Sunday 13th February - Windsurf *** River Orwell at Levington – cloudy.

Foil – 18.51 knot max, 17.14 knot ave., 11.11 knot hour, 14.77 knot mile, 26.74 km., 13.52 knot alpha.

Exocet RF AST 91 with Slingshot Hover Glide 76 with Tushingham Storm 5.2m.

The wind just keeps on blowing with another week to come and hopefully getting milder too! It remains a tad on the chilly side being only 7/8 degrees but you are fine especially when on a big foil board on the river with my Mystic palm less mittens working really well:) Was not sure about today but Robert was keen so agreed to meet up again at Levington Marina at 9.30. The tides are getting better all week and being high water, we had loads of water to launch from the usual spot today. No hanging around, straight out to set up the foil boards then with a strong onshore breeze, slightly more south today it was time to pick a sail, Robert went for his smallest 4m while I rigged my 5.2 and to be fair, I could have used my 4.2 today with some rock-solid gusts to 30 knots, I will pick the right size sail one day but it certainly keeps you on your toes! I launched and was beating out to the right and sadly caught the bottom with my foil, thank goodness I haven’t got an expensive carbon foil, it would certainly be wasted here with the muddy/rocky bottom! I then headed down river to find the wind and quickly realised it was pretty windy and lumpy on the corner so I quickly turned back up river where the water was much flatter but gustier. With it being SSW you could not sail so far down the river today so we had fun sailing diagonal runs from the marina towards Pin Mill both having fun gybing. It is great turning with small sails and I got a few good ones. It was nice to see some life on the river today, a huge flock of dunlins flying over, dinghy racing in the distance at Woolverstone with some yachts actually sailing:) There was an old-style schooner yacht heading down river so I decided to followed getting really close, it was great fun until suddenly I was under my sail not looking quite so cool! With the wind building we decided to call it a day as there could be loads more windsurfing next week! Quickly packing up, Robert had to help me put my board on the trailer because of the strong wind, hot shower and home.

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