KITESURFING HOLBOX, QUINTANA ROO

Holbox is one of the favorites mexican kiteboarding destinations. It is situated northwest of Cancun city only two hrs. It means black hole in Maya dialect, Holbox is a beautiful island in Quintana Roo state, situated north coast on the Yucatan Peninsula. Isla Holbox is 12 km long and 1.5 km wide aproximatley. The island is separated from the mainland by a lagoon which offers a place to many pink flamingos, pelicans and other exotic birds and animals.

The locals lives basically from the fishing. Usually you can watch the fishermen walking through the town with their catch and their fishing equipment. The streets of the village are on white sand, like typical mexican caribbean islands. The town is a virgin tourist spot, not to many visitors come.

The village is not to big, there are no cars, people is walking all time, golf cars or bicycle. Holbox is known for the pink flamingos and lots of many birds if you walk the beach west or east away from Holbox. The whale shark tours are a great attraction for the visitors. Many other activities: Fishing, Dolphin view, bird tours around the island, Kayaking, paddlepoarding, Whaleshark, Turtle watching,visiting Maya Temples (on the mainland.

Holbox is accessed by ferry from the mainland town of Chiquila, 15 minutes on boat.

kiteboarding in Holbox is delicious. Shallow waters and not too many people around. A completly kitesurfing paradise

Via: http://kitesurfvacation.com/?page_id=636

THINGS TO DO IN HOLBOX ISLAND

Isla Holbox is a beautiful island off the coast of the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico. The island itself is actually pretty long, about 40 km, but only part of it inhabited. Residents have resisted commercialization, leaving Isla Holbox with some of it’s original charm. There are no cars, and most people get around on foot, bicycle, or take one of the golf cart taxis from the small town. Everyone here seems so happy and friendly, and the beaches are absolutely stunning.

1. Swim with Whale Sharks on Isla Holbox
2. Eat Ceviche in local restaurant
3. Watch the sunset in Punta Coco
4. Relax in the hammocks
5. Visit the flamingos in Isla Passion
6. padlleboard or Kayak into the mangroves
7. Horse back riding on the beach

PARTS OF A KITESURF BAR

Over the years kitesurfing equipment has changed a lot. Bars have become much safer to use due to the addition of safety systems. If you’re buying a second hand bar, always make sure it has a depower system and a quick release.

Chicken loop

The chicken loop is the connection between you and the kite. This loop is attached to the hook of your harness. All power is transmitted to your back rather than your arms. To kitesurf you don’t need to have a lot of power in your arm, contrary to what many people think.

Donkey dick

Without the donkey dick, the chicken loop could come out of the hook when your lines lose tension. The donkey dick is place between the loop and your hook and prevents the chicken loop from coming off.

Quick release

This is an essential part of your safety system! NEVER buy a bar without a quick release! The quick release is always above the chicken loop and is usually red. Almost every quick release on the market has a push away mechanism. However, there are exceptions so make sure you know how your works before you go kitesurfing. To activate the release, always let go of the bar first. When you activate the quick release, you leash will pull on one line, which flags out the kite.

Back line adjuster

Most modern bars have a trimming option for the back lines. You can use this option if you feel your kite has a deviation.

Standard/ suicide mode

Every modern bar has a depower line with a ring the leash can be attached to. There are 2 ways to attach the leash: standard and suicide mode. Unless you are advanced and do unhooked tricks, always use standard mode. This way in case you activate the quick release, the kite will flag out and all power will be gone. Suicide mode is made for unhooked moves. In this case you open the chicken loop and put it through the ring. This way your kite doesn’t flag out if you crash and let go of the bar. As a beginner NEVER use this mode as it is not safe.

Depower strap

The depower strap allows you to adjust the angle of the kite and give you less power. There are bars with below the bar and above the bar depower systems. Usually when you see a piece of cord hanging it means the kite is depowered.

Swivel

After making a rotation your lines can be twisted. Some swivels turn back automatically but some have to be turned back by hand.

