We (Simon Marks and Geoff Ham) are planning on kitesurfing along the WA coastline for the next two weeks, but instead of taking a car or having a support crew we have built an 'ocean sled' over the winter that we will tow behind us. Inside it will be a tent, sleeping gear, a watermaker, a few clothes, some food, as well as survival and extra kitesurfing equipment. It weighs around 45kg when full.

Our plan is to leave from Bunbury and kite as far as we can every day the wind blows, stop in at a beach wherever we are and camp; then do it all again the next day. At a minimum we are hoping to reach Kalbarri (~750km as the crow flies), and if the weather is in our favour we will try to go further, probably hitching past the Zuytdorps and on towards Exmouth.

Why are we doing this? Well apart from the obvious fun factor, we decided to do it for our favourite charity Redkite. Redkite provides essential support to children and young people with cancer and their families. They offer counselling and financial assistance to families throughout the cancer journey, from the moment of diagnosis until after treatment has finished.


If anybody is interested here is where you'll find information:

- Facebook page: 'Downwind without support' -> Please ?like? our page to stay updated and show your support.

- Spot messenger page: (We are taking a GPS tracker which should show our actual location on a map every 10 minutes when we are moving ? If anyone wants to join for a kite, feel free. Or even better, bury some cold beers at a random beach for us!)
maps.findmespot.com/Account/AuthCheck?redirectUrl=%2FTrack

- Donations page (you knew it was coming...):
give.everydayhero.com/au/downwind-without-support


Lastly we?d like to thank Airush Australia for letting us use their gear for the trip including the two big Lithiums (16m One and 18m Zero) and Sector -60.

Also a big shout-out to Chewy Mooey? for giving us a few kilo?s of gourmet jerky.

We obviously won't get much of a chance to update on the way but Nic Douglas from Sunset Media will be updating the Facebook page and hopefully a small website will be coming soon...

why not just get a sit on sled ? boat thingy you can buy? peterlynn kite kat?
long downwinders get boooooring if there's nothing to do

Wow what an adventure ! But kiting and towing a water sled ? Have you any pics of your kit and trials with it ? It sounds really clumsy - Im sorry I dont want to sink your boat but thats my first gut reaction .... I gather you arent surfing the downwinder and towing the 'pig' ?

Good on you guys for having a crack and trying something really different!

I'm sure you have done a lot of test runs, but I'm really struggling to understand how it would feel to tow a 45kilo sledge whilst kiting. I get it for polar exploration and using kites and sledges.

Am looking forward to hearing your story, love to hear about people creating new adventures. If you make it to Horrocks have a place for you to stay.

I hope you have a reel leash

Turns out the spot messenger isn't as waterproof as they say... Feeling a bit stupid for not putting a rain jacket on it. We did however make it to some random dunes ~10km past mandurah, so that's about 90km in 3.5 hours. Not bad, will get another GPS in Perth

Think I saw you guys go by dawesville at about 5:40?
I saw the kite with blue / orange? Maybe seemed to luff a few times. Is it a bit weird motoring downwind with the sled such that you kind of stall the kite a bit riding at it?
Sorry, I should have tacked out to say hi but you were a fair way out and I'm lazy. Have a safe trip! All the best

Certainly sounds different

With the sled

Wish you all the best

My mate and I are doing the a similiar route

But we are doing it the old lazy way

have a kite,drive up the coast,pitch the tent

Have a kite ,drive up the coast,pitch a tent

We may even see you on the way

Towing a sled..... WTF... That looks like it would take all the fun out of it!

Hmmmmm, I saw them towing the sled and it does get going. Looks like it planes easily. It will be a blast traveling along some of the most beautiful coast line in the world. Good luck from Freeze

Awesome.

But i thing you can do it without the sled.

Find Louis Tapper on face book and drill him for info. He set a world record for solo kiting around 2000km down the coast of brazil. He didn't use a sled and somehow packed all he needed in a back pack.

Good luck fellas! Looking forward to the updates as you progress! Will be a great adventure im sure of it! 50 dollars coming redkites way from me

Awesome work fellas!! Good luck and chuck some pic's up of you dragging that pig when you get a chance if you could, I didn't even know that was possible with a kite.

Gotta admit..... The sled would be heaps easier if it foiled!!!

Hi Guys, It's been a good trip...until the wind decided to take a break for a few days, fortunately we were going past home, so we have popped in and are just hanging out for the wind to come back (hopefully wednesday by the look of the forecast).
quite a lot of questions in the thread so far, ill try and answer some of them.

long downwinders get boring / does that not just take all the fun out of it?
We have spent lots of time having fun with big air / freestyle / waves / racing and all of these disciplines are fun but we are interested in another side of the sport that has not been developed nearly as much as all the others, the adventure / exploring aspect, seeing the coast from a very unique perspective and doing something a little different, we get it certainly isn't for everyone, but there is nothing quite like it.

