December 2006 Diaries

Date: Saturday 30th December  

Location: Newbrough

Mission: Calm before the storm

I got back yesterday feeling very worse for wear after an acquaintance with a little Christmas spirit, a.k.a. vodka, so I unloaded the van and left everything in the kitchen to do the following day.  I told myself I had my priorities right as I walked past the suitcases and stepped over the washing with my kit and headed off to Newbrough.  When we arrived the wind was strong and the rain was heavy but it passed and all went calm so we decided to set up, Thompson was first out, he hadn’t been out long when heavens opened again, I looked over my shoulder and saw a big flash of lightning behind him-he hadn’t seen it but he didn’t miss the huge clap of thunder that followed, Thompson has just won the Rocket Blaster Competition at Moon Beach for fastest board speed but I reckon he beet that record as he sped towards me to get off the water, I grabbed the kite and all was well but it was a little scary.  The skies finally cleared, I only got an hour on the water before the wind went but it felt good as it seemed like ages since my last session.

Zoe

xx

Date: Sat 30^th Dec 2007

Location: Newborough

Mission: avoid the lightening.

Yippee yippee yippee, finally a session.  Can’t really believe we’ve had to wait so long.  Zoe called round at the crack of dawn (well 10 am really but i was only just out of bed ;-)) and off we trotted to newborough in my van (which has just come back from it’s holidays in scotland).  We arrived and ran down to the beach, saw a few others out on the water, a good 20 knots and blue skies we couldn’t have asked for a better session.  So after quickly changing (zoe, the huge pink thing is supposed to make it happen quicker ;-) !?) and setting up we were just about ready to launch.  That is until the heavens opened and dumped a load of rain on us.  Not only did it rain but thundered and lightened too, with 8 of us sat under my kite for shelter we were wondering whether we were destined ever to get out again.  But... after a minor brush with a bolt of lightening (i’ll let zoe tell you about that) the sky was blue and the wind was good again.  Tried zoe’s waist harness and loved it, and found a nice little lagoon down the far end to play on, even thought about doing some jumps but just as i was getting brave enough the wind dropped and we had a long walk back to the van where the pink thing came out again and the dog rolled in a really muddy puddle.

Sheryl xox 

Date: 29^th December 2006

Mission: Locate missing angels!

Location: Collect them from across the UK back to the Turbulence HQ!

So what’s been going on?  You haven’t heard anything from the Angels in a couple of weeks now; can they really not have had a session in so long?!!  Well it’s true!  Before Christmas we had lots of fun plans to make our sessions more Christmassy, and when the wind refused to come and play we had a sneaky Christmas day plan for Newborough as the forecast was looking temptingly southerly!  So as so many children across the country wake up on Christmas morning eager to see if Santa’s arrived, the Angels woke up disappointed that Santa’s sleigh had not been delayed by the high winds!  There was about 3 knots!

Zoe headed off to a secret corner of Scotland with her family for a week hoping for some Easterlies to try out the huge deserted beaches over there but all in vain!  Sheryl headed to her mums in Daventry for Christmas (her mum had even cooked Xmas dinner for Mystery the dog…ahh!).  I headed to Shrewsbury just before Christmas for a little break with my ma then spent Christmas at home with mum doing rounds of the nursing homes seeing my grandma and aunt and taking nice long walks with the dogs!

Today, the first windy day for what seems for ever, its gusting 60mph at valley!  Would be fun on my 7m Atom but I have an absess in my cheek which makes me look like a hamster on one side, Sheryl is doing family stuff and Zoe is not yet back for her hideaway in Scotland, so yet again our session is being postponed!  So I am left to get ready for my forthcoming trip to Morocco and decorate the kitchen sink!

I hope everyone else out there is getting a session in for usJ

Joxx

Date: 17 december

Location: Westshore, Llandudno

Mission: where oh where has the wind gone?

Zoe called at 9 this morning to ask me where i was.. still in bed.. but when she told me again that there was enough wind down at west shore and that some of the lads were out i got myself a coffee and went down,  well it was marginal but as i didn’t get out much yeaterday i thought i’d give it a go.. so got changed, pumped up, ran down to the water... and the kite fell out of the sky ;-(  it must be me, i must have used up all of my wind tokens cause that was it for the day ;-(.  I was on borrowed time anyway as i needed to paint the bathroom.  4 hours later, two coats on the ceiling and 20 on me another chore done which will leave plenty of time next week to get out... just need to start praying for wind again (though maybe not as hard as last time, don’t think we want hurricanes again :-))

Sheryl

xx

Date: 17^th December 2007

Location: West Shore, Llandudno

Mission:

Marcus was up at first light checking the wind this morning-well, maybe not but he did jump out of bed straight into his wetsuit when I woke him up saying we were on for a West Shore session again.  Lukas took charge of him today and I wasn’t allowed to interfere so whilst Sheryl was rigging up I asked her if I could try out her Nobile 555, I only got a couple of  runs before the wind dropped but I liked the feel of the board straight away-Santa? (Yeah right you can forget about that one Angel lots of boards)   I was really glad to see our team photographer Debbie at the beach today as she got some pictures of Marcus on the water, I will be putting those in the family album.  Marcus wasn’t as keen about being a kitesurfer when he was in the garden washing both mine and his kit down when we got home! 

