Recently had a week at Club Vass, Greece. This place is pretty awesome... 250+ sails pre-rigged, about 150 boards, SUP's and mountain bikes.


Max Rowe - PWA champ and instructor




Post session

How cold was the water?

250 sails and 150 boards??
And only a small handful of polers left that haven't yet progressed to faster better options. Me thinks they need to upgrade their gear to fit the times or they will go down the same bankrupt path the hire/schools did 15 years ago here on the east coast.

The name "Club Vass" should attract the pole dancers though. lol

^^^ grow up.

I think that (and the Defi wind meet with 1000 entrants last week) proves you wrong

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lotofwind said...
250 sails and 150 boards??
And only a small handful of polers left that haven't yet progressed to faster better options. Me thinks they need to upgrade their gear to fit the times or they will go down the same bankrupt path the hire/schools did 15 years ago here on the east coast.

The name "Club Vass" though should attract the pole dancers though. lol

If they had 250 kites, they would all be tangled up with each other and blocking half the beach.

Surprisingly, windsurfing is alive and well in a lot of countries. In some places it is the equivalent of surfing here.

Yeah, I know, they need someone to enlighten them to kiting, but I guess they are just behind the times and not up on the newest easiest trendy things yet

^^LOL^^^^ Or they are all really old because they have a healthier diet and are living longer than the old beer swilling obese Aussies.


Oh and Markie, you are getting even faster posting in retaliation. lol.
It use to take you 10mins to post after me, now your down to only a few. Good to see you are following me even closer.

Yawn. Get some new material.

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Mark _australia said...
Yawn. Get some new material.

I bought this new material today, just need to paint some pink dots on it.

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Mark _australia said...
^^^ grow up.

+1

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Mark _australia said...
^^^ grow up.

+1

You can get away with board shorts and a 1mm rashy.

You won't be hot in a short sleeve shirt leg 2mm wetsuit

I was there in July last year. I was cold. I bought a 0.5 mm rash a size too big (all they had there) and was still cold. Must have been all that time I spent in the water rather than on it. Everyone else seemed OK. One advanced (and buff) guy did wear a shortie. I asked him why. He said 'he does not want to feel even a little bit cold'. I'm like that. I'll be going to Cocos in August, I wonder what I should bring given my low tolerance to cold (I weigh a lot less as well now).

Actually there were two kiters on the water there last year. They stayed downwind of the windsurfers. One time they went into the midst of windsurfers and were promptly chased away by the club boats. And rightly so. They took up a HUGE amount of space on the water.

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lotofwind said...
250 sails and 150 boards??
And only a small handful of polers left that haven't yet progressed to faster better options. Me thinks they need to upgrade their gear to fit the times or they will go down the same bankrupt path the hire/schools did 15 years ago here on the east coast.

The name "Club Vass" should attract the pole dancers though. lol

That's just Club Vass. There are another 4-5 windsurfing clubs there on that same spot.

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MrCranky said...

lotofwind said...
250 sails and 150 boards??
And only a small handful of polers left that haven't yet progressed to faster better options. Me thinks they need to upgrade their gear to fit the times or they will go down the same bankrupt path the hire/schools did 15 years ago here on the east coast.

The name "Club Vass" should attract the pole dancers though. lol

That's just Club Vass. There are another 4-5 windsurfing clubs there on that same spot.

Don't argue with him, he is just trolling for responses. You could show a photo of a thousand windsurfers sailing at one place and he will just ignore it. Funny thing is kitesurfing is apparently something older people can do because its easier and gentler on the body than windsurfing, just like lawn bowls.

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MrCranky said...
How cold was the water?

My dive watch said the water temperature was 17 deg. at the outside of the bay, with a few degrees water at the shore line. I used a 2mm shorty... spent a lot of time in the water doing flicky stuff - definitely dont want anything less.

It was the second week of the season, which lasts 4 months 'ish. Aparenly by late summer, shorts-only is the go.

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mathew said...

MrCranky said...
How cold was the water?

My dive watch said the water temperature was 17 deg. at the outside of the bay, with a few degrees water at the shore line. I used a 2mm shorty... spent a lot of time in the water doing flicky stuff - definitely dont want anything less.

It was the second week of the season, which lasts 4 months 'ish. Aparenly by late summer, shorts-only is the go.

When exactly were you there? I'm just trying to gauge my tolerance to cold. I was there in mid-July last year and felt cold. Practically everyone else was in board shorts.

BTW, what did you think of the conditions? I was a noob, but to me it felt very gusty and the water far from flat. I found it pretty tough going. Many told me that that "this is hard sailing, if you can sail here, you can sail anywhere". But when in December I resumed windsurfing in the Bay in Melbourne, I realised that Vass was a windsurfing paradise in comparison.

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Yuppy said...
You can get away with board shorts and a 1mm rashy.

You won't be hot in a short sleeve shirt leg 2mm wetsuit

You mean Cocos Islands, right?

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lotofwind said...
250 sails and 150 boards??
And only a small handful of polers left that haven't yet progressed to faster better options. Me thinks they need to upgrade their gear to fit the times or they will go down the same bankrupt path the hire/schools did 15 years ago here on the east coast.

The name "Club Vass" should attract the pole dancers though. lol

yeah mate its full of them



but unlike most kite centers the average age is below 50 and people don't have harnesses integrated with their shorts

ops wrong user :)

Legit, @36 I felt like an oldfag there. So much for an old man's sport.

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MrCranky said...

When exactly were you there? I'm just trying to gauge my tolerance to cold. I was there in mid-July last year and felt cold. Practically everyone else was in board shorts.

BTW, what did you think of the conditions? I was a noob, but to me it felt very gusty and the water far from flat. I found it pretty tough going. Many told me that that "this is hard sailing, if you can sail here, you can sail anywhere". But when in December I resumed windsurfing in the Bay in Melbourne, I realised that Vass was a windsurfing paradise in comparison.

June 1 - June 8... water temperature is warm enough to go for a swim without a wetsuit.


I wouldn't say that it was hard to sail there - it wasn't gusty at all, but there were large holes in the wind line due to the shape of the mountain (the wind flows down the side of it, so is affected by its shape).

The water is reasonably flat, but with 150 people sailing from all the clubs, it gets really chopped up -> if you sail near the end of the session when most people have finished, it gets much nicer.

I did try some speed runs, but the wind didn't have the "power" in it where it flogs you senseless... which makes it great for learning new stuff. I did find it hard to plain old chop-jumps, as there really isn't any swell due to the short fetch from the mountain to where you sail.

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MrCranky said...
Legit, @36 I felt like an oldfag there. So much for an old man's sport.

Indeed... while I was there the average age of the customers was low-30's, but the staff it is low-20's.

But also, the Globalshots vid shows nicely that almost every night of the week there is a party like that (albeit that particular one was for Whippy D's birthday)... I really dont know how the staff keep it up for 4 months - it was exhausting... and awesome!



Just on the gear -> almost all the gear is brand-new every season, with 100% carbon masts. Most of the gear I used, hadn't been used by anyone, having only been rigged that week.

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mathew said...

June 1 - June 8... water temperature is warm enough to go for a swim without a wetsuit.


I wouldn't say that it was hard to sail there - it wasn't gusty at all, but there were large holes in the wind line due to the shape of the mountain (the wind flows down the side of it, so is affected by its shape).

I was told told that the recent construction on the mountain side upset the wind.

When I was there, it was strong just in front of the beach, much stronger once you got to the tower (on the left of your first pic) and weakened further out.