Safety leash

This essential part of your safety equipment usually comes with any new bar. Make sure to put your bar on standard safety mode and always connect your leash.

Bar width

There are different bar widths on the market. In general, a smaller kite flies better on a smaller bar. A bigger kite needs much more input to move so the added leverage of a wider bar might come in handy. Modern bars usually have the option of adjusting the width of your bar up to 10 centimetres.

4, 5 or 6 lines

Most kites are flown on four line bars There are however high performance free ride kite that use 5 lines. Some freestyle specific kites even use 6 lines.

Line length

The length of your lines has big influence on your kite. Bigger kites are used in lighter wind and having longer lines increases the size of the wind window and you can make a bigger power stroke. Smaller kites may require shorter lines, as they are much faster.

The shorter the line, the more direct the kite reacts and the less power you have. The longer your lines the slower the kite react and the more power it has.

KITESURFING SEASON IS JUST TO BEGIN IN HOLBOX ISLAND !!!

Holbox is a lost paradise in the Mexican Caribbean. A magic island with lush white sand beaches and crystal clear water. Once a land of pirates, today it has become a first class tourist destination, where the outbreak of enthusiastic visitors merges with the warmth of its people. Surrounded by exceptional landscapes and streets of fine sand, it is the perfect place to practice kitesurfing. Only an hour and a half from Cancun or Playa del Carmen, Holbox continues to maintain an immaculate natural space. Far away from the crowd of the big hotels, you can have full contact with nature in its wildest state. An island with 42 kilometers long and 2 wide virgin space, where sailing with your board becomes an incomparable sensation. Dolphins, Manta Rays, a lot of species of fish, and an endless number of migratory birds become your companions during your kite sessions. KiteSurfing Holbox.

KITESURFING?

Kitesurfing. Kite. Surfing. What is kitesurfing? What is it exactly? Seriously! Kitesurfing?! Is it a sport that combines the ballet of kite-flying, with the poetry of surfing? Sort of. But, in many ways, kitesurfing is so much more than that. There’s a depth to kitesurfing that may well have passed you by if you’re only knowledge of it revolves around those bizarre photographs of Sir Richard Branson kitesurfing off an island with naked supermodels. Because, despite our constant wrist pinching, that naked supermodel thing definitely happened.
Moving on from that, let’s break this whole kitesurfing topic down a bit. The first thing you should know about kitesurfing is that it’s actually a specific style of kiteboarding. Wait, we can explain. Kiteboarding, you see, is a surface water sport that brings together elements of snowboarding, wakeboarding, windsurfing, paragliding, skateboarding, and gymnastics. The kiteboard used is similar in size to a wakeboard, and the kiteboarder is strapped to it with bindings. Like some sort of wind-manipulating superhero, a kiteboarder utilises the energy of the wind by moving his power kite in certain directions.

Kitesurfing, however, differs slightly from kiteboarding in that it uses a standard surf board which more often than not has no bindings attached. Stylistically, kitesurfers focus more on the riding of waves than hitting the big air and even bigger tricks that feature in the world of freestyle kiteboarding. Kitesurfing requires a location with wave breaks, while kiteboarding can happen anywhere with water and be anything you want it to be. That being said, nobody is going to shoot you down if you say “kitesurfing” when you mean “kiteboarding” or vice-versa. People who do this sort of thing are a pretty chilled bunch, more often than not.

Come and learn kitesurfing in one of the best spots in the world: Holbox Island in Mexico!

NOVATEK CAMERA
Punta Mosquito Spot: Holbox island

Why you should grab a kite and a board and get on the water?

Why you should grab a kite and a board and get on the water?

With all my answers for this question I could easily fill a whole book. Who knows, maybe one day I will write one about it: “1.000 good reasons for kitesurfing”. But no worries – I will keep this article compact. Here you get all my personal reasons in a short overview.

darkslide2

Et voilá:

Why kitesurfing?
Because it’s fun, fun, fun!

