The van was loaded and off we set.  After initial favourable forecasts,  the weekend sadly didn’t quite live up to expectations so our kit never left the van.  Not that it was hardship as we caught up with friends over lunch and a few drinks at The Inn, bumped into several Bray Lake members and other familiar faces so who had time to get on the water!

Plenty of people were not as lazy as us though, so those that took to the water provided entertainment, plenty of photo opportunities and an interesting take on demonstating tricktionary moves with the help of a jet ski…

Despite not making it onto the water this time, all was not lost as got to meet the gorgeous Marcillo and despite his temporary relegation in my attention, Craig took a great picture for me.  Also picked up a few tips from the clinics for when I’m not feeling quite so fussy about the conditions.

Having struggled a bit at last year’s event it was great to see all bars open at The Inn on the Beach for the party, certainly helped things get going quickly and we had great night with a great set from The Heathrow Jets.

We’ll be sure to be in attendance again next year.

Contributed by: Becki Chivers

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It has been super windy here. 3.7 full power every day!

We now have dream list of what we want to achieve, a bit ambitious? – maybe, but we will try our best.

My list is:

• Shaka Flaka (done)
• Triple Flakka (done)
• Ponch
• Burner
• Switch chachoo
• Air funnel

Ricky’s list is:

• Clew First Punetta  (done)
• Flaka Diablo
• E Sider
• Switch Chachoo
• Funnel
• Shove it

The forecast is looking great although we both quite want a rest day!

Also the world has turned upside down and Richard managed to beat me upwind. It happened a few days back but it brought to an end my unbeaten run stretching back to the first year. So well done to Richard. I would just like to add that I have regained my crown of upwind overlord since. For those of you who don’t know how to get to the speed spot (where we freestyle) you have to sail around a spit so we usually race downwind and then back upwind around the spit. It is not normally close though.

Other than that I have learnt triple flakkas from my list and nearly done a switch chachoo. I think i will get them net time out. It is full moon at the moment so there is no wind today. It is a badly needed rest day because we have not had one yet. Hugh has some savage blisters on his hands so he is especially grateful.  Tomorrow my or may not be windy but after that its looking great again.

As we head towards the end of our visit, it continues to be really windy here.  Hugh has arrived and it has been a bit of a baptism of fire for him with full on 3.7 winds.  Ricky and I, as is Dakhla tradition from the first year, gave ourselves 6 moves to learn.  We have both learnt only one of them so far!

Contributed by: Jack

Registration was done and then heats were due to begin at 2pm. The Single Elimination began and Phil’s heat was drawn, he would take on current tour leader Kiri Thode in the first round. This helped to ease the pressure and Phil was able to relax and enjoyed his first heat. Both guys sailed well, Phil making many moves on both sides to get a good score, but he was unable to match Kiri’s style as he pulled powerful moves such as spock-culo’s, air bob’s & Burners in the challenging conditions.

The single continued that day but the finals had to be held off till the next morning as the wind dropped off around 6pm. Day 2 saw really light winds, so most of the day was spent chilling in the shade, waiting and hoping the wind would increase to enough for the finals to be ran. At 5pm the wind had luckily filled in and the finalists took to the water with sails around 5.3′s, and the crowd was entertained with the guys putting in a huge effort to get the results they wanted. The Single results saw Gollito in 1st, Steven Broekhoven 2nd and Anthony Ruenes in 3rd with Davy Schefers taking the 4th spot, a great achievement for the guys.

Day 3 we began the double, the heats were drawn and Phil was up against a friend, Andraz Zan, SLO 49. The wind had filled in by the afternoon and guys took to the water with sails around 4.7 – 5.0′s. For Phil, the heat was a close one, with him and Andraz pulling similar moves but Phil got the upper hand with a big Shaka and and nice Kono off of one of Costa Teguise’s waves.

The next heat for Phil was to be Tonky Frans, a tough draw but having already retained the 17th spot there was nothing to lose for Phil. The heat started unpredictably for Tonky crashing a lot of early moves giving Phil the early advantage. Phil was sailing well pulling a mixture of powerful and safe moves but it was not enough once Tonky found his feet and started to show why he has been one of freestyles top competitors over the last decade, landing Backloops, Bonka’s (Forward loop in to Flaka) and other insane moves.

