That would annoy the crap out of me too, can't you just do your third lesson through another school? Is the weekend the only time you can do it. I did all mine through Kitesurf warehouse they operate out if Melville and did it during the week after work, wind always seemed to be good. Failing that a few of us chic kiters catching up this weekend and are all means so your welcome to come along. I got up on the the board briefly on my 3 rd lesson but that was with their board, couldn't get my feet sorted on mine it is a little too small but that's what I got so gotta make it work. Anyways your welcome to come:)

Yeah it is either Melville or woodies depending on wind but woodies usually good anyway. Will let you know for sure. Anyways it would pay to keep practicing being really aggressive with kite while body dragging, helps when up on your board, well my thoughts anyway:)

Hey Rumblefish,

No one feels your pain more than the schools. Although it is a pain for you, it is a loss of income for most of us, this season has been a shocker for weekend winds, almost always SE or E, or none at all.

Everyday I have to look at winds and decide whether we can make good lessons happen, we take into consideration students needs, safety, wind direction and other difficulties. It is never an easy thing to cancel lessons, and yes we have canceled our fair share of lessons too, although only once for too much wind.

The problem with SE winds is not only the orientation, but also the gustiness. Gustiness is a bigger problem than the direction, if you know self rescue and pack down, that's fairly sorted, but the gusts can be ALL or nothing causing erratic flight and difficult control conditions.

Many accident can happen in gusty winds as there is no right size of kite to handle the lulls and also the gusts, so be careful if you decide to go out. Make sure you have nothing solid to run into withing 100m downwind of you at a minimum, you'd be surprised how fast you cover 100m if your kite luffs and the slack lines catch around the end of the bar causing out of control looping. Make sure you are quick to activate the safety release in this circumstance.

Play, but play carefully! A moments mistake can lead to a major accident.

DM

You could have a crack at woodies beach 1 on a SE'ly but there probably wont be anyone else there, maybe one or two other kiters.

Otherwise get a hold of Progression Beginner DVD and study that.

Well lesson ws cancelled again so I went down to Melville, wind was a bit gusty but just enough people there to help, not too many that it was crowded.

Firstly, apologies to the guy I tried to launch in the wrond direction Sorry, didn't get the hand gesture that you wanted the kite rolled, my bad.

On the first plus side, helped launch and a few people successfully which is great for confidence.

Anyway, got my brand new kite setup and launched no hassles. Had my board but as it was pretty gusty I just body dragged around which was actually really good. Played with the trim straps as the gusts went through and got the hang of my kite.
Also put it down a few times and even managed to save it when it tried to turn itself inside out.

Set the kite up (09 Flexifoil Ion) on the longest rear knots as a start, will play with settings once my confidence gets up.

All in all very happy with my first play out on my own. Even if I didn't get on the board it has given me alot more confidence to get out there again.

Bing it on!!!