London

We had a fantastic day in London yesterday, we were lucky to go on a boat ride from Westminster to Greenwich, before wandering up through the town. The weather was great, even though we'd been mid blizzard the day before upon arrival in the city. That was pretty special though, bringing something magical to the centre of London.

fish eye playtime

We have been playing lots with my new lens, learning what it can do. I am hopeful for more blue skies and sunny days so i can get out more with it. Can't wait to try it for a water session in Egypt!

Photos from Hayling Brrrrr!

So here are the best of the pics from our chilly session at Hayling and Langstone last Sunday. It was a major shock to the system, after 14 months in Egypt arriving home to the UK in December!! I really enjoyed the session, although everything is much harder with numb fingers and the temperature made me a bit slow to react..unfortunately never a good thing when trying to avoid falling in!!! It was great to check out my new shiny kit, looks good hey? Love it!

I am really hoping the weatherman is wrong and that instead of cold and snow next week we get some good wind and warmer weather. I would love another couple of sessions in England with mates before we fly to Cape Town.

We got out on Sunday at Hayling Island. Unfortunately we were a bit late for the tide and so the shore break was nasty, but I went for a spin on my new Wavetwin 66 which was sweet. We relocated to Langstone Harbour at high tide and had a bit of a play on the flat. Everything is a lot more difficult when you can't feel your fingers!! It was really great to get out in the UK, sailing with mates we have not seen for far too long. I am very happy with my new board and also got to try out my new 4.0m which is super light and really nice. Photos will be coming at the weekend as my computer is in for repair at the moment. :S

Home sweet home!! 10-15degrees cooler, but still gagging for some windsurfing!!

We spent our last week in El Tur packing up the centre for the winter. It will be closed for 2 months while some maintenance is done, before reopening in February. There was not much wind, which although we would have loved some, helped us pack away smoothly and prepare ourselves for a month in the UK, something which, when you have lived in Egypt as long as we have, is quite a shock to the system!

We are now in the UK, a little cold, but very excited as we are going to Hayling Island tomorrow for a Severne demo day. The forecast is good!! 20-30Knots of wind and 4m swell! Bring it on!

I am really excited as I get to take out my new 66litre RRD Wavetwin with some new sails too, Severne S1's. Its under a month now until we go to Cape Town and so I am really excited to get some practise in on my new kit before we fly!

Hopefully I can get some shots up here to show you after tomorrow, I am excited too because I can pick up my new Fisheye lens tomorrow night too so there will be fun to had with that too! Watch this space!

We've had lots of wind again and so we've been out trying to nail new moves before we leave for our winter holidays (starting in the UK brrr!!). I also spent a while in the tower a few days ago and got some nice shots from a new angle. Its hard to get as close to the tower as we'd like but Phil did a good job and i really like the shots. We have a tower to put in the water but it is not so stable and scares the life out of me so we will have to put up with this! No one else offers to go up and picture me though so i guess i'm not the only one scared although the equipment is all mine which definitely adds to my fear!

El Tur from up high

We went for a hill/mountain climb after a lightwind day. It was a bit of a scramble but the views were amazing and it was really nice chilled out way to finish the day and start the evening. The views are of the wave bay and the moses bay where our hotel is, as well as the inland view of El Tur, the administrative capital of the Sinai.

The wind is back :)

Finally the wind has come back, in true egyptian winter style its cool and gusty, but also very very strong! Today I am holding back from going out as even on the smallest sails available its not fun. I will wait till later or tomorrow, as i'd rather do this than injure myself!

We managed to get some night shots last week, which was quite fun although unfortunately technical problems meant we didn't get so many as we'd hoped...maybe later we can try again!

I have ordered a new lens to play with, a 6mm fisheye, which I am really excited to see the results we can get from watershoots and and also just other fun shots with it. I will pick this up when i get to the UK so this is going to be amusement until our trip to Cape Town where I hope for some awesome results.

Watch this space :)

Still little wind over here, but the volleyball action has been intense and we are now getting pretty good at it, we have beaten the Russians from the other centre 3 days in a row now, they even tried to put us off by buying a new ball which was a bit odd but we got used to it, and whooped them again :) They are pretty good players too!

