Flower Power

Spring is such a special time of year… After what feels like a very long winter for many, the first warmth and sunshine just hits different. It gives me so much energy and drive. I think I might be some sort of human solar panel. Seeing the first flowers bloom and trees blossom always puts a huge smile on my face. The idea came to make the ultimate spring kitesurfing content and where better to go than the Netherlands, famous for their blooming tulips that challenge rainbows for their brightness.

The idea blossomed a year ago with Dutch filmmaker Andy Troy, whose photos are often seen in this magazine. At the time we were shooting in Egypt and the tulip season had just finished. A year later and it was time to make this idea happen. But the more we looked into it, the more complex it seemed… Every tulip color blooms at a slightly different time, so that the farmers don’t have to harvest everything at once. So it was not easy to find a field with everything in full bloom, that just happened to have a water channel next to it that would be kite-able, then to have the right wind direction to kite the channel and to have a sunny day as it didn’t feel appropriate shooting flowery spring content on a rainy day… Not asking much…

With a last-minute flight to the Netherlands for a promising forecast, the spring mission was on. The morning started off quite cloudy which made me a little nervous, but luckily it wasn’t long before the sunshine graced us with its appearance. We arrived at the first location, which was an incredibly bright tulip field that had a water channel with the perfect direction for kiting. But… it was right next to a major road… Yes it was kind of sketchy but there were breaks in the traffic, so I had pick my moment and plan the kiting for when there were no vehicles on the road…

Within seconds of launching my kite, a farmer came over and asked me what I was doing. He didn’t actually have a problem with it, but just warned me he’d sprayed pesticides all over the field I was walking barefoot through! Anyway I got in the water and kited one run down the channel, but I was quickly stopped by two wardens. They said this was not allowed but they would give me 15 minutes maximum to get the shot. As soon as they left another warden instantly arrived and told me I had to stop. I managed to persuade him to let me have one run then I would leave. Luckily he agreed, but literally as soon as I finished my second run, the police turned up too and then it was definitely game over… We packed away and headed off to search for another location.