Cabarete, 8/7-8/14

[Jason Klein]

7 for 7, with a mix of 14m and 10m throughout. Stayed at kite beach hotel. Basic, but nice enough accommodations right on the beach. Wind came up between 12 and 1 every day and lasted til 6 or so, except the last two days, when storms cut it short around 4:30. Kind of a madhouse on the water near shore with many lessons going on, people that just seemed to not want to venture too far out, and the local Dominican kids throwing big tricks 10 feet out to impress their friends (and crashing their kites on the beach as often as not). Probably 50-75 kites up in the area around our hotel. Out at the reef (about 600 ft) and beyond, there was plenty of room. The reef offered 4 ft rolling breakers, which made for good ramps, and there was a nice swell beyond. I worked on front rolls, but with relatively little success. Probably tried 40 times, crashed spectacularly 30 times, almost landed a half dozen and actually landed 4. Tried a few kite loops, with similar results.

Our first day there, Lynn got run over by a guy in a lesson, who got himself completely tangled in her lines/kite and put a rip in my 10m. I swam out to help. Never seen someone so tangled up in lines. I calmly told him that I watched the whole thing, that his instructor had no business sending him out alone with a kite, that I wasn't real happy abouth the rip I could see where his board was draped over my kite, and that when we made it in, my wife wouldn't be nearly as nice as I was being. Upon our arrival to shore, lynn proceded to scream at him for 10 minutes. I think he got off easy.

Besides that incident, Lynn did well. She gets up easily, kites without falling until it's time to turn around and then starts back in. She's starting to stay upwind on some tacks, but not consistently, yet.

The second to last day there, I watched an ugly storm developing upwind of us. There was a destinct frontal boundary and it started to look like a picture with a caption of "what were these kiters thinking?", so I got off the water well before it arrived. It brought a 30 second gust of maybe 30mph, then the wind just shut off. Kind of laughed at the people swimming in, but that didn't last long. The next day brought a not-nearly as fierce looking storm about the same time. It got pretty gusty and after a bit, everybody else's kite was on the water. I started to head in. Being the only one still up and riding, i was again chuckling and thanking Deer Creek for having trained me so well for gusty winds. RIght about that time, the wind completely shut off and i got to be one of the swimmers. Oh, well.

Overall, a nice trip. Very inexpensive once you're there. A bit of a long trip from Utah, though. Just as easy, travelwise, to go to Maui.