Maybe the most important point of all. Gliding over the water, practicing new tricks, the sense of achievement, sessions with good friends … do I need to say more? Sure you can have a lot of fun in the gym too. But (I go to the gym regularly!) it’s not the same kind of fun: On the one hand it’s the kind of sport itself, on the other hand all the things around kitesurfing – places, lifestyle and much more. I promise!

airridersstyle16

Because it’s healthy

Being outdoors and breathing the fresh air … didn’t our grandmas tell us all the time, how important this is? They were absolutely right. Good news: Fresh air is one thing you will get a lot of while hanging on a kite – think of all the wind!
Apart from that kitesurfing will improve coordination, balance and concentration, trains reflexes and reactions and strengthens the whole body – also the often neglected core muscles.
Compared to windsurfing you need much less strength for kitesurfing. But you will use muscles you never knew that they exist! And you will feel this … when it happens the first time that after a intensive kite day you can not sit up in bed the next morning – cause your abs burn like hell (well, this is a good kind of pain ;)).

20007334508_3e1212af63_o

However, going kitesurfing regularly will get you in shape. Also the calorie consumption is nothing to sneeze: for me Runtastic says that I burn 320 calories per hour. Quite a lot – and I have a lot of fun while burning it! What I really notice is that I can (and have to) eat much, much more when I kite a lot. Pizza or fries after a kite session taste so much better – and you can stop counting all those calories 🙂
Last, but not least: Kitesurfing reduces the stress level, makes you more resilient and strengthens the immune system.

Because it clears the head

You, the water and the wind – one unity. Elements, the force of nature, movement. This combination is relaxing and lets everyday worries shrink till they are vanished. What to do on Monday in the office or in which mood the boss will be – during a kitesession you couldn’t care less. There is no time to brood over such thoughts. Moreover the physical activity will get you tired in a very pleasant way. You will enjoy the sunset totally relaxed and afterwards slumber like a baby. Conclusion: Kitesurfing is head and shoulders better than a stay in a wellness hotel.

19574377733_ba7a8bfeb5_o

Because it makes you happy

Moving your body leads to release of happiness hormones – this is no news. But all kinds of surfing activities add a special bonus: feeling “stoked” after a day on the water is indescribable and priceless. “You can’t buy happiness, but you can buy a kite and that’s pretty close” – word. But be careful: All this causes addiction very fast 😉

Because it makes you sexy

Did I already mention that kitesurfing keeps you top in shape? We heard it a thousand times: If you feel comfortable with your body, you are moving different and you ray out way more self-confidence. Additionally the huge grin you will wear after a fantastic kite day, the sleaziness you ray out from being happy and chilled. The tan you get, the fresh appearance you will have from being outdoors a lot. What’s the result of all these factors? Very easy to answer: You will appeal sexier, that’s for sure.

kadriya_photo

Because you will make new contacts and friends

Even if you should be a totally unsocial character – sorry, you merely can’t avoid getting in contact with a lot of people if you join the kitesurfing lifestyle. At your homespot, on vacation, hanging out on kite stations and -beaches, camping spaces or whatever … the companionable atmosphere which you (usually!) find at kitespots is supernice. Everyone is helping each other – after all every kiter is part of a community (with a few exceptions – like everywhere).

Usually kitesurfers experience that their network is growing rapidly.  Facebook, Instagram and Social Media in general make it very easy to stay in contact with people all over the world, interchanging information about traveling, kitespots, equipment, tricks – or arranging to meet each other again somewhere. The kite community has become huge – but you will be wondering how many mutual friends you have when you add someone new you met at the kite beach. Yes, the world is supersmall!

crowdwatching

Because it expands one’s horizon

I dare to say that a sport like kitesurfing contributes a lot to personal development. New people and relationships, new countries, new tricks – kitesurfing yields to a lot of new things and experiences in life and forces someone to get out of his comfort zone again and again. Why? Cause you can’t calculate natural forces like wind and water – you have to be flexible all the time, very often you have to improvise, make decisions very quickly or weigh risks. Ditto for traveling: If you go on a wellness vacation for one week you will – compared to a kite surf week with the bus – probably experience not a lot of unexpected things. Becoming addicted to kitesurfing means that a lot will change, especially in daily organization. Cause kite addicts want to get out the most of a windy day – this can lead to a lot of planning (I mean, most people have a job too ;)).

