where they tried to talk him into a new board... (apparently they already have his old one sold....), and I picked up an 899 foil wing.  We then picked...
Read more

2022-06-17 Mixed and Shifty Day

Image
Andreas, Handré, Ted, Brad, Blaine, Bernd, Kent, and Big Jim It started to rain about the time we all got up.  Most of the guy's headed down to Dog River for coffee and then Bette's for breakfast. The usual shopping frenzy continued.  Blaine bought the board he was looking at.  Kent still has the new Roberts in his truck to demo, I picked up my new Kraken 999 foil from Sailworks, and Big Jim bought a wetsuit from ProMotion.  I am sure there were other purchases as well.  Oh, did I mention I also bought a 3.5m Wing for Louise! It is very light and should be perfect for her.... (I might use it once or twice while I am here...) Andreas arrived and met up with us at Sailworks.  He had Dale help him set up the new foil system that he had purchased just before he came down here. Andreas with his new Kite Foil I got an email from Air Time that my wing was repaired and ready so I stopped by their store to pick it up.  They really have great service! The foreca...
Read more