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Blog Archive 2013 May

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Wed 5/1 = This morning I went to the Port Isabelle Library to update this website and catch up on a little finance and email.
- Then, just before noon, I flew my
Nano
fourth RC micro helicopter: Blade Nano CPx that has a tail rotor, no flybar and true collective positive and negative pitch
in the grassy area near Dan's Auto, being careful to avoid the ant hills. Everything went well until I let it get pretty far away, low, unable to see its orientation and slammed it the back window of an SUV parked across the street to the north (no SUV damage, of course). It's going to take some repair it before I fly it any more, which will be unlikely for the next two days of forecast wind. - After supper I went to the Gym in Port Isabelle for a medium-weight workout and shower, doing one set of every exercise that included all body parts.
- Spent the night at the Port Isabel Walmart

Thu 5/2 = Fantastic KITEboarding today - not so much the conditions but that I conquered the monster inside me. Read on... Thanks to my iKitesurf account I could see that the wind was not yet blowing on the island so caught up on computer stuff at the Port Isabel Library and then headed across the causeway to
SPI
South Padre Island, Texas
 to lay in the sun 20 minutes and do a beach run at the Isla Blanca Park. By the time I ate lunch the wind was picking up from the northeast so I headed north, stopping to create GPS waypoints for the south and north limits for the Wave (little free shuttle buses that ply the island).
- Now for the monster: I wanted and needed to do another gulf downwinder but I was apprehensive since my last one ended in sort of a disaster (check out my Thu 4/25/13 blog). I gathered my guts and what wits I had and went out with my 6m Best Nemesis on my 130 cm Lite Wave Stealth twin-tip board, having measured the peak gust at 40 mph with my
hand-held
Windtronic
 wind gauge. It was a good call as I had the kite mostly depowered all the time from the Andy Bowie Park at the north to Access 1 down south. The kite never touched the water and I got off my board twice. I traveled 5.02 miles in about 50 minutes covering the 3.1 miles. After arriving at my destination I wrapped up my stuff and took the Wave back up to the Andy Bowie Park and to my van.
- I spent the night at the South Flats, which a policeman at the Andy Bowen Park said was OK. The van did some rocking as a cold wind blew all night with a low of 57°.

Fri 5/3 = Three KITE sessions today! After doing the things that needed to be done this morning I headed to the North Flats, measured the wind averaging about 33 mph and gusting up to 38. For the first session, at noon, I went out on my 6m Best Nemesis and 130 cm Lite Wave Stealth twin-tip board for almost an hour, concentration on pops, some jumps and doing all my transitions (jibes) by downlooping the kite, trying to come out of the kite loops a little earlier to have more speed in the opposite direction rather than a sudden pop downwind. It was cold, with an air temperature of 58°. I evidently used mind over matter as I did not over control with such a small kite using my relatively long control bar - either this session or yesterday's on the gulf.
- After fixing and eating lunch I adjusted the control lines to the longest knot on my 6 because the kite was way over sheeting with the bar set at full power, wrapped it up and pumped up my 8 (8m Best Nemesis kite), going out for an hour with it and my Naish Custom Fish 5’2” x 17.5” surfboard with the footstraps for today's second session. I worked my way downwind to the south flats, practicing and making most of my jibes and lots of practice removing and reinserting my foot into the back foot strap, as that is the skill I most need to improve. When I was in a shallow area I practiced a lot of jumping up on the board with both feet to start up. Didn't nail any of 'em.
- At the South Flats, with the South Padre Kite Roundup in progress, I visited with old and new friends, including Joann and her husband from Seattle. We hope to hook up when they go to
OBX
Hatteras Island and the Outer Banks off the coast of North Carolina
 in a month or so. My third KITEboarding session was courtesy of Ocean Rodeo I demoed a 12m Razor with three different boards: their 2013 OR Twin-tip and two sizes of Mako boards, also twin-tips.
- This evening I took a shower and trimmed my toenails (gotta keep up with that, ya know) at the Isla Blanca Park then drove over the causeway to get a car wash with a fresh-water undercarriage rinse, caught up on this blog and headed to bed in the Walmart parking lot.