beachview

I was never expecting the massive impacts of kitesurfing to my life. It’s not that it changed me personally – it also changed my job and a lot of other things. For me traveling to kitespots became lifeblood.  I know I am not alone with this. Exploring new spots, always searching for the perfect kite beach, the perfect wave, the perfect conditions – this thoughts are my companion, permanently. Days with sunshine but also rainy days with squalls … learning to deal with everything is part of the game, if you get yourself into the kitesurfing adventure. Unforgettable moments will follow!

So much for the theory, guys. Now I ask all those who are thinking about starting kitesurfing: What are you waiting for? Are there still doubts? If yes: Why?

Well … I am sure I forgot something and there are so many more reasons for kiting – so if anyone has any additions: please tell me, I would be happy to hear more.

Beatiful Articule comming from Anja, from http://www.kitejoy.at/en/why-kitesurfing/kite23

Top 10 Reasons Why Kiteboarding Is Good for You

 

Besides burning calories, kiteboarding has other important benefits:

  1. Kideboarding tones the body, especially the upper area, arms and abdomen. Strengthening your abdominal area resulting in turn in a physical improvement of the abductors and legs too. You increase the strength in your arms by holding, the kite in legs by bending over the board to ride, and the muscles of the hands by grabbing the bar.
  2. Healthy heart. Kiteboarding also combines aerobics and resistance exercises, perfect for keeping a balance weight, toning your figure and gaining physical strength, all of which keep your heart healthy.
  3. Increases coordination and concentration. You are focusing on several tasks at a same time, and you must keep the kite in the air with one hand while you enter the water grabbing the board with the other hand.
  4. Balance. Also riding on the board is great to improve your balance.
  5. Stress relief. With any sport you eliminate stress, but if it is an extreme sport adrenaline rushes are much higher, creating a great feeling of wellness.
  6. Immune system boost. By boosting endorphins and reducing your stress levels, you also boost your immune system.
  7. Better reflexes and adaptability. The way of navigation and jumping in kitesurfing, in which you have to constantly make decisions about movement and position of the bar, body, board, etc, makes you resolve difficult situations on the water, increasing your reflexes and reaction capacity.
  8. Respect for nature. Like any sport in which you interact with the environment, kitesurfing fosters respect for the ocean, animals and nature in general, as well as makes you breathe fresh air away from the city smog.
  9. Community and networking. When you practice kitesurfing you become part of a community and meet other people that enjoy the same activities, which helps you to interact with people with common interests and tastes, improves your relationships and your ability to communicate.
  10. New experiences and sensations. Kiteboarding allows you to experience new sensations, like the feeling of flying, increasing your level of happiness.

So, the more you practice the fitter and happier you will be — and we just happen to have a great way to help you with that…

Kiteboarding is fun and addictive. Once you feel the pull of the kite, you’re hooked and you’ll never be the same. You become obsessed with watching the wind (and wind forecast), and every time you see a body of water you think, “Can I kite there?” And in addition to enjoying the outdoors and the water, you’ll get a great workout.

So go fly a kite!

WHAT IS KITEBOARDING?

cropped-kite-web-19-long.jpg

Kiteboarding is a surface water sport combining aspects of wakeboarding, snowboarding, windsurfing, surfing, paragliding, skateboarding and sailing into one extreme sport. A kiteboarder harnesses the power of the wind with a large controllable power kite to be propelled across the water on a kiteboard similar to a wakeboard or a small surfboard, with or without footstraps or bindings.

Should I Use a Board Leash While Kiteboarding?