The rest of the day the wind held and so the double was continued up until the quarter finals when the judges postponed the action to be completed the next day. So the competition was finished on the Sunday, with amazing heats seeing the worlds best use the windiest day of the competition to really show what they can do. Pushloops, Air Chachos, Spock into Air Bob were some of the most impressive tricks amongst many being seen and after really tight heats the final saw Gollito Estredo take on Steven Broekhoven again. Both competitors were throwing massive tricks but in the end even Steven’s no handed burner couldn’t beat Gollito’s massive Air Chacho and other strong moves he pulled in the 8 minute heat.

The event was brilliant, the windsurfing displayed was incredible by all the riders, the wind and waves were good and a great competition was finished, leaving the competitors excited for the next event in Fuerte, although for many doing the whole tour the next 3 weeks will give them a welcome break after 3 weeks back to back events in Bonaire, Aruba and Lanzarote.

For Phil and I, we are now in Fuerte training for the next event with Adam and many other UK riders. Its set to be a great few weeks, with challenging conditions to get used to, definitely no shortage of wind!

Contributed by: Danielle Lucas

This was then followed up by even more good news that Simon and Lindsay had booked the following couple of week,  with the addition of Rich and Lyn, who were coming to play too!

So, what did the ‘escapees’ get up to.  The fortnight with James and co was great fun!  We even saw the party animal in James come out to play – more than I have seen in the 4 years I have known him.

Not only that he fully threw himself into his windsurfing, trying freestyle moves with some epic outcomes…and no I don’t mean he mastered any, but we did enjoy the comic (if a little painful looking) crashes, usually right next to me as James definitely likes the camera!!

Phil and Laura took advantage of their stay, and put in a huge effort on the water, enjoying all the unusually good wind at a less than predictable time of year for Egypt (so lucky!).  In fact on some days Phil was so illusive, once he was gone on the water he didn’t like to come off, must be something in the name?!

During this visit, the political situation in Egypt took a worrying turn making the remainder of stay somewhat interesting!  Highlight of the week for James was our (top-secret) ride home in an Egyptian police van, during the peak of the riots in Cairo and problems in Egypt, after many a gin, vodka and tequila.  But don’t panic, it was in fun, not because we were in trouble!!

We took a photo of us in the back of the policevan afer we’d enjoyed a glass or two, this was a big mistake as the officer in charge panicked and made us delete the shot immediately… He obviously would have had a slapped wrist for being a  taxi driver for some inebriated tourists.  James was so excited by all this he insisted on phoning Frostie at 2am, luckily we saved Simon from this only to find James still managed a text to tell him all about it.  All in all, a really good time had by all.

The following 2 weeks when Simon, Lindsay, Rich and Lyn joined us, were equally fun. During the evenings, we managed to replace the dancing till 4 am and shots of tequila, with many a night on local gin, shisha and enjoying the fantastic range of local restaurants.

During the day we all played hard on the water and a good time was had by all. Simon was seen working on his aerial moves with Phil, while Linz and I messed around with old skool tricks and, of course, Linz got the Isonics out to play too.  Richard found a love for the Serenity after a first week of planing around on the Futuras when the second week brought less wind. The Serenity was perfect for keeping him flying across the bay.

Lyn had a great week of coaching with Neilson’s Heather and Jamie and impressed us all by getting comfortable in the harness and achieving footstraps at some points too, and most importantly enjoying the experience. The second week was much more chilled, with an opportunity to do a bit of SUPing and snorkelling to keep busy in the lighter moments.

Things in Egypt at this time were troubled, and we want to thank all our friends for sticking to their plans and coming out.  As they found out the situation in Dahab was ‘business as usual’, except a fraction of the other nationalities here and so the water was blissfully quiet.  The local businesses all appreciated the British not being put off by the volative situation in Egypt and still supporting the local tourism industry during such a difficult time for them all.

For Phil and I, we are working hard now catching up on sleep, detoxing a little, and of course working hard coaching,  photographing guests and training, in the lead-up to our next clinic, starting on March 5th in Moon Beach.

This should be a great week, we still have spaces too so if anyone is interested in a last minute deal please be in touch, flights are cheap and, the water is quiet, warm and the wind is up! Take advantage of a Moon Beach trip

Contributed by: Danielle Lucas

In the evening a group of 10 of us headed into the local town for something to eat and the odd beer / glass of rum as well.  After a very nice meal at Funny Mummy’s we wondered to a local bar where the Neilson staff tried and failed to get Frostie up on the karoke – it was left to Andy C and Andy (Neilson instructor) to hold the forte with a redition of “Blue Suede Shoes” which sounded more like cats being strangled!!

