Hey windsurfers!! Here’s an article I wrote several years back; an oldie but a goodie worth posting here.

The windsurfers of Rhode Island a few years back never noticed the caveman frozen in a big block of ice slowly melting at the beach. It was actually me who was from the frozen north in that big chunk of ice.

Neon Sail

I always have a little chuckle when reading in this magazine about the board test team memebers’ many years of sailing. Suzi Shortboard, 4 years, Expert; Bob Billabong, 7 years, Superior; Frank Finn, 11 years, Super sophisticated. I wondered how many years I had on a board. I was sitting there trying to do what felt like advanced math in my head, when the sum of years formed a number; the magazine dropped from my hands ….Gooood Gaaaaaaawd!! 35 years! How did that happen? It’s true, I can actually remember rigging up a teak boom to a perfectly triangle sail. Roto-molded plastic boards were cutting edge. In the beginning you couldn’t just go to a shop and purchase something hi-tech like a harness because they simply weren’t available, so I used to try and make my own on my mom’s sewing machine. The hook I used; it was a REAL hook from the hardware store. Then one day in the early eighties the windsurfing scene suddenly exploded and the equipment advanced at a dizzying speed. You could buy a fin and it would be outdated by the time you installed it on your board. Remember the Football Fin? It was an exciting time to be a windsurfer.

To be fair about my “years of windsurfing”, I did take a little hiatus from the whole scene for about 12 years for a number of reasons. Long gone were the days where I would show up at the beach to see hundreds of boards laying in the sand, and all my sailing buddies hanging out. Most of my friends had dropped out of windsurfing one by one. It was sad. It was also about this time that I took on a real job and could no longer spend each glorious summer day at the beach waiting for the wind to come up. Aaaah those were the days! But the finial straw was the extremely narrow wind range the equipment had. Sailors would drive themselves mad trying to rig up their new hi-tech gear with the right combination of board size and sail size. There were guys who honestly spent a whole beautiful windy day rigging sails to try and match the wind speed and board size. And rigging those first generation RAF sails was somewhat of a time consuming task. Enough of this, I eventually said, and went off to race on big sailboats.

Years went by and I hadn’t given windsurfing much thought. Once in a while I would get a sharp pang and think back, “man that was SO much fun, what happened?” Then one year I relocated to Rhode Island, and I discovered to my shocking amazement that windsurfing was still alive and well. I felt like the Grinch when he discovered all the Whos singing their song. People were windsurfing, and not just a few but a LOT of them. My people!!! I have rediscovered my people!

I took a closer look at “my people”. At least I thought they were my people, but after a closer look I wasn’t so sure. The windsurfers all looked like somebody’s geeky little brother all geared out. They were wearing helmets, goggles, rash tops, gloves, elaborate harness system, special shorts, booties, and one guy even had a wide hat with an inflatable brim. Perhaps the inflatable brim helps with water starts. My people used to windsurf in nothing more than a pair of jams and a small waist harness. I was going to have to get to know this new breed of windsurfer.

The next windy weekend I excitedly went on an Easter egg hunt of gear through out my garage. I was going windsurfing again, WHAO HOO!!! After I scrubbed off all the years of garage dust off my boards I hustled down to the beach where a good crowd of windsurfers were beginning to gather. My car exploded board parts and neon colored sail. The first guy I met I asked him what size board he was going out on because I was thinking about using my 9’-6”. He tilted his head to the side like a dog when it looks at you confused and said he wasn’t sure what I was talking about, but he was going to use his 130 L board. I replied back, “Oh, of course, a 130L board. Good call, man”. What IS a 130L board I wondered? My pile of ‘80s neon parts were waiting to be assembled. I was tying my boom on when I quickly realized most had already rigged up a sail and were heading out in the time it took me snap together the right lengths of boom sections. One woman walked past and commented on how colorful my sail were and that she had never seen one quite like that. I wasn’t sure how to take that comment, but kept rigging. Eventually I got put together when I realized I had the boom height wrong. Damn! I had to take everything back apart and retie the boom a little higher. It came back to me the irritating amount of time it took to get a sail rigged up properly. I could see gear had evolved for the better while I was gone.

