how kitesurfing dreams come true. The dummy crash test (the end)

by Emilie Marx
(Part 4/4)

I’ve done a lot of fuck ups lately under the name of experimentation: as I explained in my last issue, I started putting together something I always wanted to do and it seemed evident to me I had to experience a maximum of blunders on my own… so that people joining me wouldn’t have to go through them.

Let me tell you I have done this extremely well!

Page 35: “Self launch for the first use of a kite and make sure to get your fifth line caught on a rock as doing so.”

Page 21: “Spread your sunscreen widely so that it goes all over your sunnies and in your eyes just as you down a big wave”

Page 62: “Throw a big kiteloop gone wrong a day that you forgot to tie your boardie properly”

Page 91: “Crash your kite in your power zone, right in front of a breaking wave“

Page 43: “Self land with on-shore wind and aim for the one broken bottle on the beach”.

Page 13: “Organise a big downwinder on a day there’s fuck all wind”

Page 7: “Buy a waterproof camera, lose it while jumping and do the best you can to land right on it”

Page 52: “Buy a very cheap kite on Ebay so you can receive a piece of crap that doesn’t fly”

Page 16: “Forget to look over your shoulder before doing a bottom turn on a wave on which there’s already a windsurfer”

Page 77: “Be very polite and leave the right of way to another rider on a day you’re perfectly overpowered so that you can end right in between his lines”

Page 88: “Ignore the tiny hole in your canopy so that you can watch your kite tear in half as you launch it” That was brilliant as well…

I could write an Encyclopaedia, actually!

At the end of my “crash test dummy experimental phase” I learnt some precious lessons!

I can now comfortably say that people willing to share my dream life can rely on my experiences and trust my judgments. Even if they belong to the “do what I say, not what I do” register…

I have trashed equipment, bought new ones (good and bad), I have gone on explorations, I crashed on every available piece of hanging reef, stepped on crabs, conch shells, got trapped in some evil waves, I got the forecast wrong, rigged too big sails, I did everything that was possible to do.
So now I’m ready!
Lol

I’ve found the boats, the motivated captain that I trained myself, I’ve explored the coast, I went to get more certifications (call me “Captain Em”), collected a whole lot of fun no wind options, I’ve done all the possible fuck ups myself so you wouldn’t have to go through them and now I have available the product I had been dreaming to find for myself.

I’ve done my best to keep the prices low so that the fun could be had at an affordable price and now Kitesurfari Sxm is a reality.

After months of hard work and sleepless nights to be up to scratch, I am escaping my Caribbean dot for a well deserved break in South America.
I will do my best not to add too many chapters to my brilliant instruction manual of the stupidest things one can do with a kite…

Have a wonderful start of fall and ride safely!

Em

Go back to Emilie's journal to read other of her adventures