Day Four

On Thursday we were given the day off from instruction and if we wanted, could try new things.   Some took the opportunity to out for a sail in the morning however the wind dropped off by the afternoon – for me (Fiona) I took the opportunity to visit the pool and finish my book saving my hands as already have blisters.

In the evening four of us decided to allow Neilson to take us to the Thai resturant which was very nice, if fairly expensive for Dahab.  This was followed by the weekly quiz for about 5 of the party, the rest of us all had an early night.

Day Five (Friday)

Andy C, Vincent, Jean decided to take a morning cycle ride which I hear was rather hot work as the temp was already on the rise.

For Neilson this was coaching day which meant that those of us who wanted to work on our beach starts, including me, could do.  Unfortunately after a rather painful sail back to the beach bar for lunch the wind died completely.  We did experience causalty number 3 and our first blood as Lucy managed to kick some coral resulting in a bandaged foot for the afternoon.  The rest of the group headed off to snorkle – I didn’t join them as I had come out with a heat rash – doh!!  Everyone met up again in the early evening to watch Windsurfing II movie on the beach.

Contributed by: Fiona

The first week was all work, honest.  With 8 students on an advanced instructor course for Neilson and a good forecast Sam Ross (Neilson Dahab manager) and I knew we had our hands full. So just to make sure that I was fully acclimatised I postponed the course for a day and went sailing. After all is was 4.7 weather and it was a shame to waste it.

The course went well, once we started, with wind everyday bar one, theory day! The course was made up of Neilson staff including a couple of their Egyptians staff and Phil and Danielle (ex Bray Lake) working freelance (Get Windsurfing) check out their web site and a guy from Ardingly Reservoir.

Despite the hardship of having to talk windsurfing everyday and spend most of the day on the water we made it to the end of the week in one piece and with 8 new Advanced instructors.

While Sam and I were working hard Linz managed to keep herself amused, scaring all the freestyle sailors on their 4.5′s by buzzing them on her favourite Isonic and 7.5!

With an epic forecast for the following week we eagerly awaited the club trip (made up of members from Bray, Burfield and BTYC) with another free day on the water this time fully powered on 5.0′s. An awesome way to finish the first week and it looked good to continue for the next!

And then Crocker arrived! Since his arrival the promised wind has failed to materialise, we have managed to sail every day but it’s been very sedate. Crocker has done his best to keep us all entertained with a succession of incidents of which I’m sworn to secrecy and have promised not to say anything about the bathroom incident ending in him getting a black eye, or the attack from a sea badger that resulted in Andy having to defend himself with his fin before it was lost to the depths.

I gather you may now have more info but at least it wasn’t me that told you. And I also never told you about his karaoke debut last night! We have photos and will try and get them to you soon.

For further info on the Sea Badger type into Google!

Fingers crossed the wind will return before we leave or I may have to make a wind sacrifice!

Contributed by: Frosite

We had incredible conditions for the last couple of weeks in Dakhla and surprise surprise the other two managed to stay fit for all of it. I hope that you have all seen the video of our successes and wipeouts a little further down the blog!

The drive back was significantly less fun than the drive down. De rigging the marquee and packing up was all very depressing. We had a great deal of help for Isa, one of the beach guardians.The drive to Marakesh went pretty well, the Ricky Gervais podcasts again keeping us very amused. Once we reached Marakesh Ricky’s map reading skills failed us (standard) and we found ourselves totally lost. Marakesh it turns out is the most poorly signposted city in the world. After 4 hours of being lost we eventually found a sign for the airport, which as it turns out, was only 50m from the entrance to the airport. We dropped Ricky off which was a mega bummer and Tom and I continued on to Moulay, another 4hours down the road. This meant that Tom and I had been in the car for getting on 30hours when we arrived. This particular leg of the journey was in 47 degree heat and may I just remind you that our air conditioning had not worked from day one.

When we arrived in Moulay there was no wind, I think we would have been far too knackered anyway. The next day we had some 4.2 to 4.7 type conditions and some nice ramps for jumping. Tom sailed pretty well and got involved with some forwards. I was a being a bit of a wimp and concentrated on back loops. I made some progress though; sometimes over rotating, sometimes under rotating. Tom gave me a load of flack over lunch about not doing any forwards. Unfortunately we were both a little underpowered after lunch and nothing much really happened.