12 years later and I was back in the water with my 9’-6” board and circus tent colored sail. What a feeling to be flying across the water again! Back in the day I was unbeatable, so keeping up with the new fancy pants sailors with their clear sails should be no problem. Oh I kept up all right, even passed a few, but I rapidly noticed I was working much harder than everyone else. Back at the beach I was sucking in great volumes of air expecting to see others just as whipped as me. No one else had their head placed between their knees trying to keep from passing out. In fact they looked like someone who had taken a nice brisk walk around the block. How could this be? I was suffering and they weren’t. I knew I was in pretty good shape from all the mountain biking I did, but I just couldn’t get the air down my lungs fast enough. Something was a miss.

It didn’t sink in immediately with me what was going on. In my book, fat boards are just slow and flat sails are not powerful. Maybe my brain was still frozen from that block of ice I came out of, but by the end of the summer I started to make the connection that not only did the equipment become easier to rig but is much easier to sail. Sailors were rigging up in half the time, their equipment now had a huge wind range, and they were easy to sail. Windsurfing was fun again!

My finances were such that I wasn’t going to be able to run out and get all new gear at once. I would pick the most outdated part and start there. Sails were further down on that list because I had a whole garage full of bright colored sails that I perceived as perfectly good. However, when it came time to get one new sail I noticed something very interesting, the price was the same as what I paid for a new sail back in ’84. I’m not talking the price as adjusted for inflation, I mean after 20 something years the price was THE same. How is that possible? Once I had my one new sail I quickly discovered how easy it handled, and I was in aw of the wind range. To even think of taking a 7.5 out in the big wind I was easily sailing in at the time, would have been laughable years ago. Sailors just would not have considered attempted it.

After my first day of sailing with my new sail I was in a flood of many emotions. My full on stoke was overtaken by something I wasn’t excepting. I realized I had lost out on many years of windsurfing because I had given up on it. There was a whole next equipment evolution that took place that I didn’t even know about, and it was for the better. I loved windsurfing, but I along with many others gave up on it. I was looking for someone to kick me many times in the butt.

I may have many more windsurfing years than most, but it seems I missed out on an all important faze that took place in my absence. Fortunately by shear luck I didn’t miss out on it completely. The equipment evolution turned into something that makes a sport that I once was passionate about into something that I once again get excited thinking about. The rigs are almost as easy to assemble as the days when you just rolled the sail up around the mast. The ease of sailing the new equipment doesn’t mean sailors have to have many hours of water time getting good at windsurfing skills just to have fun. I wondered, do the rest of my friends who dropped out of the scene know what has taken place? I would love to chase them around on the water again. I’m happy and excited to be a born again windsurfer.

If it were the movies two people would be innocently driving their vehicle in the Australian outback on a lonely road that stretched to the horizon. Suddenly the husband would look in his rear-view mirror because he thought he saw something. Nothing. The hot pavement must be creating optical illusions. But then, as if it were the beginning of a nightmarish dream, over the soft music playing on the AM radio they would both hear a thunderous roar of engines approaching them from behind. Clad all in black like pure evil was the notorious motorcycle gang who everyone feared, quickly approaching the unsuspecting people in their car.

Strangely enough my wife and I had a similar experience while mountain biking. Actually, we have experienced this many times, but this particular time shook us to the core.

Weetamoo Woods RI

I knew the local NEMBA riders had been working hard for years cleaning up and restoring many of the trails at Big River. We hadn’t been there in a long time, so we headed back there to see how it had changed. It changed a lot. The trails were way beyond anything we were expecting, and that days ride ranked up there with one of our best rides ever. There was one particular trail on a slight downhill tight through the trees with many quick banked turns and whup-DE-do bumps that we were able to charge fast with the speed of professional mountain bike racers. It wasn’t even a question between us; we had to do that one again.

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The entrance of this particular trail was hard to find because it was just barley wide enough for one rider to pass through the trees and brush. We ducked in and started attacking the trail again; then like the movies, we heard the roar off in the distance. Thinking they would never find the start of the trail we continued on, but the roar headed in our direction faster than we realized. They were on our trail. The vegetation was so thick and the turns were so tight there wasn’t even a small place to jump out of the way, so with only seconds left before they were on us I pedaled as hard as I could trying to find a place to bail and could only hope my wife, who was a few turns back and five months pregnant, was doing the same. Around the next turn there was a slight gap in the thick growth so I dove for it just as 5 off-road motorcycles shot around me, never slowing down while spewing mud from their back tires. The deafening racket was so loud I couldn’t even hear myself screaming that them.

