Vancouver Island Archives - WindDudeWindDude

Storm season has rolled into Vancouver Island in full effect, cancelled ferries, power outages, rain and lots wind. All good news for us wind boarders. It might be in part due to my change in work status, but I’ve scored more amazing sessions this fall and winter then I did over the summer.

Columbia beach north of Parksville has delivered many days over the few weeks, and I even missed a few of them. And it’s been delivering some of the best and most challenging conditions I’ve seen, with nice waves, but 25-50 knot winds, making it difficult to nail jibes on the outside.

A local sailor know as “Dunkinguy” throws a port forward coming over the wave and lands on the lip in 40-45 knots.

There have also been the odd day here and there at a secret point break that can deliver world class down the line wavesailing a couple times a year. The best looking day was last Sunday, a forecast of 30 knots winds and 27 foot swell. Sadly the winds missed the south Island and only swell rolled in which made for some amazing double to triple overhead swell. Also on this day winds and swell hit Tofino in Full effect and two windsurfer from Vancouver, Ryan and Jen, scored big time. View the full gallery of the epic Tofino storm sailing here.

Lets hope this stormy trend continues, I could go for a weekly session at least!

July is at an end, and on Vancouver Island all in all it’s been a pretty solid month. It started off with a bang on Canada Day, and a few solid hours of sailing. The rest of the week continued to blow unfortunately I came down with a cold and missed a few solid days that week, but what can you do. I’ve scored about 11 sessions since my last update including a weekend trip to Nitnat.

With not much happening right around Victoria after recovering from a bit of sickness the forecast was looking favorable for a spot called Pipers Lagoon located just North of Nanamo. I headed out, but arrived a bit late, and the few windsurfers on the water were on the way in. I got to check out a new spot, and hope to sail here again on a windy day. It is an excellent place for beginners taking their first steps with a sandy beach and a lagoon at high tide.

One day really stood out, June 9th at Gordons, fully lit on a 4.7 with some very nice ramps. So nice in fact I made several backloop attempts. Luckily I had my GoPro mounted on my mast so there is some nice video of a bunch of backloops into crashes, I’ll post the footage shortly. The conditions that day also provided some waves that you could squeeze one or two turns in on, quite fun. Unfortunately majority of the other days didn’t provide much for ramps or windsurfing.

Also in July I made another weekend trip to Nitnat. On the agenda was attempting to work on Vulcans while over powered, and I managed a few attempts each day. I think my fear of sprained ankles on this particular move is still there, having already sprained it 3 times. So I spent a lot of time working on carving 360s and was getting closer by the end of the weekend, this should be excellent practice for my bottom turns in waves.

The second last week of June saw two more great days at Gordons beach working on forwards and and some backloop attemps.

Coming soon I’ve got some backloop carnage video from my GoPro and a few more videos, so check back soon.