Japan

Day 1: Friday 18^th

After arriving the night before on the plane feeling a bit sick, I woke up feeling a bit better but still had a cough. We drove down to Kujikuri beach, which turned out to have a setup just like home. An open facing beach break with waves very similar to that of Sunshine Beach. There turned out to be no wind, but a bit of swell because a typhoon that was beginning to get closer to the coast. I surfed a fun little shorey and the wind never got strong enough to kite.

Day 2: Saturday 19^th

The typhoon has arrived. Woke up at 6am so we could get back down to Kujikuri beach and set up for the annual TED kitesurf cup. We arrived to a solid swell, but the wind still hadn’t come up yet, but by 10am the wind picked up and they began running heats. They started with the Wave open which had pretty good conditions with a strong cross-shore and solid waves and I ended up taking out the division. Next was the freestyle division and the wind had picked up even more. Was a good 25 knot cross-shore so there was plenty of carnage to be had. I also managed to take out this division, but there was good competition in both and there are definitely some good kiters in Japan.

Day 3: Sunday 20^th

The typhoon was still in full force conditions similar to the day before, but with bigger waves. They had organised to have a Standup paddle division in the comp as well, but the swell was too big and it was also to windy. Ended up just going kiting again and had a pretty fun session on both the surfboard and twintip. There was a super strong rip running down the beach so staying upwind was a bit difficult. It was a good session and it’s surprising how similar the beach is to my home beach.

Day 4: Monday 21^st

Once again they were looking at holding the SUP comp but the swell was still pretty maxed out at Kujikuri so it was cancelled completely. We decided to go have a look for some other surf spots that were holding the swell a bit better and we managed to find a fun little beachie late, but didn’t get any photos. We stopped and one spot on the way and got a pretty cool shot with the waves hitting the rocks.

Day 5: Tuesday 22^nd

The typhoon started moving off the coast so the waves were heaps smaller and there was basically no wind. We went to another beach and one of the locals had a land board so I had a play around on that for a bit.

Day 6: Wednesday 23^rd

We woke up to another day of no wind, but there was a few waves so we checked out one of the spots that had been maxed out on Monday. It had a super fun little wave with not many out so I had a good solid 3 hour session. There are some sick surfers in Japan and I was pretty surprised at some of the waves they get in Japan. They also had a local festival in the afternoon so we check it out as well.

Day 7: Thursday 24^th

We woke up to a bit of wind so we went to check out Kujikuri and there was a bit of wind so I got a bit of a kite in. It was pretty up and down so I didn’t stay out that long and we had to leave for the airport at 5.