Long time friend Aaron Hadlow is back in the city, he should just move here considering he is here half the year….. Every year he is out here we try to get a day or 2 in studio as well as some sessions in. Always good shooting with Aaron, we usually nail the shots pretty easily needed. Ruben is usually with us but he has been on the sideline looking after his ankle that has been giving him hassles again. hopefully we will get a session in before he limps home.

A quick session at Big Bay

Aaron still ripping

Hard working hands

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Table Mountain

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Yesterday, kitesurfer Alexandre Caizergues beat the outright world speed record under sail with an average of 54.10 knots (100.19 km/hr) over 500 metres of the Luderitz channel (Namibia). The young Frenchman is the new outright speed record holder. He has deposed Hydroptère and its 51.36 knots.

The 12^th October 2010 will go down in the long history of speed records under sail. Alex Caizergues, a native of Port Saint-Louis in southern France, had an absolute blinder of a day. During his first run, with 45 knots of breeze blowing along Luderitz’s legendary lagoon spot, Caizergues immediately powered off at blistering speed, well positioned on his board and harnessed to his 8 m2 wing.

At the end of an incredible 500 metre straight, the fastest kitesurfer on the planet gave free rein to his delight on discovering that he’d broken the 100 km/hr barrier across the water (54.10 knots). It was a top drawer performance, reminiscent of the sprints by a fellow champion, Usain Bolt!

First over a 100km/h

Alex stretching his legs on another run

Manu Taub speeding past

Chilling and taking some time out

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Second day here and the wind is gone, Pretty much nothing to do here, so we cruized around shooting some town images and basically keeping ourselves busy. This Little town us usually fast asleep all year, then in October every year that all changes with crazy kiters and windsurfers coming here to kill some speed records.

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Arriving to a foreign country  and having all your camera gear taken away from you  is not fun, well this is what went to me last week. We arrived in Casablanca, Morocco amped to shoot some Kiting and to cruise around. Not even out of the airport I was pulled aside and asked “whats in the bags” in broken english. To cut a long story short, when you fill in the form when you arrive in Morocco don’t put down Photographer or Journalist as your job and have gear with you. For some reason this requires “special permission” to bring your gear in the country to shoot even if you are going as a tourist like I was. Well, I got to spend 8 days in Morocco cruising with some cool locals up and down the coast to a number of surf and kite spots. I managed to get some gear from a German tourist who with out a question let me use it for the last couple of days.

A local fishing boat

Coming back to SA was just as much of a mission, We arrived at the airport 8 hours before my flight to get my gear, this was after a 6 hour taxi drive from hell from Essouira to Casablanca, but at the end of the day that’s all part of the journey. Needles to say I got my gear back as the plane doors were closing, after been escorted around by customs police like criminals I was not a happy person, they made me check by gear through and pay 200 euros over weight and also made sure my tickets were all the way to Cape Town. We were even escorted to the plan to make sure we got on. At the end I was pretty glad to be out of there, but now that I know what to do next time I will for sure go back…..if they let me in there.

Ruben Lenten forgetting about the hassles

The local crew from Moulay and the Kite crew

On arrival back to Cape Town happy as hell I thought the nightmares where in the past, but it was not over yet. When I checked the gear from check in I found that Emirates had managed to snap my 300-800 lens in half….thanks guys, trip over.

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