Maui Trip

So had a month in Maui over April. It was really really busy and the conditions were inconsistent so it was a bit disappointing especially compared to last year when we had wind nearly every day for 5 weeks!


Spent a few days on Oahu seeing the forecast looked bad for Maui and I wanted to check out the fabled North Shore but we didn't end up getting a car organised and Hookipa turned out to be pumping... Wasn't too pleased about missing out on sick conditions while stuck in Waikiki.

The first day we had at Hookipa was by far the best of the trip, 4.2 wind, cross offshore and mast high on the sets. Wasn't ridiculously crowded as most of the photoshoots hadn't started yet. Unfortunately I felt like a total retard on starboard tack after only sailing port tack for the past 7 months or so!


We had wind for about 5 days and then a full week of literally zero swell and zero wind! Pretty unheard of for Maui! Wasn't much to do other than go for a SUP and check out girls.




Ended up having a few good days though and felt like I improved my starboard tack sailing by the end of it. Sounded like there was close to zero windsurfing conditions while we were away which definitely made it worthwhile!

Maui - part 2

New Swell


After the original swell we had scored in the first week had died down I wasn't expecting much more in terms of quality. Luckily we were suprised with a decent North swell coming into Hookipa up to logo high - about 4ft or so in surfing terms or 3m faces for non-surfers. Unfortunately for me it was ridiculously windy! Being a light weight I don't really like it when the wind is much over 30 knots. I was so overpowered I could barely sail in a straight line - let alone bottom turn! Joel and James on the other hand were loving it. The waves were pretty punchy due to the low tide and I had a few run ins with the reef, scraping my arm along the bottom. James also managed to find the mother of all sea urchins making his foot look even more like a pincushion. Later in the afternoon the wind backed down a bit as I had hoped so I was finally able to get out and get some rides. The crowds had back off as well which was a bonus, it was only me, Francisco Goya and about three others on the water all trading some decent waves.

Tweaked tabletop


The new swell was short lived, by the next afternoon we were back to mucking around on the small windswell. This was easily enough for some sick jumping conditions allowing me to practise my involuntary double pushloops! At the start of the trip we had all set specific moves we wanted to work on, mine was the pushloop with tabletop forwards coming in second. I had been having trouble slowing pushys down, usually ending up going way too fast and coming down hard after going into a second rotation. Although hilarious, they were pretty painful... We only managed to get one of the smaller ones on film.

Practising the Polakow tweak


On a windless morning Phil dragged me out bed for a trip to the cannery where Goya and Quatro were based out of. Due to a lack of research we actually had no idea where to go so ended up driving around the hills of Haiku for over an hour before finally giving up as the wind began to crank. The next day armed with the info we needed courtesy of Google maps we hit the road. When we arrived the guys were super helpful, Francisco, Pascal and Keith answered all our questions about the latest shapes and multi finned boards. Pascal even took us for a tour behind the scenes which was pretty cool, showing us the process that Keith goes through to ultimately end up building a sick board.

Sprecks forward


As the last week of the trip drew nearer the pressure was on. We all wanted to pull off our new moves and get enough video footage to make a decent movie of the trip. It was decided that everyone had to pick a move for someone else to land, Phil's was a decent stalled forward, Joel's a massive cheese roll, James' a tweaked pushy and mine - a tabletop forward. After the first day of this strategy no one actually pulled off their move, we all just ended up smashing ourselves. I was pretty motivated to nail a tabletop forward though so I ditched pushys and decided to focus solely on my new goal. A few days later I pulled one off at Kanaha totally dry. Bit of bummer that no one got it on film but I was still stoked.

Rockpools


On one of our last days a few of our friends took us to some rock pools around the corner from Jaws. It was a pretty sketchy walk down the cliff face - at one point we nearly lost Joel haha. The pools were pretty amazing with a little cave, lots of fish and urchins as well... You had to be careful where you sat! We also found a few hermit crabs and started a bit of a battle. My crab kicked ass until a fish tried to eat it.

It seemed like much too soon as the trip came to an end. It was hard to believe we had spent so much time away. The memories of all the days blurred together, the mediocre sessions were forgotten and only the sickest moves and the best crashes stood out. On the last day we were treated with nuking wind. Powered up on my 3.6 I wanted to make the most of the warm water and sunshine. Joel chased me around for about half an hour with the GoPro camera to amp me up for a double forward attempt but the ramps just never materialised...

