Nothing is worse for kiters than a lull. Everyone gets grumpy, some get scabies. A pitiable radical splinter group smashes the skulls of surfers. I make plans to go to the Sahara. 750km oneway, cars are only available from local hire companies and expensive. However, after a broken boot lid on my last trip 15 years ago, my confidence is a little shaken.
I feel like I’m in a book by Garcia Marquez. I’ve forgotten which one exactly. It’s hot and humid. My glasses fog up during the nightly revelry in the pirate’s den when it rains outside. My six-hamster cage has been converted into a cage and I’m now alone in it. I’m working and waiting for the wind from hell, which will hopefully arrive in six days’ time. (more…)
Essaouira
Essaouira is an old Portuguese trading post. Clouds push the sultriness down, intensified by the complete absence of wind. Anyone who says that the most important ingredient of 1001 Nights is heroes is a bulimic. The only important things are the stench and the scent of the sky. In the morning I wake up in a windowless 12m² six-bed room. When I return from the bathroom, I’m green with envy: I’ll never be able to stink like this on my own.
The roof terrace on the fourth floor offers a view of hundreds of courtyard houses. The outside, and especially the top, is pretty run-down, but the inside is whitewashed. Cats lie on piles of rubbish. The medina is an incredible labyrinth. I count 202 corners and find two right angles. Open manhole, deadly stench. Nana mint on the next corner, then a fish market and mountains of spices. (more…)
Travelling And Smoking
Some things just don’t go together: George Bush and intelligence tests. Dieter Bohlen and groove. Heroes in tights. Sea and calm. Others are absolute dream teams: chips and ketchup, white wine and water, Ray Liotta and broken mafia characters or travelling and smoking.
I always smoke a lot when travelling. Maintaining an age-old tradition. Back then, on the Eurasian steppe: a biped smells smoke. Even back then, smoke meant: “Go travelling or your balls will burn!” So quickly reduce the take-off weight and set off for new destinations. I’m standing on the observation deck of Nuremberg Airport. The smoke trails behind the jets. (more…)
Revolution In Egypt
Egypt has been a sell-out since the beginning of the revolution. Even after an apparently successful outcome, there is no end in sight. You can get a week in a 5-star hotel with a flight for 260 euros. I wonder what is better: stay away and skip the funeral feast or fly there and at least secure work for the remaining 20% of Egyptians.
We need sun. We need wind. We decide in favour of the latter. We set off for Egypt late at night from Linz and Vienna. We go through passport control at the airport unchecked. There is a recall, but nobody notices that we are simply left sitting there. From above, Hurghada looks like a Christmas tree at night. But that’s deceptive. I was here five years ago. (more…)
Holiday Flat In Cilento
While looking for a new holiday destination in Italy, we came across the Cilento region on the internet. We have been travelling all over Italy for years – but we were initially unfamiliar with Cilento. The pictures we discovered of the region promised a dreamlike landscape.
According to the information, you can combine a beach, cultural and hiking holiday in Cilento, which starts around 100 kilometres south of Naples. We booked a great holiday flat in Marina di Camerota right on the beach online. We travelled to Cilento from Munich by car – which takes a little time, but a stopover in Florence is also worthwhile. (more…)
Travelling And Travelling
I wonder what the best way to travel is. I know a few that are definitely bad. But none that are always right. I’m currently asking myself that on Fuerteventura. Even though the wind yield was more than poor, we saw and experienced a lot. We completely overlooked other things. Dominik is probably just arriving home for the winter. I’m staying here for another week.
Travelling alone is always different to travelling together. It’s more strenuous, less secure and usually much more expensive because of the rooms. Nevertheless, both are good. When you’re travelling alone, you see completely different things. I didn’t notice how empty everything was here last week. (more…)
Storm Over Fuerteventura
One of the heaviest storms of the year is approaching Fuerteventura. At Flag Beach, the wind is already blowing full offshore with up to 35 knots the day before. The rescue boat is still broken. We head south to Gran Tarajal. A thunderstorm including a downpour unloads over us. Then the wind comes back. But unfortunately not enough, and totally stubborn.
Dominik alternates between overpower and underpower for a few laps. I flub his kite twice in wind holes in the water before I even get on the board. We head back to Corralejo. In the evening, the wind is blowing at over 55 knots. The car shakes in every gust. The storm is here. (more…)
Spot Search & Poker
The wind remains westerly the next day too, which means full offshore at Flag Beach. We spend the whole day travelling to every conceivable bay that looks kiteable on Google Maps. Kitebar with a westerly wind requires a coastline to the north or south.
