A few people have recently asked about the kite spots at Lizard Island - I've managed to snap a few pics of the major launch spots over the last week or so.
www.seabreeze.com.au/gallery/gallery.asp?imageid=4742
www.seabreeze.com.au/gallery/gallery.asp?imageid=4750
www.seabreeze.com.au/gallery/gallery.asp?imageid=4743
type "lizard" into the search box within the photos page and it will bring up a few more.
Lynita (from Skysurf Kitesurf School in Brisbane) and I have been working here at the station for the last 2 weeks or so. We could have kited every day theoretically - the wind hasn't been below 15kn yet. Most of the time it has been in the low to mid 20kn range, with a couple of days recently closer to 30kn. We have been riding 8m and 7m kites most days, with a few sessions on the 12m's earlier on.
Kite beach (mangrove beach) shown in the first pic has been the pick of the spots, with the low tides giving the flattest water. We can confirm about 0.6m tide is needed to cross the coral sections! We kited upwind to the waves at the lagoon entrance twice, once on about 0.7m tide and the other time closer to 1.7m. The lower tide day had better waves but they were still breaking too hard over very shallow reef for real down the line waveriding. My guess is about 1m should be good. The Jtides program www.arachnoid.com/JTides/index.html has data for Lizard.
On the minus side, we have seen a lot of grey overcast weather this trip, which would make for pretty miserable camping. Temp still about 26c in the day, 24C at Night. You would want at least a short wetsuit.
Andy
That looks like a great spot dude!
For the less informed among us, where abouts is lizard island exactly? Are you able to camp there? looks like a good spot to go for a kite holiday!
Lizard is 35km off the far north qld coast of Cape York, lat 14.67S and long 145.47E if you have google earth. About 90km NNE of Cooktown and 245km N of Cairns.
You can camp, there is a nat. parks camping ground about 2km walk from the beach. You get there by aircraft from Cairns, Hinterland or Skytrans fly in most days.
We need the wetsuits because its winter mate and it is very cold here, very very cold, maybe even down to 26 or 25C, and the wind, it is so windy all the time, that when you snorkel for hours and then kite for hours the wind chill just saps you to the bone, it is 25C but it feels like.....maybe 22C!! Icy mate, frikken icy for us poor North Queenslanders that are used to 33C for 6 months of the year. Don't worry about the jellyfish, they are hibernating it is so cold. It was a big deal to take off the dive hood and strap the gath on for the kite session, let me tell you.....
In the immortal words of Samuel L Jackson, and bizarrely this robot....
Just editing pics from the last trip and found this nice aerial shot of the main riding area in the lagoon and the waves at the entrance.
www.seabreeze.com.au/gallery/gallery.asp?imageid=5210
Andy
hey Neo, try this beach im sure Youve heard of it.
very very UBER awesome beach and great place to kite (if water regulations dont catch you there =(
Whitehaven Beach- Whitsunday Island- awesome water, best sand in the water, literally. NASA buys the sand from there to mould the glass for telescopic lens on satellites.
www.whitsundays-australia.com/whitsundays-windsurfing.html
www.whitsundays-australia.com/100163.php
that one is airlie beach (the launch point to the whitsundays and the place where a lot of my mates are staying right now.
www.whitsundays-australia.com/100163.php
that one is Shute Harbour- where you take ferrys and cruises and yachts to your kiting breaks on the islands.
www.whitsundays-australia.com/100163.php
and this one is where i worked for 3 months, in exactly this weather and had the TIME of my life (they are desperate for staff, just send a resume and you will definetly get a job working there)
We were up at Lizard two seasons ago on our boat, what can i say, absolutely sensational!!!!
Kited ourselves stupid!