Stalled forward



Later we got home and got packed before going for dinner at the Paia fish market. Our flight was leaving at 6am which meant we had to wake up at 4am. The thought of sitting on a plane for a whole day wide awake was not very appealing so I stayed up all night editing the video footage. After an hour and a half of sleep I had to get up again and get to the airport. Negotiating with the check-in chick about excess baggage when you are that sleep deprived is not much fun, especially when they didn't even accept my travellers card or cash to pay for it!! Luckily Phil saved the day and I was able to make it onto the flight. Thanks Phil! As soon as I got in my chair I was pretty much comatose. The sleep deprivation worked a treat. I woke up again to drag my luggage to the international terminal at Honolulu airport and then got back to sleep as we took off for Sydney. It didn't seem like too much longer and we were descending back into Australia. Time flies when you are that tired. After clearing customs without any dramas we had to drag our bags across another airport... At the Qantas transfer desk we had the biggest legend ever so got us all on an eariler flight so we didn't have to wait another 4 hours to get home to Melbourne.

Arriving back in Victoria it was pretty cold! The forecast was looking windless but with some decent waves for the next few days so it looked like even though I wasn't in Hawaii, I would still be in the water. You can't ask for much more than that.

Maui - part 1

To escape Victoria's autumn doldrums Phil Chalko, Joel Ryan, James Toth and myself decided to go to Hawaii for a month!
This time of year is photo shoot season on Maui with the best of the best all turning up to score some of the conditions that make Maui the Mecca of the windsurfing world.
I had been eagerly watching the forecast for a week leading up to the trip, and as the time to leave came closer, it was apparent we were going to be in for a treat.

The boys heading out to Sprecks


Phil, Joel and myself were catching a flight from Melbourne to Sydney and from there then flying to Honolulu before catching another connecting flight to Maui. We were all nervous about the large amounts of equipment we had to drag around and the potential damage the excess baggage could do to our bank accounts! Amazingly for us we scored the best check-in chick at Qantas ever. She processed our bags no questions asked without even mentioning excess baggage. It wasn't until our inter-island flight that we had to cough up any cash. $35 US. A pretty awesome run I thought. It could have been bad though when Phil let it slip that we had windsurfing equipment (which incurs a flat fee of $100 per bag) as opposed to normal 'surfboards.'

Joel and I were left to convince the check-in dude otherwise, quickly coming up with stories of luggage and camera equipment. We eventually made it on to our flight and as the North Shore of Maui came into view excitement levels went through the roof.
Rolling swells were pounding the outer reefs and we could see the ocean was covered in whitecaps. Touching down at Kahului we got our hire car sorted, dumped our luggage at our house just behind the beach at Sprecklesville and hit the water. Fully powered on my 4.2 zone it was a sick jumping session - a perfect start to the trip. Later we drove through Paia to check out the world famous Hookipa Beach Park. For those who don't know this spot is to windsurfing what Pipeline is for surfing, having a reputation for consistently good conditions where the world's elite come to hone their skills. It wasn't really happening when we checked it out but the JP team were still out there ripping up the small waves for the photoshoot.

Big crash at Sprecks


The next day James was arriving from Alaska where he had been heli-skiing in some serious terrain. His arrival was timed with that of a pumping new swell. After a morning session at Sprecks we headed to Hookipa. This time it did not dissapoint. It was mayhem on the water with basically every big name in windsurfing out ripping up the mast high plus sets. After a quick chat to Jason Polakow on the beach, me and Joel hit the water with James and Phil both opting to sit on the cliffs and catch the carnage on camera. Launching off the beach it became apparent that it wasn't going to be easy making it out the back. A super fluky breeze and large walls of whitewater made sure Joel and I both got worked before finally catching a break through the sets and making it out into the lineup. After one decent wave I made the mistake of catching one of the smaller left over swells, sure enough as I pulled off it a monster set loomed on the horizon. I knew I was in trouble as the solid 6fter walled up in front of me and proceeded break right on my head. During the split second it took for me to jump off my board and get smashed by the wave I had already come to terms with the fact that I was going to be dealing with a lot of broken gear and a trip over the infamous Hookipa rocks. After a massive swim I was finally reunited with my gear. Amazingly I was wrong, everything survived no dramas! Unfortunately the wind had dropped out by this stage and I had to dog knee deep in water back upwind to the beach. After about 20 minutes a gust came in finalling allowing me to make it back in safely.