You can do it without the sled and be unsupported?
Yes, i have spoken with Louis Tapper and his journey was remarkable however he was able to travel from settlement to settlement in brazil carrying little food and water, in a 30L back pack, Western Australia does not offer quite as many options to pull in and restock as Brazil does and also the climate and terrain is rather hostile here. What we wanted to do is travel for an extended period of time without having to stop and pull in to civilisation, to be self sufficient and not need rescuing if we are caught without wind for several days 80km away from a town. The primary pice of equipment we carry that allows us to do this is a hand operated desalinator, that weights 3.5kg and is quite a bulky bit of kit, added basic food for several days, cooking equipment, gas to cook, survival gear, shelter, sleeping gear it all adds up to too much for a back pack to safely be kited with so a sled was the option we went for, this also gave us the ability to carry more than one kite and greatly increase the wind range we can operate in. We can make fresh water, catch fish and camp out for as long as we like waiting for the wind, our goal is to be self reliant and travel by kite unencumbered by the usual constraints kiting brings.

the sled may sink!!
this is always a possibility, however we have done our best to make its as unlikely as possible, we built it like a moth, 200gm carbon sandwiched 6mm divinicel foam, then wrapped it all in several layers of impact resistant Kevlar, with some sacrificial glass fibre chucked in to the mix, it is built tough, light and strong, and should take quite a beating. (we hope it doesn't have to)

The sled tows well, you just need a bigger kite than normal, we carry a 16,12,10,8 two kites are in the air and 2 in the sled. the sled likes a fair bit of power to really get it humming, we find that when the 16 is struggling to get going towing the sled the 12m is struggling get going without the sled, and they top out at a similar wind as well. We will try and upload some video but even with 56kg it simply flys and spends a good amount of time airborne especially when it get choppy but typically it is 10-25% (depending on angle to the wind) slower than I could go if I had no sled flat out. We knocked off 90km in about 3.5 hours the other day and I didnt feel tired or sore afterwards and even caught the odd wave, it was kind of cool looking back and watching the sled catch its own wave occasionally.

Thought about hydrofoils on the sled?.... yes but not for long, with this kind of project we needed to minimise our risk and keep it as simple as we could. Plus simple things like big swell, weed, shallows and trying to drag something upwards of 40kg ashore in big dumping waves pretty much ruled out the use of hydrofoils for us.

Thanks for your support and donations guys, it's really appreciated, and gave us a smile whilst eating our instant mash and peas in the sand dunes. hopefully there will be more updates as soon as the wind kicks in, check out the face book page called downwind without support for more info and updates.

and for the record its not called the "pig" it's known as the "choad" as its nearly as wide as it is long!

Haha "the choad", that's gold, sounds like a good name for a light wind board.

Just saw you guys stop a little south of the wreck at Alkimos. Watch out for ghosts Sled seemed to tow ok.

If you're wanting a decent feed, shower or a nicer place to crash for the night, shoot me a pm. I'm 5min away.

Hey guys. Saw you this arvo passing City Beach & Scarborough. The sled / choad thingy looked like it was handling the surf well. Do you have a gopro on it ? Might get some interesting shots. Pretty epic conditions tonight - hope you enjoyed it. Best of luck for the rest of your journey.

Sawa you going through Pinnarroo last night, all looked great. Wish you a great adventure.

If you hit it right you'll be going through the gates of Hell on Sunday....this I HAVE to see

Great work guys - what a challenge and love the sled - we were blocked from dragging our 'boob sled' across the Torres in 2013 by maritime police because it was an unlicensed vessel is something! Will be thinking of you guys tomorrow as we head for a NSW south coast downwinder.

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austin said...
If you hit it right you'll be going through the gates of Hell on Sunday....this I HAVE to see

You are evil Austin! I reckon they will be taking the inside channel if they have any survival instincts which I am totally sure they do

After sharing a few beers and stories with the legend Ian Young last night we must have bee inspired. Did our first 100+km day (Google maps says 132km by road). Caught some great waves on the famous lano to wedge route (even the CHOAD didn't want to miss the action!) and stopped for lunch on a nice island just short of Cervantes. No fish caught unfortunately, time for some dehydrated goodness. Check out our tracking link above

Great work guys! Look forward to catching up with you in Gero!

If you guys make it as far as Exmouth be sure to give us a shout, bbq and beers as standard

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Robbo2099 said...
Great work guys! Look forward to catching up with you in Gero!

Watched the guys heading past Dongara, had a chuckle at the poor bloke pulling the sledge, he had some mental winds to cope with , good effort though,

CHOAD cauncy CHOAD

Congrats guys!

Looks like they made Kalbarri today. Nice work. Would have been pretty nervous moments rounding those gnarly cliffs at Kalbarri!

maps.findmespot.com/Account/AuthCheck?redirectUrl=%2FTrack

Hey robbo! Cheers mate! Sorry we couldn't participatr in your Downwinder the other day. We were definitely pretty stoked to pull into the river at Kalbarri today. The wind was very marginal and we were considering waiting til tomorrow around the first cliff but with no real spot to land the choad we decided to go for it Happy to be downing a few beers now with an awesome bunch of kiters who happened to be in town with Adventure Kiting WA. Looking forward now to a few days of kiting without having to worry about getting x Kms downwind. If anyone does want to donate to the great cause, here's the link: give.everydayhero.com/au/downwind-without-support
Remember we did this 750km trip without any support just for this cause; children with cancer.

Mate, I think you guys cruised past us at Jurien Bay on Friday 23rd.. we'd already had a session in NUKING winds and watched you pass at a distance. Would've liked to kite to you to see your kit up close, but sadly packed up by then.

Hats off to you guys towing that sled in those conditions.. what an adventure!