Sat 5/4 = Too late, it seems all day for me. It started after my morning routine when I arrived at the Port Isabelle Library at 2:20 after they closed at 1. Evidently the schedule I got was incorrect. Then I went to the Gym in Port Isabelle for a 3:10 workout and they had already closed at three. Then over to
SPI
South Padre Island, Texas
 for a workout at the gym there and they had closed. It seems that the roll up the sidewalks early in South Texas on Saturdays.
- I did have lovely phone visit with
Rose Anne
x-wife
where we compared notes on our kids and getting old.
- Major website problem, that I fortunately caught before I put it online: all the images in the picture array at the top of my home page were in ugly black squares after I made a
CSS
Cascading Style Sheet, formatting file, for your tech heads
border change. That and a minor weather formatting error took me over an hour to straighten out.
- I spent the night by a clump of grass at the South Flats.

Sun 5/5 = Just before noon I did a medium full-body workout at at South Padre Island Fitness and had a delightful visit with Terren Hughes, the owner. Nice place! Then went out to Beach Access #5 to sun, run and lunch. Then across the island to the North Flats. A couple kiteboarders went out with 16m and 12m kites. Both ended up walking in with the puny off-shore breeze.
- I fixed my helicopter using a combination of super glue and my hot glue gun. The repair was kinda technical, but went OK.
- Leaving the North Flats, I headed all the way down south on the island to Isla Blanca Park where I flew my
Nano
fourth RC micro helicopter: Blade Nano CPx that has a tail rotor, no flybar and true collective positive and negative pitch
in a grassy area and parked by the gulf to finish supper and catch up on this blog.
- I spent the night, again, at the South Flats after stopping by South Padre Island Kiteboarding to update my website and take care of some emails. I am experiencing significant lower back pain (on top of the previous middle back pain), maybe the result of the back extensions in my workout, although back extensions have never caused pain before.

Mon 5/6 = The most notable thing I did was to bring my
Nano
fourth RC micro helicopter: Blade Nano CPx that has a tail rotor, no flybar and true collective positive and negative pitch
in at the end of a battery and land it at my feet on a little clump of dry grass. The second most notable thing I did was to crash it into a traffic sign and break it again - both things in the grassy area inside Isla Blanca Park on Park Road 100. The heli needs repair before I fly it again.
- My lower and middle back pain has gotten to the point that it is time to do something about it. I took a Declofenac at three this afternoon, iced both parts of my back and then proceeded to go out and ride on the gulf.
- That is the third notable thing I did - go out kiting on a 3.1 mile north-bound downwinder from Access 1 to the Andy Bowie Park with my surf board and 15m Epic Renegade Infinity. The kite never touched the water (yea), I blew all my jibes (no yea), had some good practice riding back upwind for my board (yea) and did lots of toe-side riding (sort-of yea). Waves were forecast at 1-2 feet.
- I spent a quiet, relatively dark night at the South flats, facing the van into the southeast wind.

Tue 5/7 = I called the Clark Howard show this morning. They weren't interested in my topic, but I did offer to take Clark and his producers out to breakfast when I go through Atlanta on my way to Hatteras.
- Another gulf downwinder this evening - a little after 6:00 with my 12m Epic Screamer and Naish Custom Fish 5’2” x 17.5” surfboard with footstraps. I DID A JIBE!. Waves were forecast at 1-3 feet.
- My night at the South Flats was not as quiet as last night because I had my weather station up and it makes sort of a rattling sound when it is windy, which was pretty much all night.