Day two was windier and I made up for being a wuss the day before and did a fair few forwards whilst continuing my assault on back loops. Boujmaa was out and was doing loads of doubles and huge back loops. Tom continues the experimentation that I started in Daklha with hooked in forwards. We can again conclusively conclude that they don’t work (or you have to be insanely skilled). Tom because he is the most unlucky man alive (he must have done many evil things in a past life) perforated his ear drum. This meant that he had to stay off the water for two weeks.

The third day there was less wind but there was a proper swell coming in. I went out on my 4.7 and there were some big logo high waves coming in and peeling nicely. There were only a few of us out so there were loads of waves to catch. It was my first day of proper wave riding and I really enjoyed it but I think that day two was the most fun because of the awesome jumping. We had a BBQ in the evening which would rather sculpt the remainder of our trip.

We left the next day because the wind was dying and headed for Ceuta. About halfway there I started to feel pretty ropey. Tom managed to get another speeding fine (typical) after we had run out of dirhams. We managed to bribe the police man with £10 English pounds which we assured him was worth 400dirhams (actually worth 120). We did our usual trick of missing our ferry by 1minute and having to wait for the next one. We slept in a service station near Malaga. This was not the grand return to Spain we had anticipated. This was because we were too late and by now I was pretty ill. From about week one in Dakhla we had been dreaming of the 16ounze steak we were going to get on our return to Spain. A soggy, stale sandwich from a late night petrol station was not quite the stuff of our dreams. Because I was so ill Tom had to do a heroic stint behind the wheel though Spain and France. The drive went well except for in Madrid and we missed a ferry in Bologne by 5 minutes. We made it back to Windsor in the middle of the night. And the next day we were straight down to Bray Lake to buy more Windsurfing gear and for our first pint of beer in nearly three months and the Fifield.

All in all an awesome trip we never stopped loving the windsurfing so bring on next year!

Contributed by: Jack

Last weekend we had a little disagreement with the Dakhla attitude kite center over the position of our tent. They were running a beach safety day for the local kids, our tent stood proud in the middle of the beach with Bray Lake stickers in full view so expect some orders to Western Sahara. Jack was not such a pushover this time and managed to argue our way out of moving the tent which was a massive relief.

The wind conditions have been 50/50 over the last week with it either blowing not at all or nuking everyone on the water. There seems to be a direct correlation between our dental hygiene and the quantity of time out on the water. Jack – who is fastidious about brushing his teeth spends as much time out as possible, Ricky on the other hand has brushed his teeth, once, twice, YES, three times, your talking bollocks! My teeth brushing isn’t the best but I do have an excuse for not being on the water although I have earned the nick name of “rest-day Gold”.

The wind wasn’t about this morning but it should be back this afternoon. The low tide is in the morning so Jack has been sailing in the chop in the afternoons and been doing some huge flakkas. When it is blowing full 3.7 it can be pretty gnarly out there. Ricky hurt his elbow yesterday but fingers crossed it is not too serious.

Looking forward to good tides and wind this week.

Thanks for reading

Contributed by: Tom

We have had awesome conditions since we last blogged. 3.7 or 4.2m sails have been getting some good use. Tom has been having an eventful time. Today he landed his first Vulcan which he was happy about however his inability to sail upwind meant he walked home and cut his feet so he is back his standard winging. Two days ago he managed to bag us a 400 Dihram speeding fine aswell so he may be sent home early.

Ricky has been clocking up loads of spocks and Jack has been getting along with his switch stance freestyle.

The forecast is looking great for the next few days so hopefully we will all have learnt new moves by the time we next blog!

Keep it REAL!

Contributed by: Tom (4th June 2010)

And again!

Weve been having some more great winds and with low tide in the middle of the afternoon its been super flat. The sand bars work best for freetsyle at low tide so we try to windsurf then. Ive been getting on well with switch and can occasionally get the board out of the water when trying shakas. Tom and Ricky are racing to learn flakkas. Tom is also hoping for his fist spock soon.

Our tent is holding its own in the 40 knot winds although we are slightly concearned what the brutal flapping is doing to our mental state. We now have use of a toilet which is very luxorious. This will spell the end of being chased around the rocky sand dune (our previous toilet) by hoards of Moroccan school kids (Me).

In other news Rickys elbow is holding up well and everyone is reasonably healthy apart from the odd ear plug getting stuck in ears (Ricky)

Keep it REAL!

Contributed by: Jack (8th July 2010)