The second they were gone I flipped my bike around and flew back to where I thought my wife was, praying that she was okay. She was fine. We were both shaking from the experience; fear boiling over into rage. I looked down at the ripped up trail they left behind and knew it was now almost un-rideable. The trail was ruined. One of our best mountain bike days ever had dissolved away. We headed back to the car.

It wasn’t over. While I was putting one of the bikes up onto the roof rack, the same group came flying down the dirt road towards our parked car and when I looked up there was my wife in the road trying to flag them down. They didn’t want to hear anything she had to say and never slowed down. I quickly pulled my pocket camera out attempting to get shots of them. Not surprising that aggravated them a lot and they charged me while attempting to knock the camera out of my hands. How had a nice day’s mountain bike ride turned so crazy?

Being Responsible: I have lost count how many times I have confronted motorcycles and ATV who were not supposed to be on the trails. It’s a useless feeling because the motorcycle riders know the authority’s chances of actually catching them are nil. A few years back I confronted a group of ATVs and I was able to memories one of the license plates they had forgotten to remove. But when I reported it to the to the park ranger as much as he wanted the ATV off his trails, I sensed he was probably just humoring me. (see Death of a State Park) One time I had phoned in a report to the local police using the number posted on the entrance sign for that specific reason, and the operators response was….”so?”

But as a responsible mountain biker I couldn’t live with myself if I did nothing every time they come tearing down the trails. So I just groan, try to get them to stop,and tell them in as nice but firm way they are not welcome on the trail and remind them of the fines. Maybe it will discourage them next time. It’s frustrating.

Weetamoo Woods RI

What is the answer? Surely there is a solution to dealing with this situation in a responsible manner? After all they love off-road motorcycle riding as much as we are passionate about mountain biking. An all out war just makes matters worse and everybody looses. But preserving the trails and quiet of the woods is essential. I would like to know what other mountain bikers experiences are with motorcycles and ATVs. What did you do when they came up on you? Has anyone had any real success in discouraging them?

Please comment below.

If you’ve read this blog once or twice you’ll have noticed I’ve written a lot about Moosehead Lake. It really isn’t my intention to continually focus on one particular place, it just happens.

I have pieced together a video of my daydream. Hope you enjoy it.

The summer had been a little on the slow side for both surfing and windsurfing, but when September hit Rhode Island it was tough to keep up. The waves began rolling in with the passing ocean storms, and on the days the surfing was flat, it seemed solid wind took it’s place making for great windsurfing.

Here is a quick video with the help of the GoPro boom cam from fall 2011 in the middle of October from one of the best places to windsurf in the North East; Fogland Beach, Rhode Island. The weather was still good, water was fine, and the wind was great.

This action, on both mountain bike and mountainboard, took place on Elephant Mountain, the final resting place of the ill-fated B52 crash site, down the south side of the mountain near Moosehead Lake Maine.

What is the single thing that can double the fun in any
activity.

There you are on your mountain bike dropping in on a trail that
rockets you through the woods with tight bank turns that shoot you
around the trunk of a tree like a slalom gate. What a rush! At the
end of the trail,  stopping to catch your breath with excitement
running almost out of control, you turn around to give a big
high-five to……..nobody. You are riding solo today.

I admit most times I prefer to roll solo simply because usually when I get the urge to do an adventure I want to do it now! And Now doesn’t have time for making phone calls, planning a trail to explore, and setting up a meeting place & time.  BUT….having a buddy with you no matter if it is mountain biking or windsurfing or lawn darts will almost always push the fun level up the scale.

To ensure that I will always have someone that I actually enjoy being with on my adventures, I have taught countless people to mountain bike, windsurf, sail, and rock climb over many years.

