PHOTO GALLERY:  http://www.jeremietronet.com/trips/punta/

Three weeks ago, while filming in Brazil, Mallory Hersart de la Villemarqué, http://www.malloryprokiter.com called me on skype an afternoon and told me that he had found a good deal to go to Cape Verde and surf Punta Preta. The problem was that the departure was only 2 days after I would be back from Brazil and I had several things to do, but the idea of a trip to Cape Verde and the mytic wave of Punta Pretta was to good to ignore. So, in 10 min, after a quick call to Ocean Rodeo, we booked our flights and were ready for our first real trip together.

Manu Morel, http://www.manumorel.com very talented kite photographer would be part of our trip. I was really exited as I had already met Manu in St Marteen several years ago, and I always been impressed by his work in all the kite magazines worldwide.
Two weeks later we were on our way to Sal island, famous for it’s amazing wave conditions at Punta Preta. Mallory and I flew from Nice where he is now studying, and Manu came from Montpelier.

Thanks to Fun and Fly who arranged our stay on the island, we arrived at the Morabeza hotel http://www.hotelmorabeza.com which welcomed us right of the airport. We had a super nice room well located close to a nice Surf spot, a kite spot, the center of santa Maria ( the town) and punta preta where we can see the brakes from the road ! The perfect location for us. You can go out at night,  surf and kite the same day.
The first day of our trip, we met Mitu Monteiro, wave KPWT world champion last season, he lives there and knows all the best kite and surf spots, he would be our guide for this nice trip.

After renting a 4 wheel drive to load all our gear, we first went to surf punta preta as the wind wasn’t very strong. The right brake is amazing, I ‘m not so use to surf rights, but this was a perfect opportunity for me to train and surf backside.
The next days the wind was pretty consistent, and using the same board, strapless, we went out me on my 8 m ocean rodeo and Mallory on his 7. This is when Mitu did the show on the water and showed us what strapless kite surfing means. He was ripping the wave, getting in all barrels etc .... a very impressive rider !
We had a lot of fun the next days, kiting this amazing wave, and scoring some pretty good wipe out.

The next days, to show the full potential of Sal island, we went to explore some freestyle spots and had some pretty good sessions in kitebeach ( the main freestyle kite spot) offering a lot of nice kickers. But the main surprise came from punta lema, a long rock strip offering the perfect flat water spot with sometime nice kickers coming in. It was to tempting not to use my bindings and we went out for a really nice freestyle session.
The next days the wind went down a little so we decided to explore other islands around Sal, so we flew down to Sao Vicente , the whole team together, Mallory, Mitu, manu, me and Alex Caizergues and his girl friend Marie .
We had a lot of fun trying to discover some new waves on the north shore and score a couple nice surf session.

I’m now back in the south of France for few days, I finally got my laptop back from warranty, so I’ll be able to sort out all the pictures and videos from this trip.
Thanks to Manu Morel for the amazing pictures and the filming.

Have a look at the web selection of the pictures before to find the exclusive shots on your favourite magazines:
http://www.jeremietronet.com/trips/punta/

Jeremie Tronet
http://www.jeremietronet.com

very nice picture’s
Looks like a sweet trip what was the averge wind speed

we’ve got 0 knots, 15 knots to 25 knots
all conditions
perfect for surf, kite, etc ...

Nice shots Jeremie. You are lucky to make it over there. One day I too will go.

Kirk

Thanks jer I heard the surf is good and it looks like it on your pics,  did you had some problems with the rocks @punta preta they look pretty scary to me.

And what an amazing shot of the lighting i know how hard it is to capture it.

Cheers

No wind in Seattle for 3 weeks now, starting to really get a lot done around the house and at work,
but dang it, I’d rather jet out and get some of that for sure!
You are keeping the stoke alive with this post dude!

Hey guys,
thanks, I’m glad you like the updates !

The rock at ponta preta can be a little scary while surfing . I wasn’t use to surf backside waves, but I got use to it.
When the swell is small it can be scary.
When it is big, it is bigger but brakes further away so it’s better.

For kiting in the waves, it is not so bad, the wind is offshore so if you fly away you fly away from the rocks.
Also, if you crash your kite it often pull you away from the waves so it’s all good.

I had a couple wipe out with the kite in the water , got a few set on my face, but fortunatly the kite was just on the outside and I could relaunch again.

The place worth going guys !

J

Lovely photo of the lightning.  Sounds like you had a blast!