I am sure most kiters around have. like me, tried to explain to your boss why you just have to leave work early because it is wind, why you absolutely neeeed 3 weeks holiday to Brasil in October and why every Friday throughout the winter you are either staring glassy eyed out at the wind and snow, or not at you desk..Well, I figured it was time to do something about it :) So last weekend me, Emily, our dogs and 12 of my colleagues (including two of my bosses) headed for Haukeliseter and a weekend of good food, fun people, loads and loads of powder and snowkiting course with
sideshore.no. We were lucky enough to get two excellent instructors for the course, Lisa and Anne-Sofie!
Friday started off really snowy! The driving conditions were pretty horrible, but we all made it up there. And when it snows... you wake up to 20cm of powder!! The first half of Saturday morning was pretty light wind, we drove to the Haukeliseter tunnel and found some prefect conditions for the guys practicing launching :) You have to struggle a bit when you learn snowkiting! After lunch the wind increased and I have no idea how all the students were doing cause I was out there having a blast in the light light beautiful powder! 3hrs session of cruising, practicing frontrolls/backrolls and a little bit of transition looping.. (had a few faceplants - dragged 5m forward under the snow experiences.. haha). A few of the students really got the hang of the kites. And a few really got the hang of kiting with skies! First day!! Must be great instructors :)
Some wine, hot-tubbing and a lovely 3-course dinner later we were all completely out. I think we were all pretty soar, beaten up and tired Sunday, the snow was packed heavy by the wind, and prove to be incredible heavy to ride in (with my very very soar legs from 3hrs non stop kiting Saturday). It was windy but completely whiteout.. Forced myself to ride for about an hour. At that point both my legs were cramping and there was about 40 newbies out with kites and skies making the area pretty crowded, so I gave up kiting and we packed or gear and headed home. Apparently the wind died an hour later, made me feel a lot better :) The guys all got to ride for a little while and everyone was really happy with the course and the weekend. I hope at least I few of the guys will buy kites and continue riding!
Paul Gundersen took some great pictures throughout the weekend (below and link):
Sideshore Cameron Course
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Ready for snowkiting! |
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The dogs could smell Torstein's lunch |
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Me and Nani |
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Learning fast! |
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Espen showing how it's done |
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Not sure who this is.. But doing well! |
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Paul getting the kite ready |
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Ready for course |