Getting Through Summer
 

It feels like the summer wind pattern may have set in. It might spike up again with useable wind so don't hold me to that OK.

Still, assuming the wind goes the normal route, what are folks planning to help displace windlust in the calm times? Have any summer trips laid on, any getting into standup, diving, knitting?. What's your plan this season?

im going to Bolivia in south america for a month on the 29 of june.
winter time over there.....shucks

What about white water rafting? You could always hop a flight over to Chile for some skiing? Have yet to make it to SA in winter. Have fun down there, at least it shouldn't be that hot.

yea, I was thinking of going to chile while im down there. There's some good skiing and snowboarding there. Its gonna be a 13 hour drive to go there, but its worth it.
Winter in south america is basically pretty cold during the morning, 65-75 degrees F tops during the afternoon and 30 degrees F during the winter.
What are you doing over the summer Rick?

Hope you make it and be sure to tell us how it goes. Also, if you see Warren Miller, say hi.

I suspect I'll be wind waiting with everyone else and shifting focus back into free diving. There are some good articles coming up on that soon for the "Something Rich and Strange" forum. Should be interesting, no end of great stories out there. Just did a quick stint in the Grenadines largely to get wind-skunked but it was great all the same. Beyond that ... ?

What are other folks planning for the summer?

You should consider going to Dominican Republic during July.
Wind is epic and its cheap!

That is exactly what I did in July 2001, some of the early FKA posts were made from there. The wind was great. I went again in July 2004, caught two tropical depressions in less than five days. Messed up the trade and thermal winds big time. This July, who knows, could be a good move.

Only way to get thru the summer here is to leave for two weeks to Greece end of June and then to leave for two more weeks end of July for the Gorge. I'll be sure to taunt from Greece with pics and stories when I go.

nice!!!
get to back to us on that with epic pictures.

uh
 

Im working as a sailing instructor for five weeks. Hopfully i will be able to get some wakeboarding in too.
chris

Where you are going in Greece? We were thinking of heading over ourselves, I've never been in Europe outside of snow season. The Grenadines seemed a lot easier and faster so won out.

Sounds like fun. Are you teaching in New Providence or somewhere in the Family Islands?

Thats cool.
I used to volunteer at Shake-a-leg miami and check this out, the blind sailing team kicked my teams ass 3 times in a row. They're really good.
Sailing is a great sport, involves team work and quickness.

I am going to Peru in July.......stand up surf in the am, maybe spear fish for an hour, the kite in waves all afternoon......mmm night time....sleep, i will be spent.


aloha Paul

its going to be mighty cold, Paul.

Sounds intriguing, have a blast down there Paul. Say, will you be near Chicama? You're taking your standup gear, you could always paddle in with some of the locals into a wave ...

http://www.fksa.org/albums/album183/...Reed_Horse.jpg

Better still, you could save all that packing and just weave a board while you're down there!?

im thinking of going to the DR for a long long weekend...anyone else?

not this year, but next year for sure Im staying at the DR for a week.

Im teaching in new providence nassau
chris

So how is the summer going guys? Have you been on trips, if so how was it? Michael is working on a July record in Palm Beach County, amazing.

Being out of Florida can be a good thing particularly if you come into some nice wind. How was Greece? What was your favorite spot?

I thought that kiting in the Gorge could be a pain in the butt due to the gust range. Flat kites have helped out with that somewhat. How is it there?

We where limited to just one of the Greek islands, called Kos, way out on the dodecanese chain. About 6 mikes from Turkey and just north of Rhodos. Thw Meltimi wind pumps up like clockwork everyday around noon and blows from the N or NW very steady anywhere from 15 kts to 35+ kts.
By the time we got our rental car, we were able to explore the island more fully and found at least 5 really good spots.
Kited everyday that we wanted to once we figured out that the wind was pretty much always on as long as you were willing to drive to one of the other spots if there was no wind at your spot.
Amazingly, if there is no wind at your beach it can be howling just a few miles away! Beautiful places and impossibly blue / tourquoise / green water. Marmari, Kohilari, Mastichari, Tingaki and Psalidi are all good places.

Just got into Hood river, no wind today for BOG apparently. I've been kiting the Gorge two weeks every year since 1999 and never once found it a pain in the butt except for the first year when I used an f-one foil and got the living CR@P knocked outta be by a gust that lofted me from the sand spit halfway to the marina. With c kites it's all been good. Flat kites you don't even notice the gusts anymore. Really its all people kite on over here anymore it seems.


Hope you guys get some kinda fix over there

I'll have a new 17m contra III that will be waiting for me when I get back.
Looks like we'll need it.
Anybody that wants to demo it is welcome to try it in the st Pete / Tampa area.


:D

Well, I was able to score 10 consecutive days of rideable wind this month (So far). With the last day being a 6.5 mile down winder, What a great ride with loads of sea-life to be seen along the way.

May/ June and July have produced some unusually windy days this year here in Palm Beach County. Will it continue and make this summer somewhat bearable, I sure hope so :D


Sounds like BigR's scoring some sweet summertime action abroad!

