Does anyone else get really really sore eyes after a few hours out in the water? I think it's a combo of the West Oz sunlight, wind and salt water... Anyone got any ideas?

Sunglasses.
I use Seaspecs. The "shop" link in seabreaze has a brand too.

Waiting for one of the fan boys to suggest ditching the tt for a foil. Less spray to hurt your widdle eyes

Haha so far one good suggestion, two not so helpful! Let's see how this progresses.

Get your self some of this, I rekon your sore eyes will be greatly reduced while still getting spray in the face. Normal sunscreen roasts ya eyes.

http://www.islandtribe.com/spf-50-clear-gel-50ml/

... +1 for sunnies.

Helps stop spray or indeed if it rains and of course when its sunny.

I used to have Seaspecs but now have some generic Spotters with cable ties acting as the strap. Yes, cable ties,,,, thanks Jamee for the brilliant idea. Started out as a temporary measure but to my surprise works great, year later and still haven't come off. Mind you, if they do then they are definitely not floating so expect them to be gone!

Either way, I reckon get sunnies!

cheers,

Robbie

ps make sure they are polarised.

I have surfers eye or what ever you call it. Lump that grows over your eye. Dry summer winds are terrible on your eyes contributed with salt glare and sunscreen. Blue eyes are very sensitive also. Wear glasses or you simply have to shorten the seshions you have out on the water. As soon as your out of the water wear sunnies and buy yourself some eye refresher lubricant stuff. Wearing a cap can help a little bit.

If I use any sun screen above the eye area it washes off and runs into my eyes even if it says water resistant/proof.

The only stuff I found that doesn’t is zinc SPF (Invisible Zinc).

As much as I want the sunnies to work I've never had much luck with them, as soon as they get some spray on them they become useless... I'll try again

Sunnies, hat or helmet, spray sun cream rather than while on. Less smack downs.

I get the fried, painful eyes after long days too, tried sunnies over and over and just never kept them on more than 5 minutes. I feel like the perspective was a bit too altered and I couldn't stand the water spots, fogging, etc. Tried rain-x and still didn't like it. For me it's a regular old baseball hat with a para cord leash, stays on and it protects my eyes enough to not have any soreness after. There are a lot of nice surf specific hats out there too with velcro chin straps and other bells n whistles. I think FCS makes some nice ones. Definitely nothing like waking up in the middle of the night with sunburned eyes! Sucks!

Kiting ruins my eyes but i now run FCS kook hat and sunnies. The Barz ones are the best ones it tried so far. Yeah it sucks wearing them but you get used to it. Also when im out for a while putting eyedrops in halfway through makes quite a difference.

I used to get bad sunburnt eyes when I first started kiting. This was due to being a noob and looking up at the kite for prolonged periods.
Now that I feel where the kite is thus not needing to look up I never suffer from burnt eyes anymore.
But yes seawater spraying in your eyeballs is annoying and the answer to that is a board that will eat chop I guess.

Yes sometimes my eyes burn like acid from the salt and sunscreen (I am going to that Island Tribe stuff mentioned above). Usually they burn the worst in the first 20 mins of kiting. So long as I wear sunnies they recover quickly after kiting. If I don't wear sunnies they get fried and stay sore and red for a few days. I already have pronounced pterygia, so need to wear sunnies to stop aggravating it, and making it worse. I just invested in the Kurtis surf goggles, which were very expensive and made me look very kooky, but they are good :)

www.allaboutvision.com/conditions/pterygium.htm

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mowingthelawn said..

Good luck with that when you develop a surfer's eye...

Btw, this is "Bijeli Cement" for Slovenian Market. Doesn't work here ;)

anyone saying they'r eyes feel it but don't like the water sunnies get a pair today and use them every sesh
youll thank me in ten yrs the ptyterigium op is extremely uncomfortable I knows it
the couple of drops on the lense are not putting your timing off smacking the lip