In writing this I realize I tend to take a different approach. Rather than hanging out with the group of people who are already into the activity, say like windsurfing, I tend to unconsciously make my own group. I’ve been teaching friends my activities and adventures from as far back as I can remember. That way it is my group; people I actually like to be around, people who we go a little deeper than just a one dimensional friend  who we only talk about the latest tuning techniques to rigging a windsurfing sail. I’m not saying my way is best because it is a little like bringing your own group of friends to a party; but that’s just how I always end up with trail buddies.

On the surface I am telling myself that if I teach someone to climb then I will always have one more person to call on when I need someone to belay me. But I think the real reason I do it is because I get just as much of a thrill seeing someone get hooked on an activity as I do the activity itself. It is that moment when everything I have attempted to pass on suddenly clicks for them and you know they are hooked like a big fish with a lure in its mouth, and when they get home they are going to scour the internet for affordable gear in that adventure. It will always be burned in my memory as one of my best windsurfing moments when my best buddy, my wife, after several years of learning to windsurf, got her first rocket ride across the flat waters of Palmico Sound, Cape Hatteras. She was in perfect control and rode it for miles, and when she finally stopped to take a break on a sand bar it was all very emotional. That’s why I teach friends my activities.

The funny thing is, the approach to introducing a friend to your adventure is a little like a social networking where it spreads in all directions. My wife, who I introduced her to mountain biking years ago when we first meet,  has now hooked several of her good friend  on mountain biking.  There is one friend who just became addicted who last we heard is now dragging one of her friends to the trails. And on and on it goes.

But there is a down side to all of this; I have also found over the years the “Stick Withit” rate is terrible! Years ago, the site where I used to rock climb was a huge all day commitment from early in the morning to sometime in the evening, and these days most people only have a few hours in their schedule for fun. But because climbing absolutely requires a second person to climb safely I had taught well over a dozen people to climb and safely belay so I would have a huge people pool to draw on. It worked well. Since I have left town, none of those people still climb today. Same thing with windsurfing; I had taught dozens and dozens of people to windsurf in the 80′s, but if I ever run into them today they had stopped long ago. It makes me a little sad. It never carried on past me.

I guess the real question is, am I getting my friends hooked on my adventures or are they getting hooked on my pure enthusiasm I get from doing one of my many adventures? Maybe it is just simply my friends just need a little kick in the pants to get them going, and if I’m not around kicking, they aren’t going. Possibly they are just dropping out because life changes, priority’s change, things become fond memories, and people discover new adventures to take the place.

I know, like it or not, I’ll keep introducing friends to my adventures; I always do. I think it is important. I
can’t help but to pass it on.

The last grind of the hill was the toughest part; the climb had been steep and the trail had been washed out and gravelie making the rear tire loose bite if my balance wasn’t perfect. Without any warning; Crunch! Jamming itself between the smallest ring gear and the bike frame, the chain bound up tightly not moving in either direction. The bent middle ring gear meant my mountain bike ride was finished for the day.

I still have no idea how that happened. I had not hit any big stumps or rocks and there was no evidence anything wrapped around in it.

The little bit of luck that was working in my favor was being at the top of the hill, the rest of the pedaling part of the ride was over; all I needed to do was roll the several miles to the parking lot downhill.

Typically I don’t mind making bike repairs. I’ve got my garage set up with a special bike workshop complete with my own specifically designed bike lift where I can quickly set it at any level I need. In fact, the current bike I have been riding was created several years back right there in the workshop. I’ve got the radio dialed into my favorite classic rock station, and in the colder months in the corner there is a wood burning stove. It’s usually not a bad place to spend a Saturday afternoon.

I actually fix complicated sailboat parts for a living, so repairing a bike, in my world, is in a way my entertainment.

Looking at the bike as it hung in place, the repair to the middle chain ring looked pretty straight forward; remove it and flatten it straight again. And that’s exactly what I did.

With the straightened ring back in place, I put the chain on the teeth and gave it a test spin. CRuuNCH! Unless there was some sort of magnetic current generated in the pedals that pulls chains off, there was no good reason it was jammed up again. I had straightened the teeth almost perfectly. Truly baffling.

