On Friday we were lit! The crowds were thin while the wind was strong out of the NE. On the broad reach to the southern water tower the bugs were catching air at the top of every swale. I had one hand on the bar steering and leaning on the power while the other was handing onto the side rail with a death grip. I'm sure I beat my personal best at Jekyll on those runs.

We tried to go north to Driftwood Beach on Saturday but it was a bit too technical to squeeze through the crowds on the narrow beach with the big dog barking at my kite. We got while the getting was good and played a little further south.

Friday I got to ride my 15m Phantom 2 most of the day. It's so easy to handle in every respect. I sure wish it could have finished out the day for me but in a brief moment of mid-air inversion I spotted a splash of white in the middle of the black back side. I landed it to find a three in slice in the backside. Nick and I were dumbfounded. The kite had barely been on the ground and only on the open beach. I figure it must have found a barnacle on one of the many horse shoe crabs that littered the beach. I relaunched, flew it back to camp, and packed it. It'll be repair time next weekend.

Here are some photos from the weekend. Most of them are from a walk to the south end Saturday morning. It's worth the trip--even on foot.

Jekyll Photo Album

Philip

Fun trip! Friday was perfect conditions -- I don't think I've ever sped along so fast in a buggy on the downwind runs. I had to ask pbc twice just how many miles we were covering on each one, it was unbelievable. Even the upwind legs had us moving at quite a clip. Saturday was a much more technical day (for me) due to the surge in people on the beach and the almost dead north winds. Phreerider showed off his amazing kite control on the landboard, and even I came out of the day with some seriously improved confidence and kiting skills. Not too hard to do when your options are practice, or sit and watch everyone else have fun in otherwise good wind speeds ;-) The only sadness for me was the missed run up to driftwood beach, low tide corresponded with the almost pure north winds of the day.. Moving anywhere on the beach meant a lot of tacking, and I wasn't quite up to snuff to manage (even pbc was forced to turn around).

As it was my first trip to Jekyll, spent some time walking the beach saturday morning near the shipwreck and wow! what a nice playground that must have been for kiting. Running to the water tower still has a lack of people and wonderful features to look at. There's quite a bit of varied scenery on both ends of the island -- makes for fun runs up and down as the scenery and beach is always changing on each run. And yes, I learned the lesson that for every sandcastle, there is a giant pothole next to it :-)

JI is a sweet spot! perfect place to get some time in Nick. side shore rides are busy for sure. NICE FLYING with guys !