welcome to kiteboarding, it can be unforgiving of errors

I now write my name and number on all my equipment, and it paid off when my lost, brand new twin tip came back to me via a nice boatie who spotted its bright yellow deck bobbing around in the bay later that night.

I hope you get your kite back -and maybe you should do a quick review of self rescue technique and site selection

were you kiting without a safety release?

If not you could have just pulled the safety, kite depowered wound in the lines grabbed the board and tootled off back in kite intact.

Can i suggest that if you get the kite back, or get a new one, get a safety release its 100% necessary.
Mike

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Thanks for the tea missus and i do apologise for eating the last piece of cake

aint peli fun?

its easy to guess in hindsight :)

it sounds like you could do with some practice on self rescue techniques and putting a bit of thought into how to get out of a crappy situation.

some sort of leash that you can attach to your board can be useful... dont use it all the time, just attach it when you decide to swim in so that you don't have to deal with the board, it leaves you free to manouvre or get to the kite

once you dont have to worry about the board... SECURE THE KITE :)

release to safety, swim to the kite and if you can roll up your lines do so... theres a few ways to do this search the forums and you'll find a couple

you should then be able to roll up your kite (just make it more manageable somehow)... let some air out of hte main bladder, roll the tips around the struts... just get some control of things

then see if you can use the kite to drag you landward.

remember at peli your in an enclosed space... your going to reach land eventually just stay calm and don't wear yourself out. its fairly important that when you do come close to obstacles, boats, beaches, wherever you end up that you have control of your kit and it isn't trailing lines all over the place etc and that you havent worn yourself out swimming into the wind ;)

whilst im not encouraging it, a few ppl have self rescued around the yacht club, theres a big open fairly shallow bay that you will end up in as long as you keep dragging to the west as best you can

"dont go somewhere you haven't already been in your mind 5 minutes ago" (or something like that pinched from youngie :)

enuf of my babble

JJD,
You got that right, I was just trying to explain exactly what happened. I was thinking about heading all the way down to the brewery, but the doubt was going through my mind, as I had never been down there before. So I had no idea what I was going to face.
At least I am here to tell the story, will have to try find some pennies and get a new kite today. And this time I will makesure I have land on one side off me.

If a boat picked it up,

Id recommend that you spend 30 minutes of your life ringing all the yacht clubs on the river and asking them to post a sign on the notice boards.

All boating have good ethics when it comes to helping out on the water etc etc so theyd want to get the kite to its rightful owner im sure

they may even ring the kite shops and tell them, so that may be worth a shot too

good luck with the hunt -

Thanks everyone for the input.
I think I will try close this issue and take it as a costly experience which hopefully wont happen again. Hope every one has a happy and safe New Year on the kiting front.

Scottyboy

There was a guy that came to Pelican point at about 6.30pm on Wednesday with a 12.5 metre kite that he found at the brewery while he was crabbing. He said he was going to leave it at the Pelican Point kite shop on Stirling Hwy. He was a nice bloke so I'd say he did it.

Happy to help