VANCOUVER ISLAND WINDTALK

Great interviews with Ken Droog and, John Stathers at San Pariel about their upcoming "kitingforkids" fundraiser for BC Children's Hospital (raised over $10,000.00 last year by crossing the Georgia strait) starting from Parksville. 20kiters signed up for this October's crossing.

This year the kiting challenge is to cross Georgia Strait from Parksville or Nanaimo (based on wind direction) over to Sechelt and back, which is almost 70kms in very cold October waters and high winds.

<a href="/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ydPKud01rA0" target="_blank">kitingforkids on ShawTV</a>

Please donate at www.kitingforkids.com
Fundraising goal is $20,000.00 for BC Children's Hospital.

Great work!!

Hi All, We are having a fabulous response to this years crossing....just a few weeks away. We are at 22 kiters and are adding a 4th support boat.

The response has been excellent and the kite community has really stepped up. We are at $13279 total raised to date with a goal to hit $20,000 total raised.

Looks like we will cap it at 25 kiters for this year unless another support boat is added then we can go up to 30 kiters.

Should be an awesome crossing.

Cheers
Ken

Hi Ken, Would like to put my name down for the crossing and fund raising
Toner ( Tony Wilkins )

Hi Tony.

give me a call tomorrow or text me and we can chat
my cell is 250-951-4777

I can add you to the crossing team. That puts us at 23 total kiters and 4 boats.....with a 5th boat in the wings. We can go to 30 kiters with 5 boats.

Cheers

ken[/u]

Thursday looks like it could be a go! possibly...

Ken wrote:Hi All, We are having a fabulous response to this years crossing....just a few weeks away. We are at 22 kiters and are adding a 4th support boat.

The response has been excellent and the kite community has really stepped up. We are at $13279 total raised to date with a goal to hit $20,000 total raised.

Looks like we will cap it at 25 kiters for this year unless another support boat is added then we can go up to 30 kiters.

Awesome. I am glad you guys are having a great response, just wondering given this week's forecasted storm whether your "capable, support boats" are able to handle heavy weather AND know how to pick up a kiter in that kind of weather..... unlike the SAR boat in Tofino last winter which ended up having tangled props etc. endangering everyone on board. Just saying may wanna revisit that with any enthusiastic weekend warrior fishermen owning "capable" boats with a questionable skill set whose idea was this to do this in the winter SE pointing into the wind weather anyway? that in itself and not doing it on a NW in glorious summer sun is kinda sketch

Thanks Kus,
yes, a lot of safety preparation has gone into this.
we have 16 confirmed kiters attempting the crossing Thursday Oct 16
and 4 support boats. We have run over the safety aspects in depth and are trying to cross in lighter winds due to the number of kiters and obvious smaller seas for the safety boats.
Friday looks epic for the kiters but not good for safety boats.

cheers
johnny

Stay as a tight group! Designate a lead kiter no one can pass, and a tail kiter who brings up the rear. Trust me on this. For serious.

skywalker wrote:Stay as a tight group! Designate a lead kiter no one can pass, and a tail kiter who brings up the rear. Trust me on this. For serious.

Agreed Luke. Lessons were learned in our downwinder ... and these will be conveyed before we depart!

Thanks for the great turnout on our kiting For Kids attempt yesterday.
Great to meet a lot of people that we did not already know.
Too bad mother nurture didn't agree with our plans but we have all been there before and understand how these things go.
Most important is that we have already reached almost $19,000 of our 20k goal towards Childrens Hospital due to these amazing people.
we will probably try again in November if we can get a favorable day and if not then again in the early spring.
This group is an amazing group of experienced kiters with tonnes of water knowledge and it is nice to be able to have confidence in each other like this. Lots of great feedback, ideas and willingness to make this a success.
here's to all of you.
cheers
Johnny[/img]