Wed 5/8 = Pretty good KITEboading day with two Gulf sessions. Trying to keep my back on the mend without taking more Diclofanac, this morning I did some back exercises and then took a hot strong-stream shower on my back at Isla Blanca at the south end of
SPI
South Padre Island, Texas
.
- Both Gulf downwinders, with my 12m Epic Screamer, were the order for the rest of the day with 2-4' waves forecast. The first, a little after noon was with my Naish Custom Fish 5’2” x 17.5” surfboard with footstraps. I made seven jibes!! and only blew two or three.
- The second downwinder was at supper time on my 130 cm Lite Wave Stealth twin-tip board. Interestingly enough, I was out of practice on waves with the twin-tip board. Carving turns did not seem to come together. I'm lucky I didn't tear my kite when I was torqued off the board and pulled downwind with the kite landing on the water and approaching the shore break. This is the first time in two or three days that my kite got wet on the Gulf. Because the waves kept moving me toward shore and slackening the kite lines I didn't get the kite relaunched until it got to the edge of the water. Then the challenge was finding my board which was out there somewhere. Then I remembered to look for my GoJo board sail and spotted the board out in the Gulf. I drug out to the board using my kite as propulsion and continued on my way. - Spent the night at the South Flats, monitoring the wind with my weather station - such a deal!

Thu 5/9 = The USPS mess is somewhat resolved. My post office back in Phoenix has lost my small, tardy, Lipo battery package from Hobby King, but if they do find it they will forward it to the Avon, NC post office for me. This has given me the freedom to head out to Atlanta, GA where on Tuesday, I'll have the privilege of joining Clark Howard and his crew for their pre-show meeting.
- Today I worked out the driving scenarios from here to
OBX
Hatteras Island and the Outer Banks off the coast of North Carolina
 with the stop in Atlanta, GA, massaged my back with a hot strong-stream shower, hung out at Isla Blanca Park for my last time this trip (little wind), drove over the causeway to Port Isabelle, filled my van up with gasoline for tomorrow, replenished my drinking water and spent the night in the Walmart parking lot there for the last time.

Fri 5/10 = This morning I figured out some online financial stuff during my last Port Isabelle Library visit, scrubbed the white letters on my van tires, took the van through its final car wash with a fresh-water undercarriage rinse and headed North.
- About supper time I arrived at my cousin's Frank and Donna in west Corpus for a short and pleasant catch-up visit. Donna thought my van was cool and Frank thought the food at the China Bear restaurant where he and I ate supper was good. I thought it was awesome, with seven double-sided buffet tables. Riding in Frank's car was a fun experience.
- I spent the night at the Greenwood Walmart in Corpus Christi.

Sat 5/11 = First thing I checked that my tire pressures were all OK and then after breakfast drove down to the Corpus Christi YMCA to massage my back in their hot tub and a cool shower (my attempt at thermal contrast therapy) and then on to the Corpus Christi main library. Magnificent! They don't make buildings like that any more. There I discovered that I had not resolved my checking for April, so spent over two hours doing April and May together. Boy, am I slow!
- I headed north toward Atlanta and spent the night in the Portland, TX Walmart parking lot.

Sun 5/12 = This morning I glued a van driver's side door weather strip that had broken and drove the short distance to a closed library and updated my website with my computer on a clipboard, balanced on a trash can by the front door. Hey, it worked! I drive all the way to Mobile, Alabama for the night in a Walmart parking lot.
- At 3:20 in the morning someone knocked on my van. I lay still, finally put on some shorts and opened the door - no security guard or anyone else was there. The rest of the night I planned what I would say if the knock returned and what I'd do if a tow truck came. Nothing happened. When I got up in the morning, I was, maybe, a little more rational and realized the knock was probably a careless person who parked next to my van getting out of their car. You know, they say you worry about the right amount, but about the wrong things. I guess I need to worry about what I should be worrying about instead of what I am actually worrying about.
- I saw three accidents on my way to Atlanta with the associated freeway traffic down to a crawl. The first slowdown, interstate had slowed to an average of 7 mph, so I exited at Lafayette, fixed supper and slept for 40 minutes. By that time the interstate traffic was back to normal. Pretty smart, eh? The other ones, I just stuck it out or took a detour around the accident, courtesy of my
GPS
Garmin Nuvi 850T with voice recognition
.