First Hookipa wave of the trip

Over the next few days the swell slowly died down but was still decent enough for some solid sessions at Hookipa. After a week of pumping conditions my hands were looking worse for wear so I decided to take a break and just film the boys for a day. It was probably a wise decision as the wind continued to crank for another 5 days!

Twin Falls

While it had been windy our routine consisted of waking up somewhere between 10 and 11am, having breakfast, going windsurfing all day, coming home eating dinner and going to bed around 1am. When the wind backed down we finally had opportunities to see the other aspects of Maui. We had three days before the wind came back to check out the sights. On the first day we went to the Twin falls which is a system of waterfalls just off the Hana Highway. We wanted to do some cliff jumping but after an assessment of the water depth we decided it would probably not be a good idea!
Later in the afternoon the boys decided to go hire some SUP boards, not being a big fan of SUP I opted to stay at home and start editing the video footage from the last week. They returned a few hours later apparently lucky to still have their limbs intact after an encounter with a rather large shark!


The next morning there was an unpredicted pulse of swell so the plan was to hit the waves at Lanes on the wave slaying SUP boards and then drive up to the summit of the Haleakala volcano. Again I didn't really want to go SUPing but Phil decided not to push his luck after the shark incident the day before so I borrowed his board. Launching off the beach it suddenly became apparent that SUP was not a good idea. When the tide is low at Lanes you have to walk over a rock shelf to get into the water. As the waves break water sucks in and out over this rock shelf covering up the huge numbers of sea urchins waiting to destroy unsuspecting feet. Totally unaware of this fact I walked out over the shelf before standing on a few small urchins. Quickly I wisened up and started to look where to stand, unfortunately a wave broke on me and the behemoth that is a SUP board, causing me to lose my balance and stand right on a huge urchin... In considerable pain I finally made it off the shelf and out to the back of the break. Sitting down on the board I inspected the damage finding a monstrous black spine stuck in my foot. I've stood on urchins before but this thing was truly massive... About 5mm in diameter and 4cm long with a dangly intestine looking thing coming out the end. Sitting out in breaking waves was not really an ideal environment for minor surgery but I couldn't even stand up on the board with the spine in my foot, after a few minutes of mucking around I finally pulled it out and proceeded to bleed all over the hire board. Knowing that I could be in for a close encounter of the finned kind I decided to head in without even catching a wave... Back on land I watched Joel and James get a few waves before they came in. James got dumped on the shelf and ended up with a similar gash in his foot to mine after a run in with another urchin.

Sunset on Haleakala - Joel, James, Me

In the afternoon we started the drive up Haleakala for sunset. Halaeakala means house of the sun and is the huge shield volcano that makes up most of Maui. It is over 3000m high and towers right up above the cloud line so usually you cannot see the summit from sea level. When we got up there it was freezing! I had only brought one jumper so was totally unprepared for that kind of cold. Being that high the air is also thinner, something we really noticed when we started running up the stairs to keep warm! After taking a few photos we quickly headed back down (thanks to Phil's engine braking skills) to the warmth of sea level.

The $800 fish!

The next day we went fishing on a charter off Lahaina on the West coast. Joel woke me up at about 4am about 7 hours earlier than usual so I wasn't really in a good mood... After a quick snack for breakfast we made it to the wharf at 5.30am ready to catch a marlin or a massive yellowfin or any sort of large gamefish really. When we made it out of the harbour the ocean was glassy and it was pretty awesome watching the sun rise over the West Maui Mountains. By this point we were all excited to catch some big fish. However over the next 8 hours we only got two hits... One was a large Mahi Mahi that didn't connect properly with the hooks. The other was a 30 pound yellowfin that James landed providing us with some awesome sashimi and lots and lots of tuna steaks. It was a bit disappointing that we didn't get any more fish, but James was pretty stoked. It was easily the biggest fish he had ever caught. After the fishing we went for a quick surf out off the harbour wall before rushing back around to the North shore as a fire spread across the West Maui mountains. That night we all went to bed pretty early ready for another solid week of cranking wind and waves....