HARDING'S BEACH, windsurfed, W, SW, SSW, light building to 15-22, Gerry

Recurring Dream- I used to have a recurring windsurfing dream; I'm driving to the beach, I can see the water, I can see chop and windsurfers planing, it looks great! But the road, like Rubberman's long arm, stretches on endlessly. I drive, and drive, and I never get there. There were variations to this theme but the common thread was that I never got to windsurf in my windsurfing dreams. I haven't had those dreams in recent years, which is ironic, because I feel like they are coming to life with alarming frequency. Skunk # 10. Since March. But who's counting? Here's How- It was howling when I arrived. All the kiters had stopped to get smaller kites, but the wind dropped off while I was rigging. Gerry and I tailgated it for about 1 hour, nursing our dissapointment with bottled water. I took some long cruising runs to explore the area some more, then practiced tacking, jibing and crashing in the small shorebreak to improve my light wind wave balance. It helped me work out my frustration regarding the unreliable wind, and unreliable wind forecasts. The wind improved near the end, I was planing about 50 %, so I sailed until 8:45 pm and got everything derigged just before the light completely faded. Gerry was overpowered on his 7.0 when I arrived Ridgevale Beach- The wind was SSW near the end, port tack out. I found an interesting spot, a little down wind (in SSW), where a creek meets the ocean. There were some small sandbars at the mouth of the creek that were about waist deep near high tide. Chop was breaking on them, even in the light winds. I'll bet with an outgoing tide, near high tide, that there is some fun jumping to be had around those sandbars. The water flowing into the creek, on the incoming tide, was surprisingly strong. One could park at Ridgevale Beach, which is right next to the creek outlet, but it looks like a long walk from the parking lot. Ridgevale is between Harding's and Cockle Cove, easy to sail to.