The Peconic Puffin Windsurfing Blog

Bonaire Windsurfing Vacation Guide 2014

Here at Peconic Puffin World Headquarters we receive a lot of inquiries about Bonaire.   The blog posts are apparently not enough...some folks want specific questions answered.  Here are the answers to the usuals:

Best Place to Rent Windsurfing Equipment:  Jibe City, because it opens at 8AM.  Windsurf Place is just as good, but it opens at 9, and the wind has been up in the morning in Bonaire. (If you've never been, these places are 50 yards apart...both on the water with excellent equipment and service.)

Restaurants We Loved:  We don't eat everywhere in a week, but here's our latest news:  At Sea is still outstanding, as is Appetite.  We tried the tasting menu at Appetite this time (with paired wines)...we were entertained, but I think we'll go with the menu next year.   Bistro de Paris gets a downgrade.  I hate saying this, but since they moved to a larger location two years ago it's just not as good.  The food is fine, but service and charm are down two notches, two years in a row.   New spot worth checking out:  Ingridients (that's the correct spelling.)   On the water at a dive club, we ate great entrees while watching pools of light move on the water from the night divers below.  Their appetizer concept is annoying ("bites"...bite sized individual items that we predict will not be there in 2015) but otherwise very pleasing.  We'll be going back.   

Do I Need To Wear Booties?   Every year I say yes, though I haven't stepped on anything that felt (through my booties) like a problem in years.  Like a sea urchin, for example.  On the other hand why would you want to risk hurting yourself and possibly missing a lot of sailing?  Bonaire is almost entirely shallows...you'll be walking on the bottom a lot.

How is the wind?  Word there is it's been blowing solid for two years straight.  I spent time on six meter sails every day of our week.

Best Windsurfing Instruction:  ABK is there (of course.)  If you're not going during a clinic week, Caesar (the lightwind freestyle master) is teaching out of Jibe City, while Elvis at Windsurf Place has a number of people who I observed teaching, though I can't say which is better

Flights to Bonaire:  All we know is the Newark run on United, but if you haven't heard, it's civilized now. Used to be take off at midnight Saturday, arrive 5AM Sunday and have to wait for your hotel to open (or book an extra night for early arrival) with a very early departure the following Saturday (7AM so get to the airport before dawn, and no windsurfing of course.)  No more!  Now arrive Sunday afternoon (we got two hours of sailing in on arrival day) and leave Saturday afternoon (we got two hours of sailing in again!)  

With Bonaire it's important to get in front of these things.  If you arrive without a gear reservation  or restaurant reservations, you can actually get shut out (on this trip I planned to rent from Jibe City, for example.  I forgot to book it in advance but took for granted that I'd be okay when I arrived.  Jibe City was polite and a bit mortified when they told me they could not equip me!  Fortunately Windsurf Place still had some slots left.   Same for restaurants...the good ones book up more than a week in advance, and they're not all open every day of the week.  Best solution for me has always been Ann Phelan, Bonaire travel agent (and windsurfer) who lives there half the year, knows everybody and knows the minutia and latest changes better than anyone.   (I have made mistakes by ignoring some of her recommendations!)  She doesn't charge you (she charges the vendors) so there's no reason not to use her.  Peconic Puffin endorsement.

Other commentary and recommendations welcome (let the Wil's Grill fans let it fly!)

Jibe Sally Jibe (Puffins in Bonaire)

The moment we hit the water in Bonaire, Sally began her jibe program.  Okay she sailed 50 yards, got off the board to adjust the boom height, and then began it, but really there was no warm-up at all.   Sally was there to jibe, I was there to give her loving uncritical unjudgemental loving warm considerate loving supportive jibing tips (while smiling).

We actually pulled it off!   Sally has been hitting the occasional jibe for a few years now, but she got about 20 last week in Lac Bay, including one stretch with four in a row.  Some were prettier than others, but the key was there were lots of jibes.   Last year Sally didn't sail away from one until the last day.

I'm going too fast here.

We arrived in Bonaire on Sunday, meeting Puffindom's Napeague Axis (Dana, Andy, Lili and Wilson) who had arrived a few days before and had warmed up the bay for us.   Dana, Lili and now Sally all wore their Xcel shorties (years earlier Sally proclaimed "if I had the sleeveless shorty that Lily and Dana have, I would sail faster and with more control, and my jibes would improve."  This has proven to be true.)  The first couple days I needed 6.5-7.0 sails (one day a 7.5 I confess) but things settled in at 6.0 for me just about when Team Napeague departed (sorry guys...we got all your wind...perfect wind for Sally's jibefest.)

While the official mission was to improve Sally's jibes, I too came with a purpose:  Learn the carved Upwind 360 in the footstraps.  I'd been doing them as part of nonplaning freestyle for a decade, but any time I went for one planing it was complete humiliation.   I didn't understand...how hard could it be to carve upwind past "12" and then be in position to spin?  I always made it to 11:30 (and then got stuffed.)  

Enter ABK's Andy Brandt, who

A:  Taught me the nonplaning upwind 360.

B:  Is a windsurfing instruction genius.

C:  I have done enough ABK clinics with him that he can speak in shorthand to me.

He gave me three key points...sheet out when initiating the carve (counterintuitive to me, but okay), luff the sail while bringing it forward, and get my head over the middle of the board.  That will get me through "12", at which point the nonplaning 360 technique comes into play.   It worked!  My first day I was going 360...and getting slammed at the end.  The second day I was waterstarting out of 360's.   My first attempt on day three I sailed away dry from my first upwind 360, in front of several people including one of Windsurf Place's instructors, who gave me a big thumbs up.  Yes!   I hit six dry over the rest of the week, and as many with waterstart exits.  Also more slams but whateva...

