Blowme, that kinda sounded gay..."And the Younger Guys Ride the Bi's", but then what can we expect from someone named BLOWME?
Rick, dude...WTF!?!? SIX MILES!?? Was that intentional? If so, why not pre-arrange a ride back? Dude....SIX MILES? Are you serious? What happened? I can't even fathom being blown downwind 6 miles so it must have been intentional. Tell more please, I'm really curious about this one. SIX MILES!?! Like, not 3, or 4, or even 5, but 6??? Holy shit! I think I would have had to abandon the gear somewhere, like maybe at a convenience store with a nice clerk or even deep in a bush somewhere and make the hike to the car and drive my ass back for the gear. SIX MILES?? WITH the gear!? More of a man than me, no doubt about that. I don't think I would have/could have done that!
I came into kitesurfing without any waterskills whatsoever. Never windsurfed. Never had the desire to. Never wakeboarded. Had a little desire, but no boat. Never surfed cuz I had never seen a wave. Did know how to ride a skateboard... does that count?
I did though have an extensive history with controlable kites and traction kiting. I remember when friends used to make fun of me for going to fly my kites...now it's cool and I get paid for it. I even actually thought once that I was going to invent a new sport. I had been out in the water with one of my traction kites playing with it and I discovered body dragging for myself. Well, what's the next idea that would come to mind after that...of course try putting something under myself to ride on while the kite pulls me. What came to mind instantly was a surfboard with straps on it. I know, I know, this all sounds alot like BS, but it's true story...have I ever lied to you guys here? So my brother and I(he helped to come up with idea...I discovered bodydragging and took him out to do it and he told me we should try with surfboard) came home from the beach that day and got onto the internet to hunt up an old surfboard to buy that we could drill and put some straps on and try riding it behind our traction kites. THIS is how and when I discovered kitesurfing. In searching for "+Used +Surf +boards" on the internet, I came across something called a kiteboard that was supposed to be used for something called kitesurfing. WTF!! Next search obviously was for "+kitesurfing" and lo and behold I had found my calling!! Here I was thinking that I was about to invent a new sport, one that I even expected to be laughed at and made fun of by my friends and others, and someone had already done it. Shit, people around the world were riding kites on boards already! I didn't care that I didn't get to invent the sport, money and profit was the furthest thing from my mind when I was inventing the new sport...I was doing it, combining traction kites with water with surfboards for my OWN fun and enjoyment and would have never thought that it would have evolved into what it has today. Anyway, I didn't care that I wan't the inventor, in fact I was happy....saved me alot of time, research, development, R&D, embarassment, and who knows what else. I was happy that I could not only buy a board made to do this with but I could also buy a kite that was made for the water and wouldn't sink like the c-quad I had been planning to use. So that's how I discovered the sport and how I got into it.
I will admit though that when I did discover the sport I was a bit pissed off about one thing though, and that was the fact that this sport had been evolving for several years, already had people doing it, AROUND THE WORLD, and I had NEVER seen or heard of it before. I thought...why in the hell doesn't these guys doing this let the rest of the world in on the incredible high you get from it? That was several years ago. Back then you could goto pretty near any beach around here or even around Florida in general I think for that matter and not see a kitesurfer. So if you were like me and not into watersports like windsurfing and not looking at windsurf magazines (I only assume that one may have seen a kite or two in a windsurf publication way back in the day), and not in touch with surf shops cuz you don't surf, it could be very easy at that time to NOT know about the sport. This, the lack of publicity and info, and at that time even the lack of more than 1 or 2 halfway decent kitesurfing websites, was the idea and reason for the birth of
http://www.tbks.net.
And here we are today. That's my story on how, when, why and from where. You do have to admit, it is a bit more unique story than the average kitesurfer on the water today. Most come from windsurfing, or wakeboarding, or from NOTHING, but at least the ones that came from nothing....even they got to see it being done and then decide they wanted to try it. My discovery was a bit different.
Must admit though, it would have been kinda cool to be the inventor of the sport like I thought I was going to be, but I am perfectly happy and content right now with where I am at and how I got here.
Pea's Out!