Mon 5/13 = I arrived at the WSB TV/Radio station about 4pm after some concentrated driving. I got the information I needed for tomorrow morning's meeting and went to the Peachtree Branch Library to upload some things I forgot yesterday when I did my monthly Blog roll-over, take care of some emails and download some podcasts. After the library closed I did a day's blogging and did a short walk/jog around the Atlanta streets.

Tue 5/14 = What a neat day! After I updated my website at the Atlanta Peach Branch Library I drove a short distance to WSB, where I joined Clark and crew for their hour-long pre-show meeting. I showed Clark 11 seconds of kiteboarding and chimed in on a couple of things. I hope I was not in the way, although I do not think I was. After the meeting Clark suggested I might want to get a picture with him.
Clark n Lou
What a neat idea, as I can update his picture here on Smart Stuff. It was a pleasure to meet the people I have heard about so much on the show:
    Around the table were:
  1. Christa, executive producer
  2. Clark Howard, show host & honcho
  3. Kimberly, producer and phone screener
  4. Deborah
  5. Jason
  6. Sarah, head of off-air advice center
  7. Joal, producer, researcher and my guide
  8. Theo, webmaster
  9. Louis Self (that would be me)
- After the meeting I took off to the east, spending the night at the New Hope Church Road Walmart in Raleigh, NC.

Wed 5/15 - First thing I went to the Discount Tire, where I have done business before, where Moe checked my tires and said that they should be OK for the rest of my trip, although there was some cupping. This is opposed to the Discount Tire man in Mobile Alabama who told me I needed new tires, should buy new wheels and that the left front tire was separating. So much for my previously unshakable confidence in Discount Tire!
- Kitemare! About 2pm amidst an excellent SW wind (25 mph), I arrived at Kitty Hawk Kites,
OBX
Hatteras Island and the Outer Banks off the coast of North Carolina
 , said, "Hi" to the people there, including Mark and crew from Wales, could not talk anyone into doing a Planet downwinder with me, so finally decided to go solo. I was self-launching my 6m Best Nemesis. Because I was a little too far downwind from the kite, it drifted downwind and powered up. I was ready for the bull, but my safety line was not. The upper loop opened up and the kite, no longer attached to me, lodged itself in the top of a scrub tree in the thicket with the bar lodged in the top of another scrub tree. It took me about an hour to retrieve the kite. Amazingly the kite was not damaged, but I did have to climb a couple of trees and cut the lines in order to get the kite down. As I was having my close encounter with the thicket, Bart of HISS, Morgan and others arrived for a Planet downwinder. Morgan walked, barefoot, into the thicket to check on me. Thanks, Morgan!
- I hate most automatic computer software. I keep my Windows XP desktop pretty well covered with icon shortcuts of programs I want at my fingertips. It looks a lot like Windows 8 tiles. I guess I am ahead of my time. Every so often a bubble pops up saying, "You have icons on your desktop that you seldom use..." For the first time I clicked on the bubble, thinking I could disable this stupid icon program that keeps interrupting me. As a result the automatic icon software destroyed the desktop that I had spent months perfecting. Restoring the desktop did no good. I finally got my desktop back after two system restores, which put me to bed late. Gerr!

Thu 5/16 = This morning I finished analyzing the kite-line situation, bought replacement lines from Bart at HISS and a safety-line slack bungee from KHK. I spent most of the rest of the day recustomizing my bar back to how it was before. The whole project cost me less than $100. A new RRD bar/line set would have cost about $460 and would not have included my safety-line optional single-front-line flag feature.
- This evening I worked on my
Nano
fourth RC micro helicopter: Blade Nano CPx that has a tail rotor, no flybar and true collective positive and negative pitch
, getting out a new spare canopy new spare landing skids and super gluing the broken upper right and lower left canopy-holding pins. I almost ruined the heli by getting some superglue on the rotor mechnisim which, of course freezes the rotor. I started turning the rotor by hand to keep the superglue from setting. At intervals the rest of the evening and at night I ran the helicopter on my test stand to keep the rotor free. The heli still works, thanks to my efforts and a little luck.
- My eeePcXP computer power connector became intermittent - not a good sign.
- To bed at KHK.

