Blogs Toronto - Saturday Sept 2
Kiting the remnants of Ernesto at two locations in Toronto Canada - Ahsbridge’s Bay and Cherry beach.
Saturday September 2, 2006 - Kiting the Remnants of Ernesto!
Set the alarm for 0600 hrs on Saturday since the forecast was for the wind to get stronger and stronger during the day as the remnants of Ernesto came to Toronto Canada. Got up and had a look outside - no wind apparently blowing so I went back to bed for an hour. I should have checked the weather site I use. Turns out the winds had already picked up.
Asbridge’s Bay
Headed out about 0730 hrs and decided to go to Ahsbridge’s Bay. This is a large sand beach right in the middle of Toronto. Good in a NE wind although the waves can be big for Lake Ontario. When I got there, there was one guy on the water in 1.0 - 1.5m waves and another setting up. Took some video of the conditions. You can see it on youtube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZN4FPp4K7o
Sept 19th - Here’s the full video… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CuKbOIFy7eY
Folks were riding 9m kites and the wind meter indicated that the winds were 18 - 23 mph. I’m a beginner - started kiting in May 2006 so I pumped up my 9m. Got a launch from another person and started having fun! It was a challenge for me to get going upwind, which was required to get out past the shore break. I tried 4-5 times and was marginally successful but ended up walking back up the beach. Wiped out a couple of times and had to relaunch the kite a couple of times. Great thing was there were only 3 of us there at this time.
I walked up the beach the last time with the kite over the water and noticed that the flag near the beach was blowing about a 10 degrees different direction than before. Gusts were more frequent and stronger so I decided to land the kite and check out Cherry Beach. Cherry beach does not have as big of waves as Ashbridges. Good thing I came in because more guys were showing up and I would have just got in the way. This was excellent experience though and I’m looking forward to the next time I can ride in waves!
Cherry Beach
Drove over to Cherry beach (10 Mins) and there were 3 folks kiting there. Waves were small - less than 0.5m with the wind about the same as before 18-22 mph. This was the first time I had ridden at Cherry and one the experienced guys helped with the launch and explained what to look out for. Had lots of fun on my 9m C kite. Was able to stay upwind, avoid the windsurfers 
, and not get stuck in a lull that was hanging around out in the middle of the bay. This lull was really weird. All around it the wind was blowing very strong. Yet one guy got into the lull and couldn’t get out and had to self rescue. Came in after about 2 hours for a break and some lunch.
What happened for the rest of the day was quite interesting and as I always find when I kiteboard, I learned some things. The wind did some very wild things
- several times it increased with gusts well over 30 mph (not too suprising). I learned to watch the clouds - they can sometimes give an indication what will happen with the wind.
- Wind switched from the NE to almost due north which created a wind shadow on the beach that made it difficult to launch. I learned stay on the beach!
- the wind died out where one might think you could increase the size of your kite. None of us did that.
The net result of all this was that for me, I didn’t get out for another session. I wanted to be safe and kite another day. It ended up 4 others tried to kite the conditions. Two people on C kites (10.5m and 7m) and two on SLE kites (12 and 9m). Both the people on C kites had to come in - one didn’t make it out because he was getting dragged. He hit his safety. The two SLE kiters had trouble launching but once they got their kites in the air they were ripping on the far side of the bay. Note that this is not a plug for bows but merely an observation that they can handle gusts well. I ride C kites by choice for my own reasons.
Well that was my last session that I’ve had. A good one overall. Got to try bigger waves for Ontario at least, and had a good session on my 9m, and rode at two new spots. And thanks to the guys both at Cherry and Ashbridge’s that provided advice and helped out!
Mobettah