Puerto Lajas: black volcanic sand, but again only rough volcanic rocks with thick bone-crushing holes at the nod exit south. Caleta del Fueste: A small sandy bay, but covered from the wind thanks to the many hotels behind it and too crowded even in the low season. Gran Tarajal: Beautiful sandy bay facing south, but there is not enough wind. Tarajalejo: Long free sandy beach, again no wind. Down to Rene Eglis Sotavento. (more…)
Offshore And Engine Damage
We are surprised by a heavy downpour at the bus stop. One of three rainy days in November on Fuerteventura is now a thing of the past. The bus to Flag Beach is cheap, but you still have to walk a kilometre with 30kg of equipment. Sport before sport is bearable, sport after sport is absolute rubbish.
There are things that are simply never good together: blow-drying in the bathtub. Blind cow on the motorway. Unprotected sex in South Africa. The wind only blows from the east 10% of the time here, so fully offshore. Today is 10%. Wouldn’t be too bad on its own. But together with an engine failure on the only rescue boat far and wide, it’s hell in heaven. (more…)
Better Fuerte Than Ice Tea
Time to travel. Travelling through the first snow flurries of the year to the airport before dawn. Air Berlin has a new slogan: fly full. After an exuberant breakfast, the stewardess notices my pitifully questioning look through the hole in the centre of my lox bagel. Humming quietly “All this and much more”, I fall asleep lying across four seats.
The last time Dominik was on holiday was two years ago. Iberia swallowed his suitcase – without a trace and to this day. His kiteboard is the very last thing to come off the conveyor belt. From then on, everything can only be good. The wind forecasts for the next few days on Fuerteventura range from great to surreal. Our apartment has a terrace with direct access to the pool – it’s in the centre of Corralejo and is ridiculously cheap. (more…)
Provence
The Sommières tourist board calls me to Provence to create a new website. At dawn, before the first motorway service station, a fox commits hara-kiri on my bumper. As thanks for my toughness, he takes a fog light with him into nirvana and now lights the way home for the hedgehogs.
The journey eats up the kilometres, in a frenzy all the way to Avignon. After 11 hours, we arrive at dusk. The papal palace is dark and the bridge is already closed. In the chilly October, we wander through the almost deserted old town. (more…)
Dresden
Ask me about the most beautiful waterfall in Fiji! Ask me where the sea turtles swim in the Dominican Republic! Ask me about the best of 92% of all gyros stands on Rhodes! Ask me about the most beautiful volcano in New Zealand! But when a couchsurfer asks me: “Which city in Germany should I visit?”: I just stand there like an ox in front of a mountain.
For the blog generation, no spot on the map is whiter than their home country. After much deliberation, I have to admit that I only know three cities in Germany well. That has to change. A customer calls me to Saxony. The afternoon and evening belong to Dresden. (more…)
MTB Tour To The Schauinsland
The days between matches pass. There’s a lot to do. In between, preparation for the big MTB tour up the Schauinsland. You have to get to know Freiburg by bike. Cyclists are more important there than cars.
A typical Freiburg street looks like this: 2.5 metres of cycle lane and car lane – green tram lane – 2.5 metres of cycle lane and car lane. Zone 20. If you want to overtake as a car driver, you can only do so at the cost of a jousting tournament against a tram. (more…)
Efcharisto Rhodes!
Thank you Rhodes, it was wonderful! Even if the wind could have blown more: it was always good. Unfortunately, my diabolical plan didn’t work out. I ate at least one gyros a day on average, but not one every day. Some Greeks simply don’t offer fast food.
We spend the last few days in Rhodes Town. During the economic crisis, Trivago sells 4-star accommodation with 5-star dining at the Grand Hotel for next to nothing. The buffet is amazing. Just round the corner you can pay more for a few disgusting orange juices that aren’t freshly squeezed in Erdinger wheat glasses. A weird world. (more…)
Living Like God In Greece
Greece has produced countless gods throughout its history. There are just as many ways to live and eat here. Only the differences in quality between Greek restaurants are even greater than those between German web designers. There is everything for nothing and nothing for everything.
Normally you find the nothing for everything preferably in well-populated places. In the old town of Rhodes, you can get micro-portions of bum gyros for maxi-coal, and the ouzo always costs extra. We often ate well for little money in deserted places. Unfortunately, this is not always the rule, it also works the other way round. (more…)
Touring Rhodes
Rhodes has a lot to offer, especially in late spring. Oleander bushes bloom everywhere in riverbeds that are already dry. The mountains are high, the villages beautiful. We ride the quad bike along all the dirt tracks, no matter how dirty, heat up a dry riverbed and get lost in the middle of nowhere.
Just a few kilometres south of Rhodes Town, everything becomes pleasantly empty, wide and quiet. Sometimes we don’t see a car for hours. Every few hundred metres there is a small monastery or a chapel at the side of the road. Sometimes little shrivelled black nuns come out. (more…)
Faliraki
On our way across the island of Rhodes, we make a one-day stopover in Faliraki. Faliraki is the Greek word for “stupid wine”, a very fitting and concise quintessence of everything that is important there: sex and alcohol. The latter, of course, only to get the former.
