Kitesurfers

Boards appear from backs of white vans. 📱 “Can’t finish your plumbing today luv, on another job.” 🤙

On windy days, plumbers, builders and the self-employed’s vans line up along the Meon Shore. Kites and kiteboards appear out the back of the vans. (Or windsurf sails, wings, hydrofoils, boards of all sorts, paragliders and other contraptions.) They aren’t going to work today, they’re going kitesurfing - and I don’t blame them.

And it’s often windy here. The wind is funnelled between the Isle of Wight and Portsmouth / Southampton along (cross-shore) this stretch of water, The Solent, making it for ideal conditions for water sports.

The London Olympics 2012 sailing happened nearby.

I took a few days break here before starting a new job that will no doubt be stressful.

Mid-life they say can be the hardest as you are stretched financially while dealing with the stresses of being squeezed between caring for children (not me thank god) and aging parents.

While dealing with an emergency hospital visit for the in-laws communicating remotely with my partner who was visiting them abroad, I took swims and walks along this beach in-between.

Better able to offer support and advice with a rested brain. Perhaps part of the job of being in mid-life is not to work harder, but to be rested enough to have the capacity to deal with the emergencies as they come along.

(I have a friend who's a Boeing 737 pilot who was told in no uncertain terms that relaxing between shifts was part of the job.)

Learning to relax, now that’s a very hard job indeed.

And to be wise.

As the zen psychologist Jon Kabat-Zinn says on life: “you can’t stop the waves, but you can learn to surf”.

Another benefit of mid-life is that you can buy a lot of cheap second hand water sports gear round here. (There used to be a car boot sale on Hayling Island outside Shore Watersports shop, it's moved to outside Funlands Amusements, but I imagine most of the kitesurf gear is sold online now.) As middle-managers in mid-life crises buy the latest expensive windsurf gear, give it up a few months later, and sell it virtually unused to the real surfers.

There’s toilets at the far (west) end of the Meon Shore. Next to the loos on weekend daytimes there’s an ice cream van or coffee van depending on the time of year - whether you need cooling down…

or heating up.

Further on are the Meon Shore Chalets, where you can buy souped up beach huts for half a million pounds. (And you’re not even allowed to live there year round.)

Otherwise, get changed by the car, wrapped a towel, like everyone else.

You can learn to kitesurf on courses at a couple of kitesurf schools based in the area - I know I did.

Controlling the kite is like "controlling a big dog" the instructor said, "you have to show it who's boss". Trying to ride a board at the same time is like patting your head while rubbing your stomach. I never properly mastered it (kitesurfing... I managed rubbing my stomach) preferring the simplicity of straight surfing instead.

(Actually surfing is anything but simple 😬.)

One day I'll give kitesurfing another proper go.

People have been riding kites since the Cody Kite in the 1900’s. A circus side show attraction.

Cody the inventor died when his kite crashed. Modern kites are much safer, but not without risk.

Occasionally you hear stories of kitesurfers abroad getting blown by a sudden gust into an electricity pylon. Although not round here that I’ve heard of. Plenty of open space at low-tide and predictable winds on the whole.

The Hidden Tap is nearby, but probably too far to stand-up paddle board the whole way.