On the week leading up to Christmas, I decided to take a little road trip up the coast to Geraldton with Erik (a Swedish kitesurfer I’d met at baggage claim when I landed in Perth) and some other kiters he’d met at the hostel he was staying at in Freo. In total there would be six of us- Erik (24), Eric (also Swedish, 20), Jan (German, 23), Zak (UK- Sheffield, 25), Mark (UK- Southend, 23), and me (UK? 21).
Since I know you’re dying to find out, our kites were a Takoon 12m (Erik), Flexifoil Atom ’08 9m (me) and Neutron ’09 9m and 7m (Eric), RRD Obsession 2010 9m (Jan), Best Waroo ’09 11m (Zak) and 7m (Mark). Mark had an 8 and 12 as well and I think Erik also had a 9m (keep in mind he’s 6’2 and weighs 105kg) but they didn’t use them. Board-wise, the only thing I remember was that Eric had a 136 Dragon (!) and Erik was on a 140 with boots as we were hitting fairly flat water spots.
Jan picked me up from Scarborough on Monday to meet the rest of the boys in Lancelin, where they’d been for a couple of days kiting the waves. We kited at a spot about 2km down from the kite beach, near the camping ground which was pretty sweet; it was another bay so the wind was either cross-on or onshore depending on where you were on the beach, but if you wanted to maneouvre upwind past the anchored boats and buoy lines there’s a nice wave break on a reef out by an island a couple of kilometres out. But we all know what happens when I get too near large objects like rocks… I figured the same would happen with a boat in the picture so I decided to take it easy and stick with the flat water closer to shore.
I have a nice afternoon kiting, up and riding both ways pretty easily but I still lose my board a lot, I don’t think my footstraps are small enough. But at least I can body-drag upwind now pretty well thanks to Chris (never had to do that shit in Wales but apparently it’s mandatory here), but I still lose a lot of ground when recovering my board, so I’m still doing the walk of shame 
When I land my kite after a couple of runs I notice that it feels pretty soft, only about half inflated. The last time I’d pumped it up it was a very hot no-wind day and I’d left it inflated on the beach for a good few hours, sometimes if you pump your kite up crazy hard like I do this can burst the bladder due to the air heating up inside and expanding. That day when I came to pack up my kite it was pretty much 80% deflated despite the valves still being closed; I got quite a few opinions on why that could have happened, ranging from a slow leak in the bladder to a burst bladder to a faulty valve, but when I pumped it up again straight after that it seemed fine so I didn’t think too much of it. I just assumed there was a small leak somewhere, but it was still kiteable so I didn’t mind too much.
Monday evening we drive up to Cervantes. By the time we get there it’s dark and everything is shut, even the petrol stations, so we just set up camp in a lay-by and head off to the beach first thing in the morning.
Cervantes is beautiful. We get to a spot and I’m not entirely sure we’re on the main kite beach seeing as we’re the only ones around, but the wind is perfect and the water is flat-ish and it’s epic. So I pump up my kite and do my lines all fired up and ready to go out and I get my harness on and squeeze a strut to make sure it’s still ok aaannnddd…. it’s deflated already. I turn my kite over and I can hear the leak, high pitched and very annoying; Erik has a look, replaces one bit that’s loose but then we hear another… and it’s no use, it needs to be repaired properly.
Gutted I’m at this amazing spot, dying to go out, and my kite is out of commission. Eric offers to let me use his 9m Neutron (which he was also on) so I go out for a while, almost run over some kids frolicking in the water with my board (gtfo) but damn, going upwind is EASY in flat water! The Neutron flies pretty much exactly like my Atom (figures, it’s basically the same kite just newer) but the bar pressure is noticeably lighter, I’m guessing because the bar he’s using is much smaller than mine?
Instead of cutting the trip short and going back Tuesday evening with Zak, Eric convinces me to stay by offering me the use of his 7m, seeing as I already have a Flexi bar I can use with it. We drive up to Dongara in the afternoon via various beaches and bays that were ok but nothing special and Mark spots a nice flat water spot by the marina about an hour and a half before sunset
. The wind seems pretty light and I’m not convinced I can get up and going on a 7m but we go for it complete with extremely dodgy launches (“ok, I’ll stand under this tree while you launch my kite, and I’ll run forwards as it goes up so the lines don’t get tangled in the branches”). I was right, however, and the 7m Neutron kept overflying zenith and crashing and the wind was so light it was pretty much impossible to relaunch. Eric and Jan were ok on their 9s, Mark was ok at first on his 7 but all of them found it difficult to go upwind so we called it a day after about twenty minutes and had a communal outdoor shower before we found a spot to camp.
Wednesday. Dongara to Geraldton wasn’t that far, it took about an hour and we went straight to a beach called Back Beach which was nuking 30-35 knots, I was aching to go out but that’s 5m weather for me. The boys wanted to scope out a flat water spot so we drove on, ended up at a spot by the lighthouse called Point Moore. There were a couple of kiters out already so Eric and Mark pumped up their 7s and decided to give it a go, but soon after they went out a local non-kiter ran up to us and said that one of the others had gotten into trouble out there and he’d called sea rescue!
The guy was alright in the end, didn’t actually have to be rescued, someone thought the kite (think it was an Airush, they’re very popular here) had inverted but he relaunched it in the end, was just carried a bit too far downwind in the process!
Thursday, Christmas Eve, there wasn’t any wind in the morning so we just went swimming/snorkelling and headed back home. I took my kite down to the shop in Fremantle, SOS Surf, on Monday since I think they’re the only ones that stock Flexifoil. The quote on the phone was $12 to take out the bladder and have a look, and $1/minute for repairs, so a small tear in the bladder would only cost about $20 to repair. To replace a valve is $40.
When they had a look at it, however, the damage was a lot more severe than I’d originally thought. All the valves were screwed, they were just coming off the bladder, and the guy in store, Nick, said that it just wasn’t worth it to replace them all at 40 bucks a pop. Instead I’m getting a new bladder… gonna cost me about $300 to fix 
And why this happened, you ask? The extreme heat in Western Australia actually MELTS THE GLUE holding the valves to the bladder. Apparently it can happen if you leave your kite in the car overnight, but I’m pretty sure it all stemmed from that day on the beach when I pumped it up and left it because the wind hadn’t kicked in.
See? I knew it. Lack of wind is bad for my bank account.
I should get a job.
love the last sentence