So the story goes; two more trips to the bikes shop for parts and the rest of the afternoon in the garage, which, by the way, was quickly becoming the place I did not want be as the weather turned into a perfect summer day. I was still baffled why the chain was mysteriously falling off, but I used a time tested technique perfected by car mechanics everywhere; just keep changing out expensive parts until the problem goes away while billing the customer the whole time. Eventually I had it fixes and after I a few test rides up and down the street I was ready for the next days trail ride. The end result was….a long walk out of the woods while pushing my bike. When a mountain biker screams in the woods and there is no one around to hear him, does he make a sound?

After a few more hours in the garage I really did have the mountain bike fixed. This time, because I had changed out several parts that were probably okay, and dialing in every part of the system that could be related to the problem, the bike worked almost better than new. Back on the trail after the mountain bike was remedied, it was about the best ride I had had in years. Was it because the bike was working perfectly? Was it because I conquered the mystery of the dropping chain? Or was the trail just that good on that particular day? It doesn’t really matter, it was a great ride whatever the reason and the problem was behind me.

What I learned:
While most times I thoroughly enjoy my bike maintenance garage sessions, there will without a doubt come the time when the bike outsmarts me.  Just like most things in life, the frustration can sneak up and take over if you are not careful, but just keep the big sledge hammer away from it no matter how much better that new 29er might be.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=qMakf0x_3TU

Sand Kiteboarding!

Timing is everything. I just may have timed my class I teach each year up in Maine, to finish at about the same time low tide was to hit the Biddeford Pool beach. I’ll never tell.

Three miles of hard-packed sand. Perfect sunny day. But my luck didn’t end there because I needed two more of the elements to fall into place to make beach kiteboarding on my mountainboard possible. I needed wind; not too strong and not too light, and it had to be almost straight on-shore. I drew the lucky number that day because all three came together about the time I pulled up to the beach. Timing is everything.

If it Blows

……they will come. Cape Hatteras, Outer Banks

The wind kept building like an approaching runaway freight train, yet knowing there was a good chance the sail was too big I still sent my wife out onto the water with her windsurfer. “You’ll be fine,” I kept telling her but not really believing it myself. My reasoning, right or wrong, was all the water on the Pamlico Sound on the Outer Banks was only waist deep, so how much trouble could she really get into. She grabbed onto the boom and pulled the sail in with the spirit of a ball player cracking a home run. 50 feet later it ended just as quickly as it started. Hmmm….I had thought so; too much wind. Does it make me a bad husband letting her test the wind strength? It’s an equal marriage, after all. At least I went out into the waist deep water and helped her pull the gear back to the beach….but maybe that’s because I wanted to use her smaller sail.

It was OBX round 2 for us; a windsurfing vacation in Cape Hatteras, and the wind speed was building to it’s legendary strength. Full on and in your face. Because it was the smallest sail we owned, I grabbed it off my wife’s board and plugged it into my high wind board for my own attempt. My start was a bit fumbley but once I got it going it was a hold on for dear life kind of ride skipping and bouncing across the top of the water like being in the jaws of a dog trying to shake the life out of a squirrel; me being the squirrel. After about a half hour of taking a brutal thrashing on gear that was too big for the conditions I had had enough and dragged it all back up the beach. I was okay with that. It was wild fun while it lasted.

The previous day of windsurfing in the warm spring sunshine was decent medium wind strength, and we were only two of four people sailing that day. But with our bigger sails we were getting some fast rides across the sound. The question was; where were all the other windsurfer? On the drive down to Cape Hatteras there had been a steady stream of cars with boards piled high all headed in the same directions. So where were they? Why weren’t they out on the water playing? Then we knew the answer.

They had come only for the big stuff.  On this day with the wind building the parking lot was beginning to fill with board-heads from up and down the eastern seaboard. There were little economy cars with boards piled high to big $UVs pulling fully customized board trailers to guys living out of their old Chevy van. One enclosed trailer featured many boards all neatly stacked on specially build shelves and wetsuits all hanging in a neat row ready to go like a surf shop on wheels. It was a scene.

