Went out on my own for the first time on Sherman. This place is definitely a world of its own. I launched from Little Baja and got blown down wind. When I got to the power lines, I decided to self rescue, man what an experience. After the kite got wrapped around the reeds, i tied my lines to a 40 gallon water heater that was nearby, then i grabbed a home depot 5 gallon bucket and used that as flotation device to get back on shore. After making 2 trips back and forth, one to get my kite and another to get my lines and board (45 minutes) , i started humping all my stuff back to Baja (2 miles walk at 7 PM). One of the guys heading the other way stopped and gave me a ride back to my truck. Super awesome day. I am heading back this week . Sherman Island will teach you how to kite board.

(I joined KF specifically to respond to this posting)
DT,
I launched you that Thursday night and watched you go downwind.
Some of your statements concern me.
You decided to self rescue when you got to the powerlines?? Before you arrived at the powerlines on your downwind run you should have been mentally prepared and well setup for a self-rescue. If you delay your preparation, you will drift past the last get-out and go to Decker Island. It's safe to say based on your experience you should have been mentally playing your self-rescue technique in your head before I launched your kite.

Going by your description of getting out of the water, the decision to self rescue was not made at the right time. You drifted into an area that is less favorable for getting out. Does that mean you started your self-rescue too far into the channel or you didn't hold your kite right; I wont speculate.

Sherman Island is at the end of it's season so you will get fewer and fewer days as time goes by.
I encourage you to check out www.bayareakiteboarding.com. It'll give you more local support from people who better know the area (I am a member).

Sherman Island will not teach you how to kiteboard; it will teach you how to recover from getting your butt handed to you...hopefully less and less with each time out.
Cheers,
Jason

The Kiteboarder just ran an 11-page feature story on "The Sherman Experience." One of our fans emailed me and wrote that the article was most likely one of the most thorough and best travel stories he had read -- it was like being there....

You can get the article by getting a print mag, or downloading it at Itunes (The Kiteboarder app) or the TKB store (PDF format). It will be available online at end of Dec/early January when our next print magazine mails out.