What else did we learn?   Sally declared "I don't like gloves" and didn't wear them on day one.   You know how that goes.  Gotta love a wife who says "next year bring more duct tape for my hands!"   Also she will wear her gloves on the first few days.

I learned to translate Jibe City's windmeter.    This was bittersweet, because for years my favorite way to find out what the wind was doing was to ask Brendon Quinn (ABK instructor who is always around.) Brendon doesn't like to be asked about the wind by someone who should be able to figure it out himself, but that's half the fun of asking him.  In 2014 Brendon took a stand, refusing to tell me what the sail call was.   I asked him once anyway for old times' sake, before ascertaining that the meter works just fine.  It reads in knots, but IMHO it's best considered as miles per hour.

There was of course a contingency of Long Island windsurfers there...Jimmy Rivera, Thandi, Jill, George etc.  Special shout-out to Thandi, who I had to work like hell to pass on a speed run...just a few years ago I had the privilege of being at an ABK clinic where she showed up as a "never tried windsurfing before" student.  Now she burns!   Here was a first:  I was going through comments submitted to the Puffin when I got one from people I'd never met, who were staying in the bungalow immediately next to us (hello Claudia and David!).  

Lots more happened, but this is enough for now.  Also I'm hoping to lay my hands on some of Jimmy Rivera's photos and video!

(Top:  Lili, Dana and Sally practice one-handed jibe carve initiation.  Bottom: My bride's hands at the end of the week.)

 

Top Ten Reasons To Date A Windsurfer

On this Valentines Day, ladies are you still looking for that special someone? Consider looking for love amongst the windsurfers:

10. The ratio of men to women is 4 to 1.
  9.  They can talk about something besides football.
  8.  They don’t smell too bad because it’s a good bet they’ve gotten wet recently.
  7.  They have another interest besides sex.
  6.  You know they’re rich enough to afford windsurfing equipment.
  5.  You always get the latest weather report, several times a day.
  4.  They are capable of commitment, at least to their sport.
  3.  They have no issues about wearing rubber.
  2.  You always know where they are, at least when it’s windy.
  1.  Windsurfers are generally fit, tanned, and have cute butts.

Non-windsurfing men should NOT...repeat NOT...pursue windsurfing women, unless they are prepared to immediately throw themselves into the sport.  Otherwise such men will be surrounded by angry windsurfing men who all seek the great and rare prize:  the girlfriend or wife who windsurfs (the editor is so blessed.)   To squander such a find on a landlubber is an offense to those of us who sheet in!   

(There is the opinion held by a small minority that it is a drag to be a man whose significant other windsurfs...you probably have to rig for them, they use your equipment etc. but generally speaking the willingness of such wahines to make every vacation a windsurfing vacation, to understand why the garage needs to be packed with tons of expensive wet gear etc. outweighs the rigging/sharing concerns.  Discussion of such matters is encouraged.)

Haas Tack, Not Push Tack Homes!

I met it as the Hoss Tack. A crazy jibey looking thing in Aruba, as performed by Andy Brandt and Jason Voss. A carved question mark. That was 2000.

I was hitting the occasional Hoss (ugly but dry) a few months later, but not long after that I caught the move on a Peter Hart tape, which referred to the move as a Push Tack. Boar-ring! Who wants to do a push tack? Where is the poetry? Hoss tack please! But by and by I kept hearing and reading "push tack" and finally found self saying "'hoss tack', usually called 'push tack'" to cover my ass. There was no joy in Puffinville.

Then just a few days ago I stumbled over this: "The Haas-Tack is a flashy transition that integrates a variety of technical skills such as switch stance riding, backwinding, and clew first sailing. When mastered this move is a flowing and artistic maneuver showing graceful sail and board control. Sometimes called (erroneously) a Push-Tack. Invented by Hass Jahrmarkt of Tangier, Morocco while experimenting with a variation of the Duck-Tack."   You can also find it spelled "Hass"...I suppose only Mr. Jahrmarkt knows for sure.

Did some Googling and found this in several places. Erroneously called a Push-Tack! They might have added "unimaginatively" and "boringly" and "tediously"! Yeah! Haas! Go throw a Haas Tack. If you can't, go learn it. (I know the idea of backwinded clew-first sailing in planing conditions does not immediately sound...attractive or attainable, it is possible and it is fun. I hit my first one on a Seatrend slalom board with a cammed 7.5 sail. That is about as stupid as it gets, and I suck at freestyle, and I still hit it. So you definitely can!)

(In the video at the top, I hit (barely) a Haas Tack in Bonaire while being coached by Pete Dekay in an ABK clinic (2004). The still photo is of Hoss, for whom I thought the tack was named. Now I'm wondering if the dude tacks at all.)

I would be killed in these conditions

 

Or seriously harmed, at any rate.  Can you imagine being in those waves?  What an incredible rush (do not let go of the boom!)  Red Bull Storm Chase, Cornwall, UK.

Massive Jump Photo, Video...Hospital Air

I've seen a lot of angles of monster jumps, but this one really gets me.  The guy is a spec in the sky!  Posted by "Guavajelly" on Facebook, it is almost certainly from the insane Red Bull Storm Chase session in Cornwall.   Thanks to Andy in the OBX for calling attention to it!

 

 

Magical Winter SUP

If only I'd caught it!  Jeff reports:  "Another magical winter session today with the Wolf, Christian, Joe & Marty. Knee to waist glassy lefts, blessed by a curious seal. Pic of Marty with the Wolf behind him."

"Another" because Saturday was good too.  Nice!   Pic by Jeff, of course.

Great Photos: Ripples

Producer, videographer and jibemaster Dasher posted this exquisite photograph on his Facebook page.  A SUP paddler's-eye view of a board gliding through water smooth as glass.  Those ripples in the reflected sky are incredible.