Party at York River Seafood

Wow, this is the second week in a row we've had an epic windsurfing / kiteboarding bash on a Saturday. Today, York River Seafood was the venue, and EVERYBODY was there.



The wind and rain were blasting when Farrah Hall, Paul Richardson and I first arrived. I helped Paul rig a 3.7 m sail borrowed from the VIMS Sail and Paddle Club, and rigged a 4.25 for myself. Farrah went for a 4.0 (she has nice, Sailworks brand sails that she uses when not training for the Olympics with the official RS:X sail). Ironically, the wind died down shortly after we got on the water, so Farrah and I re-rigged to 5.4 / 5.2 sails. It was pretty good for a while, but then it got a little too light and quirky. Around then the kiters showed up, so we windsurfers took a time-out to socialize with them and wait for the wind to improve a little. We observed that of the 7 riders in attendance, 6 of us could be matched up with another rider who had an identical wetsuit or drysuit. We could have had a tag-team wrestling match or something.





Anyway, after a while the wind picked up. A lot.



I had convinced Paul to go for a 4.5 for his second round, given the earlier downward trend of the wind. But when he actually got in the water with it, it was pretty darn windy.



Wind was just what Paul needed, though, and he showed everyone how ridiculously fast he could go, even without using the footstraps on his old longboard.



While Paul was out there, the kiters on their 9 m kites started to get way overpowered. There were a couple near-disasters when kites warped out of shape and snapped around in the sky, but everyone made it to shore alive. Farrah and I switched back to our 4.x sails, which were able to handle the conditions pretty well for about half an hour.



After that, though, it got REAL hairy, like significantly more than 30 knots. We ended up in the water waiting for lulls just we could waterstart. At various points, each of us had the entire rig and board ripped out of our hands and thrown end over end through the air. Yikes! We called it quits when we made it back to shore. It was warm and sunny by then, but the wind was just TOO much, and I didn't even bother rigging my 3.5.



Brian, the most agro kiter, tried to go out on a 6 m kite, but that didn't work AT ALL. When I left, Paul Dovel was rigging up a 3 m and a 4 m kite, but I have no idea whether or not he was able to actually ride them.