Fri 5/17 = All it takes is one good crash. More on that later. No wind today
- This morning I took my newly configured kite bar/line set to Helmut who does kite repair and stays in the Rodanthe Water Sports campground with Peggy, his wife. He sewed my spectra tension leader line and safety line loops with a zigzag stitch on his sewing machine. Then I headed south to Avon. At Ocean Air I bought a North chicken bone for my RRD bar. It fit and actually is better than the one that came with the bar. I also stopped by to say, "Hi" to Ocean Air, the Avon Post office, Charlie & crew at Ride Hatteras, Food Lyon, Ace Hardware and Canadian, John, who spends his spring days in the Canadian Hole parking lot.
- This evening I flew my
Nano
fourth RC micro helicopter: Blade Nano CPx that has a tail rotor, no flybar and true collective positive and negative pitch
with its new canopy and landing gear - and broke both with a crash into the Kitty Hawks parking lot adjacent to the grass field where I was flying. I should have cut the rotor power as the heli headed toward the pavement and crashed in the grass but, NO! I had to try to fly it back and ended up with the pavement crash behind a car where I could not see what the heli was doing. This evening I patched up the heli with some clear packaging tape and hot glue.

Sat 5/18 = No wind. About the best I can say about today is that I did not break my
Nano
fourth RC micro helicopter: Blade Nano CPx that has a tail rotor, no flybar and true collective positive and negative pitch
this evening when I flew it in breezy conditions on the grass area at
KHK
Kitty Hawk Kites kiteboarding center in Rodanthe, NC.
.
- The first part of the day did not go really well. I spent all morning and some of the afternoon trying to get Picasa to crop the photo that Joel took on Tuesday of Clark Howard and me. The cropped photo would appear to be OK until I renamed it for my images web page, then it would jump back to its uncropped state. Weird! The photo finally behaved when I rotated it and then rotated it back.
- Before supper time and on the way back to
KHK
Kitty Hawk Kites kiteboarding center in Rodanthe, NC.
, for the night. I took a couple kites to a wide Atlantic beach in Waves to test my new line setup. I attempted several self-launch techniques and learned that it is impossible self launch in winds averaging 5mph with gusts up to 6mph. To bed thinking there might be enough south wind tomorrow afternoon to ride the Atlantic around Avon.

Sun 5/19 = Around noon I did a beach sun/run with hazy conditions, visited the Avon Pier.
- This afternoon I reactivated my Koru gym membership in Avon, and had three
Nano
fourth RC micro helicopter: Blade Nano CPx that has a tail rotor, no flybar and true collective positive and negative pitch
sessions there - one when I arrived, one after my workout and the third one after my shower, recharging the batteries between. Their large exercise room was ideal for precision landings and take-offs, accurate 180° yaws and trying to accurately change altitude by one-foot increments.

Mon 5/20 = Two KITE sessions today: The first, local at Kite Point with my 12m Epic Screamer and 130 cm Lite Wave Stealth twin-tip board where I worked on pops, jumps and kite loops with and without jibes. The second session was from one mile north of Avon from Nor1 to Nor2 with Loli from D.C. I thought I'd never get off, having left my bar, pump and harness at Kite Point, and then the main bladder on my 12m Epic Screamer was limp after a few minutes, so I took out my 15. It turned out to be a good call. I did some fairly decent floaty jumps as well as KITE-loop jump jibes.
- I got to bed at Ride Hatteras, late for doing lots of things like my website, flying my Phoenix RC Simulator with their newly developed Nano model and with my hot glue gun and helistand, repairing two
Nano
fourth RC micro helicopter: Blade Nano CPx that has a tail rotor, no flybar and true collective positive and negative pitch
landing gear brakes.
- I surely was drowsy when I did this blog - hope I didn't botch it too badly as I periodically dosed off.

