Saturday, December 26, 2015

Team Nugget Brighton Altona Port Melbourne kitesurfing downwinder

Session 351. Team Nugget - James, Stu Styles, Anthony, Kevin and myself completed an epic downwinder from Brighton to Altona then on to Port Melbourne.

Team Nugget
The wind was a solid 25 knots, I took my Lithium 9 tied on the bottom knots.  We did a couple of tacks while waiting for Cesar, Peter Sexton, Marco and some comrades to get on the water - they were training for this years Across the Bay event.

I headed towards Altona on a slow tack with the kite fully de-powered with the occasional tack back to see how the others were going.  It was wild and woolly out in the middle, but there was a brief lull just as some were crossing the channel! 

Then Williamstown was visible, but it was still quite a way to Altona.  We touched on the narrow beach then started heading back - this time to a new section of the Bay.   Cruising past Altona Pier we followed the foreshore towards Williamstown. I was wary of extensive reefs that I have seen from the shore, but all we saw were some very big swells.  

Stu stuck with me as we surfed the big rolling swells, some of them breaking.  Downwind technique is great fun - lots of turns and surfing the waves.  Once I saw The Rocks building at Williamstown I new we where on track. We surfed in and approached concrete jetty of Battery Road.  

Stuart was still with me but the others were out of sight.  Stu and I headed out to the channel, across it, then straight in towards Port Melbourne beach.  We landed on the beach, tired but very happy. 

I could see some kites a long way off towards Elwood and hoped they were the others.  James then appeared and landed, then eventually the distant two kites came in: Anthony and Kevin.   They were having some difficulty riding downwind on one side so they finished with big tacks.

Five happy lads at the finish. A 35km tour, and section of the bay, great wind and waves.  Happy Boxing Day! 

Tacking back before leaving Brighton
Heading for Altona
Windy!



Altona



Heading to Williamstown

Surfing the swells

Surfing the swells

Surfing the swells

Mr Styles in action


Off Williamstown


Crossing the channel


 Port Melbourne beach

Team Nugget - tired but happy



GPS log

3 comments:

Francis Kim said...

Didn't even know that was possible with kitesurfing - well done!

Stephen said...

Thanks for the review Pete, I'm eagerly awaiting the summer to give this a crack!

Stephen said...

Nice one!