Epic Day at the Beach
Yes, today was an epic day, arrived fabulous famous Frank Bulter Park beach, famous because it was the black hangout during segregation. We just like it! Super nice place, clean rest rooms, nice long walkway over those fabulous Florida dunes you hardly see anymore.
First thing I see, as I get out of my car, is two kites, slingshots, looks like, working back and forth,over the dunes, out in the Atlantic! Oh Happy Day!
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Took my time putting my buggy together, just drinking it all in, the sand, no sun on dry winter skin, feeling the wind. Nice, very nice. Beach is deserted till I go to launch my kite, and if anyones done it by themselves they know, it's a moment you need to get right! I was laying out a 12 m phantom which takes a little set up when Rasta on a bicycle comes up to watch me, I'm like (littlevoiceinhead) "NO, what would DQuadeous do?" So I went up in the bushes looked at string till he went away. Kite launch flawless.Hunker down in that crust trusty seat, which if anyones ever seen, still has pieces of my original web seat a4 years old! ? Take her up to speed, cruising around 15 or so, I made it up the beach in no time, to go to our traditional A street bar and have a corona.
There's just something so damn cool, pulling up to your favorite haunt, in a kite buggy. Yeah, I'll just park over there. Heh heh. I'll sort of fly this here kite "Yeah you didn't think it was that big, did you now?" Oh yeah, that's how we always do it, heh heh. Sort of set her down over here, off to the side of the window, heh, sweet. "Sure, yeah, come here all the time" heh heh.
Jumped back in the seat and headed towards the pier to discover that if I could get under or past the pier, it looked like I could go all the way to the St. Augustine inlet! I've never in 30 years of hanging around this beach seen conditions like these, check photo! OHMYGAW!! I can't believe it, I think it might be doable!!
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Getting under the pier wasn't going to happen, so I climbed over it, and got yelled at straight away by dweeb bull horn face, GET OFF OF THAT, YOU THERE,GO BACK THE WAY YOU CAME! I chuckled and jumped over "happy birthday, sir!" Some kids pulled my buggy from the under the pier for me, and plop, back in my magic buggy seat I went, getting more excited by the second. It was an effort, as the last part curves out to the east, and I was at the end having to go straight into the wind. Progress slowed to where VMG was way slower than walking, but no matter, I was determined and I was going to make the CLAIM! Part one completed!
On the ride up, I'd noticed a few stunt kite flyers but didn't recognize any of them. On the way back down, I passed quite a few more, but could only see their kites. There is a drop off behind the last motel which lead to big dunes behind it, where the ocean used to cut us off, before they piled sand on the beach here, as some restoration effort they're always trying, as if you could hold back the Atlantic ocean, yeah, sure, that will work, more sand over here please. Great for buggies though! With out a doubt!
So I'm honkin down, just wailing when I approach the pier, with some where in the back of my mind that littlevoiceagain thought, I'm flying my kite under that pier. Well, not quite. As I chicken out and slide to a stop,. Hmph. How do I do this, don't want to talk t o Mr. Megaphone no more, so I shoved the buggy real hard under the pier, got a good roll. Walked out and flew that kite under that pier like the ace that I know I am! Everything is fine till I come out the other side, the lee of the pier. Momentum took the kite back a little way, but it just fell down on the beach, like, I'm pooped, that's it bud!
Whoa, not a soul, not a soul on the beach, but people on the pier watching me, seeing how badly I've goofed, and how's that smart ass gonna get out of this one?? He's gonna get it here, oh watch! Look at him, lines all over the place can't move
Cause it just all goes to shit. . . Well, I was just thinking, wouldn't this not be the most perfect aoxomoxoa day in the world if out of the blue, an actual kite flying type person could just appear on the spot!
As I savor this thought, I look up on the top of the dune under the pier! I'll be a son of a gun, I know that guy, it's Gary Engvall, and I don't have to say a word, he just comes down the dune, grabs the kite lightly, walks back, and away I go, just like I had it planned it like that the whole time, oh thank you Lord!
Turns out there is an Eastern League Event there, this weekend, and I didn't even know it was going on! Shame on me! I must be out of it, I don't know what's happened to me, but I always new when a kite event was happening in florida, geez. Oh well, I couldn't buggy up to where they were, and I couldn't see actual kite flyers, just their kites, and as the day went on they got big single line stuff up, which you could see way up the beach! Flying kites is important stuff. I wish you'd see more single line kites at traction events.
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Soon I'm out and under and gone and fast, really moving now, passing a few people out walking, lots of birds. Getting that cool neutral slide thang going, where your wheels just feel like they're on velvet or something. I'd sneak up on the seagulls, flying along with them for a few thousand feet, this is really nice I'm thinking. Suddenly, this dog, couldn't say what kind, brown, jumps up, and just explodes, I mean bolts, and is running in front of me, so I start chasing him, oh he was good, he would dodge and weave back and forth and then with a playful little leap he zigged and was gone! Just like that!On and on down the next 11 miles to the end of the run, picking up speed the whole time, just flying, and being juiced. In fact I was so keyed up with doing this, this epic journey, from one inlet to another, after buggying on this beach now for 15 years( I'm having trouble believing that, but I first buggied there in 91!) that when I got to the end, I just powered up and did a down turn and fired back up the beach.
There were a bunch of kite boarders at the inlet , but I didn't recognize anyone or slow down. Off I went like a prom dress, gone daddy gone, mad mad mad day at the beach and that was just the beginning, what a day, what a day!!!
Full Aoxomoxoa, had to share.
dean written January 2006
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