Zoe

xx

Date: 16^th December 06

Location: West Shore LAND END!! Shocking!

Mission: Secret Flexi Buzz and Big Buzz Video! SSHHHH!

So, after weeks of miserable hurricane rainy weather, it’s actually really nice and sunny, but only around 10 knots!  So Adam rang to see what I was up to because had Matt the film maker and they wanted to video a little film for Flexifoil with the new Punk Buzz and Big Buzz.  So I agreed to forfeit my potential session on the water (maybe walking up wind anyway!!) and met them at the land end of west shore, which is strange, unfamiliar territory to me!  We were watching across to the water watching Zoë’s son Marcus getting up and riding on his new 9m Atom, ace!!  We had great fun filming with the Buzzes and when Sheryl had had a little session on the water she came down to help out.  It did take us a little longer filming towards the end as we had got both our dogs out and had to make sure they were sat out of shot before each take!!  Good training!  We all decided to head for some Christmas drinks in the evening which was very enjoyable, apart from the fact that I enjoyed rather too many bottles of Leffe, it’s rather strong I discover, so I’m afraid there is therefore no diary for Sunday!!!!

Jo

xx

Date: 16 december

Location: Westshore, Llandudno

Mission: am i really that heavy?

Woke up surprisingly unfazed sat morn after the work xmas party, and raced back to try to get out on the water.  Stopped off in the shop on the way to pick up my kite and was treated to a cup of carte noir, really needed it too ;-).  Zoe was down the beach with marcus and called to say that it might be windy enough for me to get out so got my skates on and headed out to west shore.  I got changes, pumped up and ran to the water... but only just enough breeze to stand up :-(... had a few runs up and down, watching marcus getting up on a board (and only his second go!) before i decided that enough was enough and i needed to stop eating all the mince pies if i was ever going to stand a chance of getting out in such light wind.  So, took myself to the other end of the beach where i hopped madly about launching and catching kites while Jo made a movie!  A few drinks in the pub that eve where we put the world to rights finished off a cool day, even though i didn’t get out to play ;-(

Sheryl

xx

Date: 16^th December 2007

Location: West Shore, Llandudno

Mission: Marcus

Marcus, my almost teenage Son, got a Atom last week but its been 30+knts ever since, so he was up n out of bed quicker than ever before when I woke him to tell him the wind looked ok, never that easy to get him up on a school day!   The temperature gage in the car was showing 5 degrees but he was still mega enthusiastic to give it a go on the water.  I was really proud to see him up and riding and he’s got that ear to ear smile-you know the one!  The usual crowd were at the beach cheering him on and we all decided to meet in a local pub that evening and have a few festive drinks, Marcus assumed this included him now he’s a kitesurfer but was reminded he was only 12 when he was dropped off at neighbours for the evening! 

Zoe

xx

Date: Wednesday 12^th December 2006

Location: The Trafford Centre

Mission: Christmas Shopping

The forecast for the week was pretty crazy so a ‘plan B’ was put into place, what better alternative to being on the water than visiting the Trafford Centre to do a bit of Christmas shopping.  When we arrived we couldn’t help but noticing how quiet it was -we had arrived an hour before the shops opened! Unfortunately we had no other option but to sit in Starbucks and have coffee and muffins-it was hard going but we managed to cope J  We spent most of our time in the O’Neill store, I bought a couple of presents and Jo was walking round the store in this cream hat, now there’s a bit of history between me, Jo and hats-when we were in Watergate Bay I had gone into a café to get a couple of take out coffee’s leaving Jo and Sarki (Jo’s dog) outside, when I came out the dog was tied to the fence and Jo was inside the shop next door looking very guilty as she quickly put down a lovely brown hat, she tried to casually ask “What do you think of that hat?”  it was totally obvious that if I’d have been a minute longer she’d have been at the till and she was now trying to go back on what she had asked me to do which was not to let her buy anything as she is really saving towards her 3 month trip to Morocco in January, so I talked her out of the hat in Watergate Bay but she still mentions it now! J, so I agreed the cream hat was nice and asked did she ‘need’ a hat, she gave me a million reasons as to why she really ‘needed’ a new hat, so the cream hat was bought.  We had to be back before 2pm for work so only had two hours worth of shopping time, which I don’t think was a bad thing. The ‘time-up’ alarm went off and we dragged ourselves out of Selfridges before we had time to buy anything else we really ‘needed!’