One of the inescapable hardships of kiteboarding comes in the form of losing your kiteboard. It happens to everyone, from the new kitesurfer to the advanced rider. And sometimes, after a particularly high velocity crash or in wavy conditions, it can seem impossible that you’ll ever recover your kiteboard with how far you were dragged. Naturally, that led to some kite surfers attaching leashes to their kiteboard so as to never lose it. You may find yourself asking the question, is a kiteboard leash right for me? The forthright answer to that question is no, you should not attach a board leash to your kiteboard. The answer boils down to simple physics.

With minor falls, a leash attached to your kiteboard doesn’t pose much of a threat. But then again, small falls are easy to recover from, and the board is nary a far distance away. Larger, more powered falls is where the danger in a leash manifests itself. Effectively, you have a powerful, unwieldy kite attached to you that has a tendency to pull you across the water for several meters before depowering. In the event the board submarines, or goes underwater, a stupendous amount of resistance is going to be created. When that board finds its way out of the water, it is going to be propelled at you at an incredible speed. You might be fortunate and be missed, or merely grazed by the kiteboard. Or you may be less lucky, and get knocked out or have a chunk taken out of you. Helmets and impact vests found their way into kiteboarding precisely for this reason, and even still they don’t offer much protection from a kiteboard coming at you at mach 10.

Reel leashes are sometimes employed as a safer alternative, but can still pose a danger. The intention with reel leashes is that they are only connected after a wipe-out, attaching the board to you so it doesn’t drift away as you work to relaunch your kite. Risk is still present however, as the kite can launch off the water more powerfully than predicted, causing you to be pulled suddenly across the water. From personal experience, I’ve found that if I crash next to my board, the best option is putting it on my feet and using it as leverage to help relaunch my kite. The added resistance prevents you from being towed downwind by the kite as much, making relaunch easier.

Rather, instead of attaching a leash to your kiteboard, there is a much safer solution – learning how to body drag! When body dragging, you’ll effectively use your body as a rudder. If you are comfortable steering the kite with one hand (a skill that can be honed with a trainer kite), use a hand to further drive yourself upwind towards your downed kiteboard. Keep in mind that drastic turns can undo your progress as the kite pulls you downwind, so tack as straight as possible and turn only when necessary, steering the kite gently. Practice several times before actually going out on the water, setting upwind targets to drag to. Not only will this make you a stronger kiteboarder, but it’ll make sure you spend those windy days on the water instead of in a hospital bed!

What is Kitesurfing?

Kitesurfing. Kite. Surfing. What is kitesurfing? What is it exactly? Seriously! Kitesurfing?! Is it a sport that combines the ballet of kite-flying, with the poetry of surfing? Sort of. But, in many ways, kitesurfing is so much more than that. There’s a depth to kitesurfing that may well have passed you by if you’re only knowledge of it revolves around those bizarre photographs of Sir Richard Branson kitesurfing off an island with naked supermodels. Because, despite our constant wrist pinching, that naked supermodel thing definitely happened.
Moving on from that, let’s break this whole kitesurfing topic down a bit. The first thing you should know about kitesurfing is that it’s actually a specific style of kiteboarding. Wait, we can explain. Kiteboarding, you see, is a surface water sport that brings together elements of snowboarding, wakeboarding, windsurfing, paragliding, skateboarding, and gymnastics. The kiteboard used is similar in size to a wakeboard, and the kiteboarder is strapped to it with bindings. Like some sort of wind-manipulating superhero, a kiteboarder utilises the energy of the wind by moving his power kite in certain directions.

Kitesurfing, however, differs slightly from kiteboarding in that it uses a standard surf board which more often than not has no bindings attached. Stylistically, kitesurfers focus more on the riding of waves than hitting the big air and even bigger tricks that feature in the world of freestyle kiteboarding. Kitesurfing requires a location with wave breaks, while kiteboarding can happen anywhere with water and be anything you want it to be. That being said, nobody is going to shoot you down if you say “kitesurfing” when you mean “kiteboarding” or vice-versa. People who do this sort of thing are a pretty chilled bunch, more often than not.

Come and learn kitesurfing in one of the best spots in the world: Holbox Island in Mexico!