Port Douglas...GC crew - anyone back yet?

Yeh Craig, yes, we're back!!!

Most of us haled ass back here on Sunday a few others stayed on. The results of the trip and I feel I'm speaking for all of us that we had a blast! Wind was with us right from the get-go. As we pulled into Port Douglas on the Wednesday prior we just dropped our bags of to the Resort Hotel and headed straight down to 4 Mile Beach with our gear where we enjoyed a whole afternoon of kiting in about 20kts of super smooth wind. Two of our party members Col and Jamie were dropped off at Yorkeys Knob on the way and they kited from there to 4 Mile Beach saying they struggled with wind at first and had to head a fair way offshore to catch the wind before heading north and tracking along the coastline they reached Yule Point where they said it was very clear water and plenty of coral and wildlife in the water that they kited past before reaching 4 Mile. I'm not sure how far that is maybe they could verify it or some one else but it would have to be over 50klm.

Day 2, Thursday, the wind started to kick in about 10am in the morning and remained about 15 to 18kts all day and most of us kited 4 Mile Beach with a few like Glendawg, Matty, Paul, Jules, Andre cutting upwind heading South and for a little tour. A couple of others hit the Cable Ski Park in the morning and had a bit of a session there where they happened to run into Ewan Jaspen so I heard. That night it was game on and plenty of bevies were consumed with quite a few of the crew hitting the bright lights of Port Douglas Town where Col ripped it up at The Iron Bar with a Gun's & Roses karaoke number and the rest of the night turned into a bit of a blur. According to Jon, he found Guy crashed out sitting on the dunny.

Day 3, Friday and the wind was not wanting to play ball. It was teasing us by hovering around 13kts most of the day. Once again a few of the lads went and hit the Cable Ski Park back towards Cairns and the rest of us cruised around town had some nice meals at The Courthouse Hotel in Town and did the Touristy type things. That night all the crew apart from Jon (unfortunately Jon had a flue that he was trying to shake off) went back into Port Douglas Town and went to the Thai Restaurant and ordered up big with banquet meals all round. The food was excellent and everyone stuffed themselves with the Orient tasty delights. After that it was off to more tripping the lights fantastic for a few of the crew.

Day 4 Saturday, myself, Paul, Dan, Kimberley and a couple of the lads went on a boat trip in hard bottom inflatable boats, organised by Bretto from Windswell out to Undine Reef which is a Coral/Sand Cay with a big Ribbon Reef attached to it about 30klm off the Coast near Cape Tribulation. It took about 2 hours to steam out there and about the same on return. We first got out there and there was a Helicopter parked on it with some people having a picnic. They did not hang around long after about 16 off us all turned up, setting up and pumping up kites. The winds were quite light to start with about 13kts. One guy set up a 2013 Zephyr 17 and headed out with Paul not far behind him on a Switchy 12 then followed by me on my Jekyll 12. I was having trouble trying to stay upwind and Paul was just managing to. The guy on the Zephyr was managing to hold his ground nicely as you would expect. We had some nicely presented lunch and after that Windswell launched another 2013 Zephyr and were happy to let myself, Paul and Kimberley all have a try. The tide was starting to get quite low and we experienced a few scrapes on the bottom of our boards running over some coral heads hear and there. It was not to long after lunch then the wind started to kick in at about 20kts and then increased to about 25kts over the afternoon. Being out there off the coastline the wind was incredibly smooth and as the tide started to come back in in was then a boost fest. It was quite magic to kite over the coral reef and then off the edges into deeper water with spotting and kiting over many critters out there like Reef Sharks, Leather Back Turtles and Big Fishys. Unfortunately during our trip there was a mishap with a young lady on the trip who was just snorkelling popped her shoulder out and Bretto's father Pete, radioed in a helli to take her to the hospital. I did not hear anything more from this and only hope she is alright. On brighter note though is the trip to Undine Reef was fantastic and an experience of a lifetime to Kite there and a great trip well organised from the friendly and very experienced Windswell Crew. Once we returned back we heard that our crew that did not go on the trip had a nice session again at 4 Mile Beach for a few ours with a nice approx 20kts of wind blowing. After that it was of to Town for some more eats and drinkypoos to round things off.

Last day Sunday it was pretty well much pack the gear for those that did not do it the night before like me and high tail it to Cairns Airport which was unfortunate as the wind was up already and everyone was telling the bus driver to pull up and let us to kite back to 4 Mile Beach as we did not want to leave. Which leaves me last but not least to thank the Surf FX Crew for putting on another successful and wonderful trip where a lot of us Kiters got to shake off those winter blues, have a great time and make quite a few new kiter friends.

Sorry about my spelling guys and gals, it was 2am in the morning when I wrote the post and way past my beddy time. Hope you can all decipher and get the gist of what the hell I was raving on about Obviously suface2air did and yeh, do yourself a favour next year or some of the other planned adventures this year by Surf FX

Cheers LiS, Sounds like everybody had a great time, even toooo good for some with the bromances and bonding sessions
Hats off to Col and Jamie, taking off on an adventure before u even check in...respect!
Soooo....did the guys take any new gear up to demo???

So the Monarch performs as good as it looks Glen???