Zoe

xx

Date: Monday 11^th December 2006

Location: West Shore, llandudno

Mission: Welcome Back Katie

Katie has been counting down the days to her first day back on the water since her injury 8 weeks ago and I couldn’t believe her luck as I drove to the beach, the sky was blue and there was a nice 20knt Westerly wind.  I was the first to arrive at the beach so I sat on the wall waiting for Katie and Jo, there wasn’t a cloud in the sky and there were no fronts coming in but the wind suddenly picked up a good 10knts, the sand started blowing all over the beach and up over the wall.  The nice 20knts had just become a gusty 30knt within minutes.  Katie arrived determined to get out and unphased by the strong wind, she quickly set up her 7m before anyone could try and put her off.  I held onto the back of her harness and Jo launched her, she had a quick session and decided to quit while the going was good and wait for a calmer day but was really happy to be back on the water.  I was debating with myself whether I was brave enough to go out or not, I watched Jo happily launch her 7m Atom so decided to go for it,  I  set up the 7m Atom Turbulence think is theirs J and went out and had a great session.

Zoe

Xx

Date: 9^th December 2007

Location: West Shore

Mission: Is it really winter?

Date: 9^th December 2006

Location: West Shore

Mission:  Weird line-cam videoing and ‘animal’ hats!

So I did some yoga in my pyjama’s to put off putting my wet wetsuit on! When I’d done all the moves I could remember I jumped into my wetsuit and headed to West Shore.  I got there to find Sheryl packing up, looking very cold!  She’d been out for 3 hours already in her summer suit!!  Good girl!  I thought it was going to be 9m Atom weather but as got onto the beach the boys were hanging onto their 9m’s so I decided to go 7m Atom!  Alfie from AE Productions wanted to try his new line-cam set up so we rigged it onto my bar and lines getting freezing cold fingers in the process!  After overcoming a number of hurdles I set off, (oops the camera is upside down and the lines!) oh well!  So I had a nice little session not really thinking the camera was recording much anyway because it was facing the wrong way!  But when my fingers had frozen and I came in, we checked the footage and it was fine!!  So we hooked it up onto Zoe and she took it for a spin, talking and singing into the microphone the whole time!  When we’d used all the tape up and the tide started to go out I decided to have a board testing session and tried both Sheryl’s boards and Hoggy’s new one.  I put on a gimp mask and a fury animal party hood thing to keep warm!  After a good session trying the boards the wind turned really northerly and funny stuff started to happen with it including hale!!  So I thought I would call it a day, awesome!  The boys stole my 9m Atom so they could keep kiting, typical!!

Jo

xx

Date: Saturday 09th December  

Location: West Shore, llandudno

Mission:  Hollywood?

I had a nice slow start to the day, mainly due to the fact I was still aching from yesterdays session so didn’t get to the beach till midday.  Funnily enough the minute I got on the water I forgot all about the aches as I was ripping along and doing some good jumps now that I have started to send the kite.  Its not often you get two epic sessions in a row but the past two days have been amazing! Alfie was at the beach with a camera which goes on your centre lines, so me and Jo took it in turns doing some filming for a girly web site.  The camera had a microphone attached to it so I was very happy kiting, chatting away and being the star of the show!! Adam and Marcus made a video of my training session yesterday as well, two movies in two days-Mmm wonder if I will make it to Hollywood! Ha! ha!

Zoe

xx

Date: Friday 08^th December 2006

Location: West Shore, llandudno

Mission: More, more, faster, faster!

What a session! One of those when you’re smiling ear to ear but aching head to toe! Well, when your toes are defrosted that is.  Today well and truly made up for my last session when nothing was going right, everything worked today but I have my team to thank for that-Adam, Johara and Hoggy were stood on the beach shouting instructions to me-send the kite more!, send the kite faster!, ended up the three of them stood there shouting more! more! faster! faster! I was finding it very amusing, wonder what the dog walkers were thinking! J  I did my highest jumps yet and although I didn’t complete my backloop, Im not far away.  I only had two attempts as after four hours on the water in 7 degrees it was a bit cold to be body dragging after my board.

