What to Pack – Sam - Events and Outreach Officer

What’s your best travel experience?

With a keen interest in water sports, all of my recent wind-fuelled overseas escapades have involved plenty of excess luggage fees, ridiculously large bags and lots of sweaty, frustrating attempts at stuffing all of my gear into the back of vehicles clearly not designed to bear the load. With that in mind, I generally detest backpacking. The idea of moving between hostels and lodges every few days and spending hours on public transport in between doesn’t generally sit well with me. A decent base camp and the ability to move around freely either by car or by scooter tends to be much more appealing.

So my fondest recent travel experience was a madcap week-long kitesurf trip to Turkey. But not the glossy Turkey like the holiday brochure pictures of sunbed and umbrella strewn beaches filled with semi-nude Europeans. I’m talking about the dry, arid, Olive tree-lined, deserted and turquoise-bordered beaches Turkey. Who would have thought that you don’t have to travel to far-off exotic places to find amazing culture, fantastic food, lovely people and warm-watered, wind-filled beaches!

Travelling along with some vaguely familiar but like-minded buddies, we hired a nice Villa and a soon-to-be-battered Fiat van from our guide, a British adopted Turk living in the area, and set about exploring the miles and miles of flat water lagoons and beaches that Southern Turkey has to offer. Stuffing the combined gear of 5 kiteboarders plus the people themselves in a little van every day proved a little challenging, but by day 3 we had it sussed. Each day involved waking up late, a lazy breakfast, checking the wind, fuelling up and heading out to a different location. This was almost always followed by some sort of BBQ’d meaty foodstuff washed down with local beer.

It’s a standout trip for many reasons: The food, the company and the pioneering feeling of taking the fastest growing water sport in the world to places it has never even been comprehended. Learning new super-gnarly-radical tricks and messing about with like-minded people was a bonus.

What did you take?

The standard boardies and T-shirts required for any trip plus the kite gear belonging to my partner and I all in one very large bag: Two kites, three boards, bindings, control bars, harnesses and spare nuts and bolts! Suncream, one smart shirt (just in case!) and assorted cables for various gadgets.

What did you wish you had taken?

I smashed my kite on the very first day putting a large rip in it so I found myself wishing for some proper kite material and repair kit. I also hadn’t gambled on the warm water washing all the cold water wax off of one of my boards. This left me running round a little Turkish village looking for candles to remedy the situation. It didn’t work. Needless to say, warm water surf wax went in the kite bag when I returned!

Which frontier project would you like to visit?

Any of the diving projects. Tanzania, Fiji, Madagascar. Any will do! Having studied marine biology and as a keen diver, these projects interest me most.

What would you take there?

In an ideal world, a stand-up-paddle board, surfboard and my kite gear! These places have some of the best wind and waves in the world! If only airlines were more lenient.

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