You would have thought someone was playing a joke on us. Someone with their hands on the wind control panel. The craziest and most tormenting winds that I've ever seen, and Lord Scotworth agreed. A rigging fest like no other.
It began with Scott, Christian and I, all rigging 5.3-5.4. Scott took the first run. Nothing. Barely planed out, shlogged back. The whitecaps that were suddenly weren't.
About fifteen minutes later they were back. Scott launches. Then returns to the beach.
"It's 4.7!"
We all derig the 5's and rig 4.7's. About this time Frank shows up, and rigs a 4.7.
I got one run in, lit but happy, and came to shore to add downhaul. While I was adding downhaul sand began to blow in my face so I hid my head behind the board. What I was too foolish to realize (but had Scott and Christian laughing) was that the wind had built to 4.0. I went to get my smallest board, but by the time I got to the beach it was too windy to walk with it. Stashed it against the bulkhead, carried my 4.7 back to the van and derigged.
Frank launched on something like a 4.0 and a tiny board as sand was blowing down the road.
Then the wind dropped. Frank was shlogging. Scott Christian and I rerigged our 4.7's. Just as I finished the wind came back up to 3.4 conditions. Liquid smoke on the bay. It was comedy.
Then it dropped again, I put the 4.7 (now rigged twice) on a 93 liter board and got four or five runs in as the wind spun Northwest and got C O L D.
Time to go.
In summation, Scott rigged four sails and sailed three of them. Christian rigged six times, changing between three different sails. I rigged thrice with two sails, and got on the water with one.
Not a lot of actual windsurfing took place. It was nuts.
(Photo: A portion of Christian's rigged gear.)
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