There is nothing left of the fishing village. A thousand hotels, hundreds of bars and strip clubs and two shops selling Armani towels for four euros. Everything is empty, far too much has been built and nobody earns anything. The many Brits don’t care. Worse is always possible, and lobster is not red even when cooked. (more…)
Rhodes: History Is Cool
I join the Facebook group “I drink ouzo and help Greece out of debt”. The Bild newspaper teaches us that we are financing luxury pensions for the Greeks. 22 billion is a drop in the ocean. Every third Greek employee is a civil servant.
That calls for more blind actionism. I fly to Rhodes and immediately start my humanistically motivated aid project “Trivago sells four stars at 12 euros a day”. At these rates, it will only take roughly 780 years until we are king of Greece again. If the plan doesn’t work out, we’ll simply send Stoiber down. (more…)
Saludos Venezuela
Venezuela is a strange country. A lost country. Its inhabitants endure their fate as stoically as the Cambodians. Sometimes there is milk to buy, and sometimes they are willing to sell it to you. Otherwise, they have few interests. Venezuela is in a coma.
The American pirate has recovered his yacht. The police have arrested the privateers and looted the boat. To avoid ending up in prison too, the American pirate only had to pay $1,000, final sale. Venezuela is a country where pirates pay. (more…)
Wild West Isla Margarita
Isla Margarita really is the wild west. I heard and read a lot of rough stories before I left. After just 10 days, I have a few to add myself. First I learn that everything is safe in the hostel, the accommodation has never been robbed. A few days later, a regular guest corrects me: Not yet under this management.
But a year ago, several masked and armed robbers broke in and forced the guests to open the safes. That teaches you two things: firstly, the police station 100 metres away is worth a damn. Secondly, I definitely don’t lock my things in the safe. (more…)
Happy Kite On El Yaque
On the very first day, I step on a sea urchin on my second kite attempt. Two minutes later, to save myself a stupid-looking limp, I decide to step on a second sea urchin with my other foot. Now everything is symmetrical again.
It’s incredible how famous some small places are. The kite beach at El Yaque is just 50 metres long and world-famous. There are only 30 kiters there today. The kitebeach is completely in the lee of a small hill, which creates stupid eddies. Practically every kite collapses at least once at the start. Even mine. (more…)
In Timmerberg’s Footsteps
I get good books as presents. Helge Timmerberg three times in the last six months alone, none of them knew about the others and each came exactly once. I narrowly survived the first one with an acute abdominal muscle tear. The second is now lying next to me on the train to Basel. I’m afraid to start.
There is real travelling. And there is the opposite. Timmerberg does everything right, because he does practically everything wrong. He’s not afraid of it. He sees more, asks more, almost never finds what he is looking for – and falls on his face much harder than any stiletto-wearing mountaineer. I’m following in Timmerberg’s footsteps. (more…)
Rainy kite in El Medano
After three days in the doldrums, the wind finally arrives on Tenerife. In the morning, I see five rainbows in quick succession from the balcony and know that something is going to happen today. I pack my stuff and beam up to El Medano – once again I can’t find the exit.
On the beach, 300 tourists are building rafts as part of an occupational therapy programme. When it starts to rain, a quarter of them crowd into the three containers at the Playa Sur surf centre. Then the wind slowly picks up. I frown. Almost full offshore. No rescue.
With stilettos on the Teide
Eureka! We’ve made it. We’ve found our way out of the urbanisation! I speed up the bends to Teide in our little Toyota. At an altitude of 1000 metres, I remember that I forgot to make a note of the route. Hopefully we’ll make it out again in the next few days…
The sky is blue and we soon have the clouds below us. Red rock, black pumice, the scent of Canary Island pine. Wonderful. There are no straights. There are only curves. The Ipod yodels in the back seat and we yodel at every bend. (more…)
One-way streets into the urbanisation
Windfinder sounds the alarm. Early in the morning, I look for a way to kite in the neighbouring village of El Medano. It’s not easy. All the roads in our empty private urbanisation are one-way streets. I end up back at the hotel seven times, with no way out. Nevertheless, I find the one-way street system symbolically very fitting.
Yesterday evening, a short walk along the beach promenade. Every waiter in every empty restaurant, without exception, is courting us. There is a shopping mall in the basement. All the shops are empty. At the end, Elvis closes his Memphis Bar. It’s eight o’clock in the evening. (more…)
The Author
Frank Woelky, born in 1973. Kitesurfer since 1998. Since 2006, I have been combining kitesurfing and web design on trips lasting several months off the beaten track.