I stood up on the board when kite-boarding today! We won’t linger on the fact that it was only for about 5 seconds before falling back into the water… but I stood up!!! Ed spent the entire day (literally… we went out at 9 and finished at 4) teaching me how to do upwind drags, powering the kite during body drags, getting up without using a board (where I proceeded to get about 3 pounds of sand in the bottoms of my swimsuit), and finally getting up with a board. It was fantastic. Even with sunscreen, these seven hours also allowed me to work on my amazing tan – or should we say burn – lines. It now looks like I have red gloves on and it feels as though I am wearing a clay mask since my entire face got quite a bit of sun. I now just need to practice a lot, and then who knows, perhaps you will be hearing from the next kite-boarding extraordinaire.


We’ve had a great last few days. The whales are starting to be a bit more friendly, and curious it seems. Two days ago we swam with five adult whales (one female and four males), who came incredibly close. I finally got some shots that I’m excited about. Yesterday, we swam with a mom and tiny calf, which probably wasn’t older than a week old, with three males chasing them around. If those pesky males weren’t bothering her, I bet you anything the mom and calf would have settled down to rest and allowed us to have a really nice, long encounter. Oh well. I’m looking forward to the next few days.