Zoe

xx

Date: Wednesday 06^th December  

Location: West Shore, llandudno

Mission: Missing my favourite spot

I haven’t been out at West Shore for a while (over a week at least!) so I was really happy to get a West Shore session.  The day didn’t start so well though, I just couldn’t do anything right, I felt like I had…regressed, whereas recent sessions I felt confident and could feel I was riding well, today I felt like I  couldn’t even do basic jumps.  As Ive been practicing my Pop Transitions a lot lately I found that when I was trying to do either a jump or a Pop Transition I was doing a in between both, so a nothing really and everything feels different to my pop now Im wearing boots!! Jo and I were out and Ad was taking pics when we noticed a huge weather front coming in, we did the sensible thing and came off the water till it passed.  Adam has just got some 3m Flexifoil Strikes in, O.M.G! they are SO so cute!! A cheap option to a puppy!!!  So he rigged it up on 5m lines he has made for it and Jo launched it! Not seen her smiling so much since she got her 7m Atom! What a quick little **I mean…STAR** it is! Even overpowered Jo on an unhooked kite loop!!! AWSOME! I want one!!!  Anyway, Jo started shivering (obviously not had her Mums porridge!!).  There was no way I was calling it a day, I needed to work out what was going wrong, so I went back out for another few hours and got myself sorted, I got my Jumps and Pop Transitions back to normal and tried a few backloops-but STILL only making it half way round! Argghh!! On the bright side of things though-I was out from 11.30am til 15.30pm and wasn’t cold! Email me for details of my winter attire!

Zoe

xx

Date: 6^th December 2006

Location: West Shore WAHOO!!

Mission: Have a good old West Shore session and try my shiny new 9m Atom

So we’ve been doing so much planning for the Angel’s Trip abroad next year I’d almost forgotten to check the weather!  But luckily Zoe reminded me it was looking good for mid day with a break in the torrential rain!  So we headed out as the tide started to go out, perfect!  Was wicked session, loving my 9m Atom with it quite powered I was having loadsa fun jumping!  Gonna try it on the slow turn setting though like I have the 7m!  Headed in as a dark cloud approached and pumped up Adam’s new 3m!  Had a little fly, couldn’t get going on board so tried a kite loop on the beach and got spanked!!! Oh dear!!  

Jo

xx

Date: 01^st December 2006                                                                                 

Location: Llandudno to Whitstable

Mission: Travelling

Zoe and Sheryl had planned to get a quick session in before travelling over to Kent to do an event with The Artic Foxes but seeing as Sheryl picked up her new Nobile 555 last night there was NO wind!  The event was a kite taster session for girls which would raise money for Breast Cancer Awareness.  Jo had left really early in the morning as she was getting the Bongo serviced in Oxford ready for Morocco. 

We arrived in Whitstable around 7 accompanied by our Chick of the Month Katie  and quickly found the nearest food store; once we had filled up on food we found a suitable place to park the van which totally coincidently was right by a bar and a café! We went in the bar and chilled out on some big leather couches for a few hours drinking ultra strong coffee.  We walked up to the main road to meet Jo n bring her back to camp but the road was blocked with emergency service vehicles, an upturned car and a lamppost-bit of a nasty scene but everyone involved was ok.  In the bongo there was the usual stuff; kit, little black dog, pink fluffy stuff etc we had also received a pink Buzz and BIG Buzz from Flexifoil to use at the event but Jo also had a kitchen sink and a spare wheel in the Bongo this time!!! Yes that’s right a kitchen sink! There are big plans for this sink!

Date: 02^nd-03rd December 2006

Location: Whitstable

Mission: Turbulence Angels and Artic Foxes

Climbed out of the vans and went straight across the road to the café for bacon butties and the obvious! Met up with the Artic Foxes there and after introductions and action plans went to the beach n set up ready for the event.  There was only a light wind today, not enough to get out on the water and do the demo we wanted to but the Foxes had a good turn out on the beach so we spent the day chatting to girls about the sport. 

The wind was in full force Sunday, Sheryl was the first to pump up and was gutted to notice the tear in her kite! Andy (Traction Kites) very kindly lent her a 7m Ion, Zoe had Turbulences 7m Atom and Jo had her 7m Atom we were the only people out on the water, maybe the locals knew something we didn’t but it was a good session and it was great for the girls having lessons on the beach to watch.  We also had a good response from the spectators on the beach, wanting to know what it was all about and asking for lessons!

So we packed our kit, collected Flexi’s Punk Buzzes, said our goodbyes and headed off on the long journey back across the country.  Sheryl and Katie stopped to have a coffee with friends and Zoe, Jo and the kitchen sink made a dash for home!  We were surprised to find ourselves driving along side Mike Shaw from Flexifoil half way up the M11 but it proved impossible to hold a conversation through open windows at 70mph up the motorway!  Not advised!  So we waved and the Flexi van shot off instead!

So a big thank you to the Arctic Foxes for having us down for the weekend and a big thank you to Turbulence and Flexifoil for loaning the Punk Buzzes which defiantly were a god send in the 0 – 40 knts conditions!

Zoe, Johara & Sheryl