We have also had a few more BBQ's, one especially good was for my birthday, which Phil and I made homemade burgers with garlic, chilly, crushed black pepper and stuffed with Mozerella....sooo yummy!!! And also some amazing lemon and chilly calamari! Dinner was amazing and it was great to have the Russian staff over to have a meal between friends, no guests invited :)

Last night Phil and I went to Sharm el Sheik again, not for ice skating this time but to eat some good food and a watch the football. It was great to get away, do something we haven't done in such a long time, and we even managed to find a very nice bar with a very nice wide-screen TV and three sofas just for us, most importantly not too many horrible English tourists about to make us want to come back to El Tur!

No wind, BBQ time!!

No wind has led to us building our very own homemade BBQ, which we are surprisingly very pleased with! Last night saw its debue and it was awesome, really tasty food and a good night had by all! Just excuse the dodgy photo, although i think its kinda funny!

Where is the wind?!!!

So there has been very little blog action because there has been very little wind!! Somebody turned it off and to start with it was a nice rest, now we are slowly going crazy!!

We have played a lot of volleyball, been SUPing and snorkelling lots and connect 4 has become a very popular game!

Last night we had some excitement in the form of iceskating in Sharm el Sheikh followed by a few drinks in the centre of Sharm. We are not fans of Sharm, its tourist central and so built up and busy, but we know a couple of good places, chilled to for a bit, got in our dose of very good ice cream and then headed back to the quiet of El Tur. It was a really good night and a good call for our sanity!

The forecast now has some wind coming through at the end of the week i'm really hopeful it comes through! Until then I think I will have to learn to fish! Wish me luck :)

My new board!!

Finally I managed 20mins of (painful) freestyle on my board yesterday, I was on a 3.7 stacked it was howling, and I am so happy with my board, it likes strong winds a lot more than the other boards i have been using! With Phi's 15.5cm fin too its sweet! 

Ribs feeling a bit better today so hopefully get some more playtime, 3.7 weather again :) !!!

So I have still got sore ribs, but thats ok for me because the curse of the wind is still taking place.  Its windy but a gentle force 3-(bottom of)4 most of the time.  

We have however had a very funny week, with some awesome guests, 4 in particular were away from the families for a week and armed with Rum and the all important Elvis suits.  The first Elvis night involved warm up drinks followed by beach olympics in elvis suits and snorkelling gear, followed by board lobbing competitions, to say the least.  We were then treated to a second Elvis night, involving plenty of egyptian Rum, everybody having a turn in the suits dancing Elvis- style and then plenty more dancing.  It was one of the best nights we have had in the hotel in the whole year I have been here.

I have put up some more pictures, from this week, wavebeach trip, a good advert for Severne sails, and also a little elvis in action. 

New board = worst wind since July!!

So I got my new board, an RRD Twintip 88, and I am really happy with it.  Its a little different to the one I'm used to, but I have managed do everything i normally can do on it.  Now to some new moves!!  Sadly it bought with it a curse on the wind, we've had the most lightwind days since July this week.

I haven't yet got any photos but its on the list of things to do definitely.

The windiest day this week bought winds of 35knots or more.  The guests all wanted to check out the wavebeach so we headed up there and spent 3 hours jumping and riding, it was some of the best conditions i have ever seen there.  I spent a while at my tripod photographing the guests, who thankfully kept me entertained with some great aerials, sneaking in a few runs in between with a few nice jumps for myself.   

Later we decided to do the downwinder back to the centre, great fun, except the wind out in the middle of the channel wasnt so good, being on a 3.3m sail I spent most of the time bobbing back, when I finally got planning I stacked a gybe down some massive swell and had to finish the trip with really bruised ribs.  

I managed a few freestyle sessions yesterday on my day off, making sure my new board can spock. We went back to the wavebeach which was great, very mellow and chilled out compared to the day before.  Even in the swell and small waves I managed a couple of vulcans and a spock before the wind died which i am very pleased with. I need to take a couple of days off to get my ribs better and chill now.

We had a couple of nights where it seemed to be windy and so the boys went on the water and I got the camera out.  Sadly the first night it turned out to be a tempting gust and no more, the second night was better although still not amazingly windy.  Phil and Dan managed to pull off a few moves and we got a couple of great shots.  I'm really looking forward to some more windy nights so we can improve on these pictures, maybe even get one of me :) .

I was disappointed that my last photos were unable to be enlarged so I have reloaded the same shot in a different size so I hope you can click and zoom now, I have also posterized it in photoshop for a bit of difference, I think its pretty cool.