Luckily for us the bikes we'd ordered from Ireland had arrived and after a good night's sleep and a HUGE breakfast (we've been in Asia for months, the sight of good bread/ pastries/ jam etc and we couldn't help ourselves) we put them together and cycled into the neighbouring town of Gera Lario to go kiting. 414 is the company and these guys take you out on a rib and launch you one by one and spend the afternoon zipping around giving you tips and rescuing where necessary.
The wind was pretty pants and we had to fight to get a good ride. We were pretty chilly by the end too. We cycled back to Dascio to find a mini festival in town, although feeling a little odd, perhaps from swallowing lake water or a bug from the plane.
Day two was much the same (we rapidly got into a routine of two meals a day) although preceded by a run up the hill before breakfast:
[average photo from viewpoint on the run, but it's the only one we took all week!]
Today though we had a few more knots and the kiting was awesome. Chris the instructor was fab and gave you just enough hints and tips before leaving you to practise for a while. We both stayed out until we could barely move - at over 4 hours on the water, it was more time riding than in the whole week in Thailand. When we got back to our place the lady told us excitedly in Italian (with a little help from a singer) that tonight had live music and if we bought a cocktail we could eat at the buffet for free. Crazy economics, but we did and it was fun.
Day three and the wind looked poor and we both felt pretty rubbish, Sam in particular was running a fever so we stayed in Dascio. We found out later there was only 10 minutes of kiting that day as the rain had come in. Day four was heavy rain and kiting was cancelled. An extra day to recover from the mystery germs was fine by us.
Day 5 we got a message saying 07.00am start to try and catch a forecast northerly rather than the afternoon thermal. We eventually got out around 08.30 and the wind was gusty and patchy. Aside from that it was freezing. Our toes went numb and we were chilled to the bone. We weren't too disappointed when the wind died after a few hours and we went in. We did then spend the afternoon walking up the big hill behind Dascio which was fun, and we couldn't resist running back down.
Day 6 started with a quick training ride up a very steep mountain above the kite school. We didn't quite have time to reach the top, but 2000ft of ascent wasn't a bad morning's cycle. The wind was light again and we were out with a different chap, remarkably, the same person who we nearly kited with in the Philipines earlier in the year. So light in fact he decided to do an experiment mid-afternoon. He put Sam on a 13m2 (huge kite) and the biggest board he had...just in time for the wind to come in...........
Both thrilling and terrifying in equal measure, so powerful in fact that Sam could park the kite at 11.30 on a clock face (12.00 is where you put it to stop) and still fly along faster than ever before. Riding was fun, stopping rather difficult. A few unplanned jumps later and he collected us in where we realised we'd kited all the way to the end of the lake and it was really quite late and everyone else had gone home!
Day 7, our last day, was unfortunately a bit of a flop. Although it was looking promising when we set out, the wind never really came in, and after 15mins of very light wind kiting and about an hour sitting in the water waiting to see if it was going to come back, we headed back in.
So whilst we definitely could have been luckier with the conditions, a pretty good day 6 and an amazing day 2, plus fun biking and running and of course great italian food have left us with smiles on our faces :)
No comments:
Post a Comment