Winter Windsurfing 2014/2015

I was fortunate in that it got cold after the warm spell in December 2014.
That meant that there was ice up at the lake.
Pretty GOOD ice at that. People were skating the entire lake.

I had originally brought my snow sailboard, but went back home and got my ice sailboard - pictured below. After that I had three(3) great days on the ice.

Once back home, I was hoping to get out on the snow. When I tried it on the local river, I realized that i needed 20-40 kph winds for the SailWorks Retro 8-oh that I had purchased for winter sailing. Naturally the first time I did go out for a real session, I forgot my harness :-( and thus could NOT last more than 1 minute or two at a time - before i needed a break :-(

The next time out I obviously did NOT forget my harness and met Claude at OKA Parc. Claude is at about the 15 minute mark. (btw Claude is pronounced Clode !!)

Need to reduce the film length for the BEST parts and put some music:

After that session I removed the front snowboard and feel perhaps I will ONLY put it when needed. All I need to remember is bring that board plus some 7/16 wrench and socket... Feels like the extra "plough"/push is ONLY required when there is more snow ie deeper.

I was a little surprised when people always ask the same question first: "How fast were you going?" It is NOT about speed for me. It is about FUN, TOW/snow and being outside. Perhaps the question is meant more like, "MAN, how fast were you going ?? " :-)

Just found this video - fellow is riding on a "windski" fabricated by Langis Caron !! jibes and everything



And George of Rhode Island who has a Hiberna , real Windski AND a snowfer showed me this clip:


and here is my 58 minute cut back with some musak :-)



However, deep snow requires a whole new perspective. Believe i will remove the front snowboard because it does not do much in less snow and does NOT help in deep snow. Feodor of Finland suggested wide jumping skis. They are rare and expensive. Will try some other alternatives first :-)

This winter has been rough with extreme cold for extended periods, deep snow and now really bad cold/flu :-(

Well, I think I finally came up with the "right" ideal for deep snow windsurfing ... I was going to base it on our German sled:

Was thinking of putting the skis under the sled rails and the snow board on top without altering the sled. Then I came across this ... from instructables

The idea is to use my old parabolic skis, the PVC cross bars and then a snowboard on top :-) Could even put some straight pipe to make it higher :-)

And parts should be light and readily available :

Harder to find the bent adapters than I wouda thunk... Started my summary sheet for the winter of 2014 to 2015. In early March I have had ONLY seven (7) sessions to date. The good news is the average rating is 8 outta 10 !!