My third day in Tarifa. It was a 3 hour bus ride from Seville, and the view was cattle/horses, sunflowers, wind turbines, towns and road. Tarifa is full of tourists, but unlike a lot of other places people don’t really come here to see sights. They come here almost exclusively to kitesurf. Or to whale watch or catch the ferry to Morocco, but mostly to kitesurf. Half the shops have something to do with kitesurfing, there are fliers for schools everywhere, and it’s such a part of the lifestyle here that it’s a topic of almost every conversation I’ve heard. The windguru website is the go-to. Where’s the wind coming from? How strong is it? Today 20 knots Levante wind. Tomorrow 30+ knots. Too windy. Steady wind. Gusty wind. Wind is/isn’t here yet

I’ve been here for 3 days now, and have gotten my first 2 kitesurfing lessons in. There is nothing about kitesurfing that comes naturally to me. The first day and a half I spent on the beach trying to understand how to operate the kite. The instructor would tell me what to do and I understood, but somehow that’s not what I ended up doing. I’d mess up, he’d tell me again and I’d say “Yes, yes I know.” I don’t know how to explain it – it was like someone else was responsible for messing up like that, not me.

I made friends with Stephanie who is the only other girl I saw at the school at the same time. She is taking a course to be an instructor, and was shadow-ing the instructors until she starts the training program this week. On my second day she shadowed my instructor and witnessed my disaster of a start to the day. Finally the instructor sent me into the water with the kite, and tried to get me to do a body drag – which is basically using the wind in the kite to pull your body while laying on your stomach in the water. It was kind of a joke how bad I was. Finally he left to spend some time with the other students (I’m pretty sure out of frustration with me. I really don’t blame him – I was truly bad). Once I was alone in the water I gradually started to get the hang of it. Stephanie had stayed behind on the beach to keep and eye on me, and help me out. I think being in the water actually helped because I had other things to focus on besides just the kite. Once I stopped thinking so hard about the kite, the wind, and my role in the whole thing I started to get the hang of it a bit more. By the end of the second day I had swallowed at least a gallon of ocean water, and managed to do a one arm body drag several times.

Today it’s too windy to kitesurf, and I leave for Barcelona tomorrow so that was the last of my lessons. I think I will try it again somewhere along the way on my trip. Not because I liked it, but because I have to at least get up on the board!

What it looks like when someone really good kitesurfs

Last night on my walk home I noticed a bunch of people gathered around the stage by my hotel. It looked like some kind of Flamenco school putting on a performance, because there was a whole age range of women in costume mulling around. No wonder Flamenco performers put on such an amazing show – they must study it from the time they’re kids!! The youngest girl looked like she was 4 or 5. There was one little boy in the whole group, and he looked about 5 as well. So handsome and serious! (Pasting a pic below. Not good quality, but the best I got of him.) They all made the Flamenco face which is kind of a combination of furrowed brow, and angry pouty frown. That must be part of the training as well – and it really does make a difference. I saw a performance in Seville where the girl didn’t make that face and she seemed almost too happy to be dancing Flamenco.

This afternoon I was sitting in my hotel room when I somewhere in the background I started hearing escalating outside noise and a band. When it finally sunk in something was going on I ran to the window, and saw this:

I found out afterward it was some kind of procession in honor of the Virgin del Carmen that villages all along the coast take part in on July 16th. She is the patron of fisherman and the sea. The traditions vary by village, but they all parade their Virgin del Carmen statue down to the sea and a mass is said. I’m still not entirely sure what happened, but I followed the procession down to the port, they traded out statues to a different, smaller one, carried that closer to the water, threw flowers into the water, watched them for a while, said a prayer and then left.

Wandered around for a bit after and took a couple of other shots.