Google Earth

[MikE mAy]

i was messing around with google earth last night and started looking at potential kite launch sites for our nearby lakes. i've bookmarked a few as well as all the known kite launches. there were a few potential sites on the west side of Utah Lake that looked promising, but i think the satelite pictures are from last summer. and, i think i'm not the first to find them. they could possibly be some of the windsurfer launches i've heard about- pelican and saratoga springs??? there looks to be a good spot just north of the provo marina as well. anyone know how to post a google earth pin up on a website? has anyone else checked out this rad technology and looked for more wind riding spots? after finally messing around with it, i think we have a great tool on our hands... anybody have any ideas how to further utilize it? how much exploration has been done on the west side of the lake? is it even worth it with the good launches we have on the east side? i realize i'm about 5 years too late for the kiteboard launch exploration, but i'd like to hear about some places or adventures from the west side from the "old timers"(with all due respect).

[lesvierra]

Mike, you can zoom to what ever image you'd like to post and click file, save as, .jpg. If you want you can send the images to me to put on my server and I'll give you instructions how to post. Might be other ways, but that is one. You're right, sweet tool. Dont forget to screw around with the tilt command, especially cool with mountain launches.

[Kenny]

Mike,

I have messed around with launching on the west side of UL a few years back. One was rocky point, it was a difficult and messy launch. I launched about a mile south of there, it was nasty with nails, glass, broken pallets, it was Lindon Beach on steroids. I also launched down at MM19. As I recall, the real problem there was not so much the launch, but the wind. MM19 is good on a SW or W wind which only seems to blow when we have a very strong SW push and when it finally does blow it can be super gusty, shifty and off and on. May work now that we have bow kites, but I would definitely rather be at Rush or DC than MM19.

There is a group of guys that live in Sarasota Springs that use a boat for launching on the west side.

During the drought years we had some awesome east side launches. There was BYU beach just south of the Utah State Park Marina with wide open beaches, the north wind was perfectly side-shore and steady at that location. There was also a spot just to the south and west of SSB that was very sweet. A lot of kiters learned on that beach. I think Jason might be one of them.

When I first learned Rush and Grantsville was all I really knew. Rush didn't dry up and provided riding all summer long. It was also full of carp and cow patties were plentiful on the shoreline. The water was also a whole lot nastier then(I am not kidding, it is much sweeter today). The only downside was that my biggest kite was a 2-line 9M Naish AR 3.5. The following year Naish introduced the 15M AR5. I think it quadrupled my time on the water. Rossberg and I thought it was a HUGE kite. Back then Marty, Jon, Doug, Rick, and countless other windsurfers would sit on the beach and laugh as Rossberg and I "threw down" our latest kiteboarding moves (going downwind, jumping sans board, inadvertent kite loops, death spirals, etc.). Ah, those were the days.

Seriously, I have a lot more stoke nowadays. Back then, I kept thinking "I better quit doing this before it kills me".

Kenny

I tried UL several times, but that was from a boat.

[Josh Shirley]

Mike:

On the east side of Utah lake there are some secret local swim holes. You have to drive through farm fields to get to them - or should I say you have to drive through farm fields being developed into new subdivisions. I know of a couple spots - not only are they hard to get to but once you get there you might have to drive or walk down some muddy stretches to get to the water. The east side of the lake has a lot of reeds. If you want a full blown workout (kind of like a rom machine) then walk or run through 50 yards of those reeds. I think that is about the same workout as 5 or 6 sessions.

Utah lake isn't releasing any water into the Jordan river right now. I think it is minimum flow. One of the Utah Lake rangers said they weren't expecting to see that gate opened until the end of the summer. Utah Lake should reach it's full capacity pretty soon. And with Deer Creek being .25 full she wasn't expecting to see much water come through to the lake until that is full again.
So what I am trying to get at is when the water level is low at Utah Lake you might be able to use some of the dry shore to launch kites, but I don't think that will happen this year. The east side is almost entirely covered with reeds.

In my few years of windsurfing I have never seen a kiter at MM19 - on the west side of the lake. Maybe it has to do with that place either being too light to all of a sudden nuclear 4.0 sailing (sometimes smaller.) Also you might be shot. Four or five guys launched kites at Saratoga to run with the carp last year but I think they said it was a pretty sketchy place to launch kites.

Josh