Lele Kawa the movie

The Lele Kawa crew has been working on a feature length movie that documents some of our adventures in an artistic fashion. The plan is to finish the movie before the end of the year and then to sell it, with any profits it generates going to "Path International" a nonprofit that helps rehabilitate veterans through therapeutic horseback riding.

So far we have this trailer put together. I will add an update when we get our kickstarter up and running.

-James

Lele Kawa

SUP La Jolla, San Diego, CA

I hit the open seas for the first time on my SUP. There were 2 foot waves, and they were surprisingly easy to paddle out through. The board punched through the breaks with ease. The white wash wasn't as unstable as I expected.

Jeff and I paddled for about an hour and a bit over 2 miles.



The sea caves look a lot better from the water level. Some of the caves would have been more inviting if I was in a kayak and not on my SUP. I am not willing to risk dings in my board. Unfortunately there was nowhere to cliff jump in La Jolla, at least not without risking a $890.00 fine. Next time I will bring a mask to swim around.

When we got back to La Jolla Shores Park, we surfed the waves for a bit. I defiantly prefer surfing on a stand up to a long board. The perspective is just better. Jeff even managed to get a video of us both on the same wave. Not my best ride of the day.

-James

Lele Kawa

Multiple gas free rides on the dunes

For a change of pace,the Lele Kawa crew came to join me in Yuma, rather and meeting up in San Diego.

We pulled out all the toys for this one. We had surf boards, snadboards, mountain boards, power kites and our imaginations.

The surf boards worked better on sliding down the sand than expected, and they made for some good photos. The sand was a bit wet and sticky for the sand board, this made it better for the mountain board. You could make it pretty far down the dunes if weren't too steep because the wet sand was packed pretty well. You did end up finding some loose patches to wipe out in.

 We also had fun just trying to jump down the steeper dunes as far as we could. The picture doesn't really due it justice, but it was lots of fun.

-James

Lele Kawa

SUP with seals on Mission Bay, San Diego

For my first real SUP (stand up paddleboarding) experiance, if you don't count my ten minute demo in Oregon over a year ago, I joined Mr. Lele Kawa himself for about 2.5 miles around Mission Bay.

On a previous trip to San Diego, the owner of Wind and Sea surf shop in Mission Beach, offered me an unbeatable deal on a SUP package. I finally made my way back there to take the offer.

Sunday morning we hit the water starting from Fanuel Street Park. As the two of us Paddled our way across the Sail Bay, we were joined by a seal. He shadowed us as we paddled, often following just behind the tail of our boards. He would bump the boards and nibbled on my leash. We stopped for a while before crossing under the Ingraham bridge. As we sat on our boards the seal played around us. He could surface along side our boards and look at us, and then swim off a bit to splash around in the water.

View Mission bay SUP in a larger map
When we grew board of our seal friend we headed under the bridge. There were a group of outrigger canoes gettign ready to start a regata. Along with them was a single SUP rider. She told us she was the only SUP rider for the race, and tried to talking us into joining her. We declined and headed back to Fanuel Street Park. The way back got tiring because the wind made it so you could only paddle on one side to keep your line.

Swing flipping in the park

-James

Lele Kawa

Dawn Partol

I am not much of a morning person, especialy since I have been working shift work for the last three years.

However my new board demanded that I go out on dawn partol at least once before I head out of El Salvador. I joined the regular dawn patrol group, which on this day only included one other guy.

At 430 I jumped on my Sector 9 long board and headed off the meet Jake who I had meet durring the surf suffari. About 15 minutes later we had his car loaded up and headed off to the beach.

By 520 we were down at Kayu and ready to hit the water. It was a pretty big day, overhead, and really low tide. I got my ass kicked again. Every time I was almost out to the lineup, I would get smashed by the outside sets that would break all the way across the beach. My big 7-0 turned out to be a little to big to duck dive under all the white wash.

After getting pounded for an hour and not catching anything, I swapped boards with Jake. Now on his longboard I caught a little inside set and rode it into the shore. Unfortunatly I got caught up in the cross shore current and was carried a ways don the beach and had to walk the rocks much further than I would have planed.

On the way back we grabbed some breakfast and a frozen coco for our ride back.

Not a great day a surfing for me, but it was still nice to start the day out on the water.

Eddie would go

In 2007 I went to the Quicksilver Eddie Aikau surf contest opening ceremonies. I think being at the ceremony is even cooler than seeing the contest.

There is no place else on Earth that you can be around so many pro surfers. The contest is held at Waimea Bay Beach Park and is open to everyone. Before the ceremonies start you can mingle and talk with the pros. Then when the ceremony starts all the invited surfers and their alternates grab their boards and get in a big half circle.

The ohana of Eddie is there to talk and thank everyone for coming. When the ceremony ends, there is the traditional paddle out. The paddle out is also open to anyone who dares to brave the surf of Waimea.

Surf Safari, El Salvador

Although it only lasted two days I think this weekend qualifies as my first surf safari.

Eight of us set of on a weekend of being water men. Saturday morning we set off to Barillas for boating, surfing, kayaking and otherwise enjoying life. I came well prepared with my new surf board, kite, kite-board and wake boarding rope.

Boat loaded up with the boards

After unloading at our houses it was time to set off for the boat to head to our first surf break, Punta Mango. What we didn't know getting in the boat is that we had a rough two hour boat ride in order to get there. There was plenty of surf and wind to battle on our way to this world class surf break. Our boat captain expertly navigated the rough seas and get us there with only slightly sore butts.

On Our way out

Once we arrived at Punta Mango, the captain dropped us off a good distance out from the break, before heading to the deeper calm waters to anchor and wait for us. It was the first time any of us approached a wave from the ocean side, rather than the beach side. If you have never done it before, it is awkward. The wave was a little blown out from the onshore winds, but still breaking overhead. Finally we found where the waves were breaking and one by one took waves.

Punta Mango as we ride by in the boat

My first wave I buried the nose of my board when I tried to pop up. I accepted my fate and let the wave toss me. As I washing machined, I felt the leash pop off my board because I didn't connect it right. When I finally picked what way up was and broke the surface, I had to chase my board. My new board was heading to the rocky shore. Just as the next wave was coming I caught the nose and was able to hold on through the beating with only a cut to the knee. I finally made it out to the channel, and began my long swim against the wind out to the boat to. By the time I made it out to the boat my arms were pretty dead. Despite that once I got my leash back on, I headed right back to the break, but did not take any more waves. After a while I headed back to the boat just in time for the captain to start the motor and head in to pick everyone up. A nice 500 meter paddle against the wind for nothing.

Almost back to the boat from the shore

Once everyone was loaded up we headed to break two of the day El Espino. We didn't stay there long because the wave wore everyone out. It was a shore break and had no channel. So you had to fight the wave out every time. After a few waves we headed back to the marina against the rough seas again. Again our captain expertly got us back with only a little more beating than the trip out there. I was hoping for a short stop off at the sandbar so I could get my kite up, but a storm rolled in right behind us as we approached the marina.


We got back to our houses just before the main storm hit. We hoped it would blow over and we could head to the pool to cook up dinner, but the storm never let up. Instead it stole our electricity. We moved a grill up to our patio and started to prepare and cook dinner by candle light. After dinner and a few rum drinks we turned in.

One of the rum drinks

After breakfast we explored the mangroves in kayaks. They were full of fish, crabs and water fowl. Being there in channels that are just wide enough to fix the kayak through with alligators and other life all around was a little intimidating.

The pile of kayaks