Back on the Euro road trip again. Good bye Newhaven

st about to set sail from Newhaven to Dieppe and check into my cabin. Am heading down to Northern Spain and Portugal in convoy with my good friend Kent Flip again and hoping to meet a good friend enroute.  Hoping to call CH the best of the wind and wave conditions and have a great time generally. Just wanted to add a quick post before I lose the data comma whilst setting sail. Hope you can follow the blog for the next few week. More to come.

Favour!

Hey guys

No pressure, but as you're here looking so very generous and all, I thought you might want to check this out! 
Hope you're well. 
Talk soon. 

Tom Cummins

http://www.doitforcharity.com/TomC

Newton (Porthcawl), Wales with JK and Clive

7/10/10

Headed out to South West Wales with John and Clive for a late afternoon session at Newton near Porthcawl.  When I first arrived John was on his 6.4m Boxer SL and 110L and Clive was rigging a 6.5m +110L.  I was a little more optimistic as I saw the forecast said it would die for a bit then pick up more later.  Repaired my 6m Amp again with stickers as I had just dropped the 6.1m NP firefly in for repair at Blue chip in Cheam for a quoted £150.  Rigged this with the 91L 27cm fin and headed out.  After a couple of OK blasts the wind dropped and I struggled to back in, wishing I followed JK’s and Clive’s lead.  Luckily the tide was flowing in the opposite direction to the wind so any downwind loss when sailing/trying to balance was counteracted by upwind current when in the water.  Once back on shore we hung around for about an hour then the wind kicked in again to order.  I was pleased I took the 91L at this point as there was some great sailing to be had out there and managed to get about another hour on the water until it started getting too dark.  Unfortunately I didn’t get any photos here.

Newton Bay Beach location at the end of Beach Road

Blightly Baptism of Fire (Camber)

1/10/10

Arranged with Mike to go windsurfing at Camber Sands, Kent in the morning.  After a brief chat with the Kite surfing centre on the front there at low tide we decided to head east to get less on shore conditions.  After my first full English breakfast, we found a car park at Romney Sands to park up at and rig up.  The wind was absolutely storming easily gusting 30+knots so we headed out on 4.4/4.5m sails and 90Litre boards.  After quite a walk out to get to the water as it was low tide we got out in cross shore winds with the wave heading cross on in Southerly wind direction.  The waves seemed to be rolling in nicely and we both got some good jumps out there.  Later on the wind picked up even more, so I decided to try my 75Litre RRD Wavecult and strap the Gopro HD camera on for the first time (Video below).  I found the difference between this and the 91L in cutting through the waves quite something else especially when heading through the break.  What a great day to come back to windsurfing in the UK, I found that these were some of the best conditions I had had in the last 3 months maybe minus the driving rain and gloomy skies though. 

Romney Sands Car park opposite Romney Tavern

Mike pulling a face like a Hamster in a wind tunnel  

75L +4.4m with Romney tide becoming high in background.

Goodbye Greece - Back on the road again to Blightly

26/09/2010 

Heading onto Patra from Athens, I boarded the ferry to Ancona, Italy.  After the usual trying to find out exactly where to go. Finally on board, because I asked for ‘Camping on Board’ which is basically sleeping in the campervan, they said they don’t do that but would give me a cabin and free meal for the same price.  After relaxing in a nice cabin, after my meal another guy opens the door to the cabin whilst I’m writing this blog and starts to make himself at home.  Speaking no English he show’s me the card with the same cabin number,  so after having a moan at reception they said I have to share with 3 people or upgrade for 40euros for a cabin on my own and that it was a good deal.  So just a note of warning if you go with a crappy ferry company called Minoan, you have to ask about every conceivable situation as they don’t tell you anything on the phone and it says nowhere on the tickets – and these bunch of cowboys were supposed have won customer service of the year.

27/09/10

After a good night’s sleep (luckily the Bulgarian trucker slept quietly) I still had a bit of time on the boat then finally 22 hours later (4pm) arrived at Ancona, Italy.  Headed in the direction of Milan and stopped to fuel up in Bologna and had a 15 minute conversation with a keen non English speaking Italian pump attendant (Max) from what I understood was also a windsurfer.  He also put me on the phone to his Mum who explained how to get to the large supermarket, so I could get loaded up with Italian wine etc.

Heading on, the obvious stop off point was Lake Como near to the Swiss border,  after about 30euros  worth of Italian toll costs, I found a parking spot at this very picturesque area where the mountain is littered with houses and mansions lit up and cut into to the rock face overlooking a calm lake.  There are many parking restrictions here but I found a small car park where the toll free hours were midnight until 8AM which was when I arrived.  I must admit I am glad I didn’t have a vehicle larger than the van as is would make it difficult to navigate some of the roads here and it would have been difficult to ‘free camp’ here which would have meant staying at one of the service stations on the toll roads which is not a bad option but it is nice to go to some of the small bars they have in these off the road locations.