Tue 5/21 = KITEboarding today involved only one session, but it was a good one. I went out from 4:15 to 5:45 for about 1 1/2 hours (my longest session so fat this trip) with my Naish Custom Fish 5’2” x 17.5” surfboard with footstraps and 8m Best Nemesis at
KHK
Kitty Hawk Kites kiteboarding center in Rodanthe, NC.
and made all my jibes but two. One of those misses was spectacular! During the session I traveled 13.1 miles with a maximum speed of 20.9 mph with my van showing a peak gust of 25 mph.
- My morning project: fixing the leading edge leak in my 12m Epic Screamer. Mike and Brea, of KHK helped me replace the fill valve, which was separating from the bladder. I did an inflation test and the main bladder held perfectly for about 15 minutes then, went limp in 20 minutes when I was not watching the kite. Since the wind was blowing and suitable for my 8m Best Nemesis, I put the 12 away and went out and had the above fun.
- To bed at KHK with my van's weather station up. It was windy all night with the most wind a little after midnight.

Wed 5/22 = This morning I rolled out my 12m Epic Screamer for a main bladder leak recheck, then due to excessive back pressure when pumping, eliminated the check valve in the new inflation valve by drilling it out. That additionally reduced back pressure by eliminating the bladder perforations below the valve. The bladder held air perfectly for over an hour, so I pronounced, "Kite Fixed."
- This afternoon I installed new, better (smaller and lighter) safety Y rings on my kite lines.
- Today's kiting was interesting from both a wind standpoint and a canal standpoint. About 2:30 Boykin on his 14m kite, Ian on his 13m kite and I, on my 15m kite attempted the famous Planet of the Apes downwinder. The wind at Planet was so light my 15m Epic Renegade Infinity was barely launchable so I took my surfboard. That would have been fine, but I also took the Dogleg Canal. The fins were too deep for the shallow crud/mud bottom of the canal. The board came to a gradual halt when it's fins got into the crud. I didn't stop and splatted down in the mud. Now we're talking of some of the best quality mud anywhere in the world - three feed deep. By this time the wind was increasing and I could just barely get back to my board. I carried the board, kite in the air, about 200 feet through the mud until the water was deep enough to ride again. Good cardio! My twin-tip would have been perfect.
- Due to being so overpowered and a storm approaching in the distance from the south, Boykin and I decided to hot foot it downwind (N) to KHK, skipping all the fun stuff we usually do on a Planet run. We were both lit! Due to the overpowering conditions, Ian got out at
HISS
Barton's Hatteras Island Sail Shop, Waves, NC
unbeknown to Boykin and me. It took a while, but we finally got all our things back to the respective owners, including me back down to pick up my van at Planet.
- This evening I drove away from the wind at KHK so I would not be tempted to go out again, being tired from my Planet run, driving down to the Koru Gym in Avon for a shower and to fly my helicopter for two batteries worth before closing time, then finished off the other two batteries in a grassy area east of Ocean Air. There, in spite of the windiness, I did all takeoffs from my hand and did all landings to my hand - never crashed or landed the helicopter in the grass, damp from an earlier rain.
- To bed at Ride Hatteras after some shopping.

Thu 5/23 = Today at the Koru Gym I did a full-body medium workout sandwiched between two
Nano
fourth RC micro helicopter: Blade Nano CPx that has a tail rotor, no flybar and true collective positive and negative pitch
sessions. I also I hung around Kite Point where I met Lali, kiteboarder naturalized from India. He invited me over to the house that he, Birant, Freddie and Lena are renting for the week... a congenial group from the D.C. area.
- Lali really wanted to ride in the ocean, so all five of us walked over the sand dunes to the beach east of their house. I pumped up my 15m Epic Renegade Infinity kite and Lali his 12. Both our kites
Hindenburged
fell out of the sky due to a lull in the wind
so neither of us got out on the ocean.
- Spent the night parked by their house.