After my walloping, I parked myself in a beach chair, popped the top to a cold malty beverage, and watched the show. Sitting there as much out of the wind as I could, the wind still pounded me with full force while other windsurfers walking past with tiny high wind gear were asking me why I wasn’t heading out on the water. I simply explained I didn’t have small enough equipment; besides it’s not how big you gear is, it’s what you do with it that counts. But they would shake their head and give me that look that said, ‘how can you come to Hatteras and not bring high wind gear?’ I would have pleaded my case had anyone cared and explain that I hadn’t used the smallest sail we own in two years, so what the heck would I do with anything smaller. I wanted to ask; ‘and by the way, where were you the other day when the wind was a nice solid wind speed in the teens? We were having some great rippen rides with our larger sails.’ But I just let the question lay.

The water began to get crowded as windsurfers ripped back and forth each trying to be faster than the next guy. Boards and sails were flying by everywhere. Shredfest 2011. It was what everyone had traveled the distance for; windsurfing paradise on the east coast. It’s what I lay awake at night dreaming about…seriously. They only show when it really blows.

My goal that day was to cruise and explore down the miles of Sandy Neck Beach on Cape Cod during low tide, but I was going to do it with a power kite and beach customized mountainboard. Sandy Neck is long finger of sand that runs parallel to the north lower “arm” of Cape with a tidal salt marsh on it’s backside. The wind direction was such that the trip was going to be a one way ride with a long hike back.

While I was setting up the kite, a brief thought went through my head, what if I get injured, there was no one around to find me. I always cringe at the stories I read where people go off into the wilderness under-prepared because they have their cell phone in case something goes wrong. But right or wrong, I checked my phone and there were solid bars and reasoned I really wasn’t going deep into wilderness, there were several towns, after all, just past the park entrance.

Once the kite was set up and control lines were attached, I put on my harness, helmet, and slipped my backpack on, I was ready to explore. I gave the lines a genital tug and the kite rose into the sky with just the right amount of wind speed that made the kite easy to control yet there was still enough power to pull me. I made a few practice swoops to make sure everything was working properly, then hopped onto the board with the oversized sand wheels.

The kite went into the power zone and the force went through my arms down my legs ending at the board which began to roll through the hard-pack sand of low tide. The faster I moved the less force there was in my arms because there was a balance of board resistance and motion. It was one of those amazing moments where everything is was perfect sync; the day, the experience, the place. The only experience that compared would have been in a back bowl in the mountains with unspoiled powder, the beauty of the mountains, and being the only person cutting fresh tracks.

It didn’t take long to realize the sand was not as hard-packed everywhere as I had thought when the wheels bogged down and the pull of the kite returned to my arms yanking me off the board. I really hadn’t expected the sand to all be perfect, so with the kite waiting above in the neutral position, I picked up my board and walked it about a 100′ to the next patch of hard sand. Again I took off down the beach with my kite pulling and my speed gradually increasing. Ahead about 50 yards I saw a little river of salt water that was still draining towards the ocean. A little memory flash in the back of my head played the video of guys jumping their kiteboards to crazy heights, so I should be able to jump over a little saltwater river, no problem. At the last two feet before the water I skidded the board to a stop and shot the kite back to the neutral position, picked the board up and leaped across. Not as cool as the videos. And that’s how it went to the end when the tide began to creep back; ride a ways, walk a little, and ride some more, it was a exploration journey after all, not a speed record attempt.

Eventual the kite was stowed away in my backpack, my helmet clipped to the back, and a bottle of water in the side pocket as I took one last look at the deep blue of the ocean before I headed up the sand dune to the trail on the backside of the beach that meandered along the edge of the salt marsh. Hiking the trail along the salt marsh edge was a little longer than if I had just walked straight back on the beach, but the scenery on the backside was just as spectacular but in a totally different way. To add to the contrast, being on the backside out of the wind and out of reach of the roaring waves it was quiet. Very quiet. I set the board down to sit on it and just listen to the sound of silence for a moment or two before I pushed on.

Every now and then the trail along the marsh would cross over a dune or two. The soft sand made the simple task of walk as if your legs are stuck in honey. A lot of spent energy, but no foreword moment. Trudging up the second sand dune it became quite clear that I may have been more tired out than I had realized. It was a long several miles back to the car.

The day was amazing, the place was incredibly beautiful, the adventure was unique, and at that time of year I had it all to myself. What more could a guy like me possible want.