How is everyone coping out there? Unlike some guys, I think I've only made it out twice in some weeks. Looking forward to useable winds in fall. Any wind trip reports out there?

I have eased back into free diving to help things along. Clearer water isn't hard to find absent wind in SE Florida. In the meantime, I've rediscovered the ease of scooter diving, did about 8 free dives to 100 - 115 ft. on a large wreck in the Keys. Just like kiteboarding, don't go further (deeper or longer) than you are willing to swim back from. Blackout is a bugger too, like squalls it has taken lots over the years.

summer
 

Its been great down here in marathon, at least every other week the wind has been blowing (with the 15 omega, and a 148 prodigy) and when its not the freedivings' good, and the stand up paddel board has been keeping going. Now its lobster season, anything to keep me in the water.
________
Buy Portable Vaporizers

Went to Bolivia for a month and didn't bring equipment because its a landlocked country with no ocean, even though Lake Titicaca was tempting( highest and deepest lake in the world). Went to La paz than Cochabamba and stayed with family, ate great food, and partied my butt off!
So now im here waiting for the unexpected wind that we have in miami.

Looks like we might be back to light summer winds for a while. Hang in there guys, cold fronts are coming, soon we hope!

Well, I tried diving yesterday on a dive boat, sheez, the wx gods seem a bit miffed! There was a nasty supercell that developed over Deerfield/Boca Raton, full of strange green, blue, grays, incipient funnels, lightning, high speed cloud streamers just inland and threatening to head seaward again. Between rain and threatened lightning it wasn't the most relaxing free diving session. Sure beats a hurricane but I am resisting sliding over to Extreme Parchisie as a no wind option. What are other folks doing?

Hang in there, the summer continues ...

Rick, sorry the dive didn't work out, how were the Dean winds up your way? I couldn't wait for the race to start at Matheson last Sunday and did my own looong upwinder. Before you resort to extreme parchese maybe we should take a Cessna and hunt down the Andros thermals?
JPR

There have been lots of other good dive seasons in recent weeks. Just NOT yesterday, it actually reminded me of underwater work in the Intracoastal back in the day. Not my idea of casual fun.

We had two solid days of good winds, 11 to 16 m weather, perhaps more within normal working hours. It was good to get out and in the waves. It occurred to me that it had been months for me since a descent wind session and distance races particularly with messed up gastrocs on the mend might not be the most intelligent choice at this point. So, I wimped out of the downwinder, that time!

I have been looking over wind data for NW Andros, the thermals don't appear to be on all the time, just sometimes. The winds shift into the mid to high teen knot range in late morning through sunset often several days in a row. Over here as a rule there is nothing in the same time frames. If you're up for flying, I'm up for buying some fuel, etc.. Feel like exploring?

Rick, I would be up for an overnight hop to Andros, the cost to rent a plane for 24 hours and split it three ways would be about $240 pp rt. Basically you have to pay for 4 hours of flight time at $170.00/hr for every 24 hours you are holding the airplane. In a Cessna 182 we could go three 180 lb persons and 150/200lb of gear by reducing the fuel load a bit. Andros is only an hour away so we wouldn't need a full 88 gallon fuel load. The advantage to personal flying is you make your own schedule and go where the wind is not where the airlines fly to. Let me know, I can reserve the plane with a few key strokes. The plane is based out of Tamiami but I could fly up to Pompano and pick you up and burn off some fuel weight that way also. PS Kent M has survived flying with me.
JPR

Sounds interesting! Lets look into this some more and try to put something together. What would you guess the flight radius on the 182 would be? Andros is interesting but this place really has me curious ...

http://fksa.org/showthread.php?t=4260

Do you dive, free dive as well as kite? Getting there within a weekend using normal carriers is pretty tough. I imagine Long Island is so far out they might even have trade winds to play with as well. Kent might be up for the trip.

JP,

Just name the time. even if the wind isn't blowing, i'm sure for $75 we could rent a small boat for spearfishing...

Kent

Rick, If we stick to the 4 hr minimum we could still make Long Island, about 2 hrs out and 2 hrs back. The four hour min is on weekdays, 5 hours on weekends. Kent, the schedule is wide open for September, anything other than a quick 24 hour trip starts to get expensive, say the word and I'll reserve the plane.
JPR

Good news JP! Maybe would could put something together for September as you suggest. Are you comfortable flying to Long Island? I think there are two strips, Deadman's Cay or LGI, the one in the south may be a bit closer to Dean's Blue Hole.

Thanks!

Rick, no problem flying to Long Island, I know the island chain very well all the way to Venezuela, Deadman's is closer but no customs, so we would have to stop in Stella Maris first, just say the word. That blue hole looks intense and the bay it is in might be good for kiting too! I don't free dive but I'll be happy to dive and snorkel if the wind doesn't cooperate, how would the spearfishing be for Kent?
JPR

Wow, killer trip you guys have in mind...

Sounds great JP. I was talking to Kent, he is up for it as well after the show in Orlando. Could you PM your phone number to me at ricki and I'll give you a call to get things rolling. Thanks!

Should be fun, hope it comes together later on this month after Surf Expo. Happy Birthday btw!