Fri 5/24 = This morning I hung around with Lali and company and did a load of laundry. Later we went out to the first turn-out north of Avon (my GPS waypoint HANOR1) where I sunned 20 minutes and then the cold front came through with a chilling northwest wind. Eventually, after I shortened my center lines four inches and Lali added air to his main bladder, we took off to the south, mostly over powered on our 8m kites, me on my 130 cm Lite Wave Stealth twin-tip board, on a 5.6 mile downwinder to Kite Point - a little before sunset! The last couple of miles or so were a real struggle, as the wind almost died and we did a LOT of pumping to stay up. I can't believe I went about a half mile beyond Kite point in the pending darkness.
- Lali and I finally got together and stuffed our equipment into our respective vehicles. After a warm shower I had supper with the group cooked by Bryant: deliciously flavored beef burgers.
- To bed real late (12:40am) by Lali's house after getting my kite rolled up, bagged and everything else put away.

Sat 5/25 = I had breakfast out at the first turnout north of Avon, launched a couple of kites for other people, and then attempted an approximately 63° air-temperatures downwinder to the first turnout north of Canadian Hole with two other kiteboarders on the west wind. I don't know if they ever made it but I was never able to go upwind enough for the downwinder with my 12m Epic Screamer and Naish Custom Fish 5’2” x 17.5” surfboard with footstraps. I did ride parallel to shore for 5.05 miles with a maximum speed of 16.4 mph. In the gusts my 15m Epic Renegade Infinity would have been too much.
- After supper I hung out at the Avon Pier and got some photos and video of the surfers action, then flew my
Nano
fourth RC micro helicopter: Blade Nano CPx that has a tail rotor, no flybar and true collective positive and negative pitch
in the grass area north of Hatteras Realty, which is north of the Avon Post Office.
- Spent the night in Avon .

Sun 5/26 = No kiteboarding today, but I did, on the beach opposite Canadian Hole, sun 20 minutes, get acquainted with Ryan Lowrite, fly his six-foot mesh-front ram air kite with a top fiberglass spar, fly my
Nano
fourth RC micro helicopter: Blade Nano CPx that has a tail rotor, no flybar and true collective positive and negative pitch
(outside north of Hatteras Realty and in Koru's yoga room, practicing hand take-offs and landings), hung out at Ride Hatteras for a while, went to
SDA
Salvo Day Use Area south of Salvo
for a BBQ (Oto's pork/beef/chicken/zucchini/garlic concoction, delicious as always) with Oto and Jenny, kiteboarder and wife from Chapel Hill and flew my heli in a SDA grassy area for Oto and Jenny.
- While at SDA I met a delightful group of about 20 people, all from the Philippines. What a coincidence since I spent a month kiteboarding there two Januaries ago. They insisted that I try some of their Philippine food: flavored and grilled pork bellies - tasty! Roberto, of the group is learning to kiteboard and Ryan, the cook, was previously stationed at Luke AFB.
- On the way home I stopped by
Chimi House
old sound-side lifesaving station
to work on this blog and my website, then on to Avon to update my website and to spend the night.

Mon 5/27 Memorial Day = No kiteboarding wind today. In addition to the usual heli/gym, I cleaned and bandaged my left heal which somehow got cut, sunned opposite Canadian Hole, visited with Jeff & Seri from Alaska and her sisters, Jenny and April, contact-cemented the corners of pads on my Naish Custom Fish 5’2” x 17.5” surfboard with footstraps at Ride Hatteras, flew my
Nano
fourth RC micro helicopter: Blade Nano CPx that has a tail rotor, no flybar and true collective positive and negative pitch
in the grassy area north of Hatteras Realty (almost lost the heli in a big bush) and super glued one of the swash plate arms on the heli when I noticed that the almost-broken-off stationery arm was what had been causing the heli to vier to the right on takeoffs recently.
- Spent the night in Avon .

