Wing surfing at Camber: Take 1

After the success of wing surfing in Dakhla and Devon I decided it was time to investigate some of the local options and so headed down wing surfing at Camber Sands for what turned out to be a mixed session. The wind was good for the F-one Swing 4.2m kite wing and it looked on. 

I arrived about 3 hours after high water with the water just coming off the groynes. It turns out this was ideal. There is a deep lagoon from the groynes to the sand bars and with the onshore conditions I had great fun buzzing around the lagoon for 30 minutes. 

However, all was to change. As the lagoon got shallow I was forced to attempt getting through the waves and whitewater to try and “ride” some of the lumps out back. This proved more difficult than expected… I managed to get about two thirds through on my first attempt and then lost power. This resulted in getting washed in. After the initial semi success the waves with the high frequency period made it impossible to get going. 

All in all lessons were learned and limitations realised. Deep water beaches and flat water are easy to get started on, but breaking waves make everything significantly harder. I think perhaps with more power those odds in getting through the waves would improve but that still doesn’t help getting started. Still it has given me a lot to think and will have to be revisited for wing surfing at Camber take 2 another time!