28/09/10

Headed towards Zurich, Switzerland through some lovely looking countryside and some great toll free road infrastructure and through the 3^rd longest tunnel in the world (St. Gotthard Tunnel) at approximately 16.4km long and contra-flow-wow!  By the afternoon I was there, I thought I stay here and have a look around the city. I enquired at the campsite for parking up for the night and was told it would be 31 Swiss Francs (25 Euros) instead I parked over the road in small car park for 2 euros and cycled into town.  Looking around Zurich was quite interesting but I would say it was not a great place to visit with everything being so expensive e.g a coffee from Starbucks was the equivalent of £5 and even a dodgy hamburger you are looking at £7.  I stayed the night and a first time use of the winter sleeping bag was required, I can see the acclimatisation back to British weather is going to be difficult for me after the nice Greek summer.

29/09/10

Headed towards Frankfurt and out of Switzerland, I always seem to get stop at the borders and asked if I have anything to declare and if I was carrying more than 10,000 euros after saying ‘Switzerland was too expensive’ and ‘I wish’ respectively. They let me on my way.  That night I stayed with some family friend’s in Germany near the Luxemburg border I found it quite funny that they had a neighbours pig called 'Paulina' that would roam the street and venture into their garden eating the chestnuts.  Thanks Jeanette and Bert for putting me up.

30/09/10

Headed onto Dunkirk for the ferry to Dover, I arrived that night for nice home cooked meal at my Parents – great!

Goodbye Paros, Hello Athens

17/08/2010

It was time to leave Paros, the forecast was not looking so good and it was becoming very quiet on the Island.  I headed back via a stop off to Naxos to return my boom to Flisvos.  At Flisvos I met Martin and showed him the boom, no questions asked he swapped it for another new one and he said he had never seen this happen before, so hopefully it was a one off.  Having a look around, I also purchased a 6m Neil Pryde Firefly as my 2006 AMP has started to go brittle and has a split on the top panel, has a hole in the luff and has a poor repair on the bottom panel. I also needed a 430cm mast as I had been previously rigging my 6m on a 460cm. Mat kept telling me I need a smaller fin to loosen up the 91L so bought a 24cm Chocco fin.  Due to seeing the GO pro HD footage of Yoshi and John, I decided to get a Go Pro camera also with boom mount chucked in for free.  Really, I only went to change boom but the deals I was being offered were too good to miss in comparison to UK prices (sorry British economy but if we continue to get ripped off we will have to buy from other EU member states – my understanding is that in the UK the supply are passing through too many hand with each putting a mark up on).  To top it off, he said do I need anything else.  Mat and I had discussed getting some cheap old school wave boards in the 70L range as they would have been good for the 2 4m days we had, so I asked.  He showed me 2008 75L RRD Wavecult that has had a repair from Peter the guy that did a good repair on the Mistral – 150 euros – not quite old school need I say more (picture to follow from first use in Camber, UK)

Took the Hispeed ferry to Athens (3 hours instead of 6 hours) this thing really shifts – looking at the wake at the back it is like being on a gigantic speed boat.  Hit Athens at 10pm to meet with friends.

21/08/2010

Was on Evia, a mainland connected Island North-East of Athens. Went on a long search for wind to a place called Kymi as the direction was coming from the North.  Looking back I should have just headed back to the South east side of Athens and maybe got the best of it at Lavrio nr the Power station.

22/08/2010

Drove to Anavyssos on the west coast South of Athens to meet Zanetos who we met on Paros.  I got there early and rigged a 5.3m +91L.  When venturing out I found the conditions very gusty with an all or nothing type wind as it was coming across the land from the north, maybe it would have been better from a southerly.  The water was super flat, but going to this bay makes me finally realise that I like the waves/chop and the variances that they bring and hate all or nothing wind scenarios. 

Rigged the newly purchased 6.1m Firefly on the 91l and then the 110L due to the on off conditions.  The sail performed great and felt very lightweight and handled the gusts well.  Right at the end of the day I was trying to catch a gust to get planning, the point when the gust hit there was someone downwind and ahead of me heading towards me.  Usually I think I would have been OK and held the sail but it seemed to be a catapult or crash scenario, so I went for the catapult and ripped the upper section of the sail L .  I sailed it back in but was obviously annoyed.

Anavyssos Bay

Zenetos

Broken centre panel

23/08/2010

Went to Loutsa beach East of Athens, this point was further south of the main point where people sail from at Loutsa.  I found the location less crowded and a friendly bunch.  The spot is said to get less clean wind and you have to sail further out to catch the wind as it was a Northerly the land spit provides a shadow for the wind for the beach and the first 100m so it is good if you want to go with non windsurfing friends in a Northerly etc.  I repaired my old 6m Naish with the RRD sticker set I had and took the 110L RRD.  Once out I found the wind very consistent and with chop and a few ramps.  Not wanting to miss the opportunity I quickly changed to the 91L.  It was great to get out again in good conditions and getting some good air time again, a great note to finish my tie up windsurfing in Athens and even Greece.

all this fitted In one Van!!

Except the Starboard Carve 111, which I will ALWAYS take with me from now on!!!!

Van conversion:- in hind sight the Fiamma Turbo Vent is a must.. and the 40w solar panel I purchased was not man enough for the job, need at least 80w

the conversion worked well enough but not enough for two sleeping.. as I found out at my cost, and had to sleep on a camp bed outside the van..

Tom had no problems with his conversion, I think the only problem being with wet kit in the living compartment and sand..