Tue 5/28 = I spent much of the day driving around for wind and finally found some up north. After a heli session in the Koru aerobics room, practicing hand take-offs and landings, I drove from Avon up to
KHK
Kitty Hawk Kites kiteboarding center in Rodanthe, NC.
where I flew my heli with Jay (from Alaska) in the grass area and then inside KHK. I took off and landed either in my hand or on the 3x5' top of a display case. The 25' ceiling there makes flying neat and I was able to stay away from all the kites and stuff hanging from it - all except one sign - my only crash there.
- Jay, Joe and I planned the 3-vehicle perfect downwinder, piled our kiteboarding stuff into my van and then headed south to check the wind out at Planet of the Apes for a possible 6-mile downwinder to KHK. There was little wind there. Back in the van, we drove up to
SDA
Salvo Day Use Area
where we found poor and mostly off-shore wind. Then on to KHK thinking of riding locally - off shore puny wind, so...
- I drove, solo, up to Windmill Point in Nags Head and found enough south wind to take my 12 and twin-tip on a 3-mile northbound downwinder to Jockey's Ridge. I worked on timing the usual jumps, pops and kite-loop jump jibes, traveled 6.37 miles in almost an hour and had a top speed of 23.2 mph. (all from the Vancouver area) who took down to my van. I gave them a tour of my van. - Spent the night at Walmart way north in Kitty Hawk.

Wed 5/29 = This morning I flew my
Nano
fourth RC micro helicopter: Blade Nano CPx that has a tail rotor, no flybar and true collective positive and negative pitch
in the Kill Devil Hills Older Adult Center, recharged its batteries while updating my website with the center's open wifi, flew another session, replaced the main rotor motor (only 88 flights on the last motor).
- I ate supper while driving south to
KHK
Kitty Hawk Kites kiteboarding center in Rodanthe, NC.
, checked the wind and went out with my 12m Epic Screamer KITE and 130 cm Lite Wave Stealth twin-tip board. It turned out to be a good call. When I came in after a 40-minute ride, Mike complemented me on my jumps, in spite that I felt I did only one good jump. I experimented with jump timing by starting the board carve before sending the kite.
- Spent the night in Rodanthe

Thu 5/30 = Today started slow with flying my
Nano
fourth RC micro helicopter: Blade Nano CPx that has a tail rotor, no flybar and true collective positive and negative pitch
I spent the rest of the morning and some of the afternoon trying to repair two broken swashplate arms with super glue. I finally repositioned and super glued one of the swashplate's link balls and put the heli away to dry overnight.
- By about supper time the wind came up enough from the southwest at
KHK
Kitty Hawk Kites kiteboarding center in Rodanthe, NC.
for my 15.7m Epic Renegade Infinity KITE. It was warm enough for only my swim trunks (first time here at Hatteras this year) for 1:41 (longest ride so far this trip) with my 130 cm Lite Wave Stealth twin-tip board working on jumps, kite-loop jibes and actually tried a couple of back rolls! Then I took out my Naish Custom Fish 5’2” x 17.5” surfboard with footstraps and made all but one jibe, trying to apply How to Jibe a Directional Board from my Lessons web page. I also practiced putting my foot in & out of the rear foot strap to the rhythm of a two-count. Top speed was 21.0 mph on the surf board and I traveled a combined distance of 14.5 miles.
- Spent the night in Rodanthe

Fri 5/31 = Spent all day waiting for the wind that never came. Actually it was not forecast to be good. The forecast was for southerly winds 5-10 mph, but in actuality the wind was mostly from the southeast - off shore at
KHK
Kitty Hawk Kites kiteboarding center in Rodanthe, NC.
. The wind was poor everywhere on the Outer Banks. Zafi and I talked about driving all the way up to Jockey's Ridge but the wind was ify there also.
- I did get a couple of things done. I researched
Nano
fourth RC micro helicopter: Blade Nano CPx that has a tail rotor, no flybar and true collective positive and negative pitch
swash plates and ordered two, plus landing skids, a grommet set and a main rotor drive gear from Horizon Hobby, all for nearly $50. The items should arrive the first part of next week. - I drove down to Avon for the night to charge up the
LiFeMnPO
our van's Lithium/Iron/Manganese/Phosphate/Oxygen house battery
and for some grocery shopping tomorrow morning.

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