We do! Liquid Force kites’ Canadian team rider, Craig Cunningham has been traveling throughout the far East for the past few months. Stance magazine had a chance to catch Craig while he wasn’t sessioning the waters of Thailand or the numerous other countries he’s visited so far. Fellow traveler, Sam Medysky also weighs in.

Have you had a chance to kite in Cambodia or Vietnam? Let us know your favorite Asian locales and let the 2012 vacation sessioning begin!

“Stance: Where are you guys at now?

Craig: We’re in Cambodia! We were just [in Vietnam] for 2 days, and then we left all our board bags in the Capital city there, and we’re doing a bit of sight seeing in Cambodia. Tomorrow we head back to Viet Nam and then to the KTA event down there.

Stance: So how many countries have you guys visited yet?

Sam: We were in Philippines, Thailand, Viet Nam and Cambodia.

Stance: You guys have had good conditions and everything?

C: Yeah, we’ve had a lot of good conditions, lots of different spots to ride

S: It’s been good. I mean, the wind in Thailand this time of year is a bit lighter, their season is more in March. We’ve definitely kited a bunch there, but on big kites, usually, like 11 or 13m. But for Vietnam right now, they say 7 or 9m every day.

Stance:  How much gear are you guys traveling with? How is THAT?

S: I have 2 board bags, which sucks!! Haha… I have 4 boards, 3 kites 2 bars and a harness. No wetsuit.

C: I just got 2 kites, and a kiteboard and a wakeboard. That has pretty much been perfect. I haven’t needed any more.

C: But you know what’s crazy? You know how in North America and Europe you get away with having “Golf” written on the side of your bag, and a lot of that stuff flies for free?? Well here if you get caught with “Golf” on the side of your bag, they try to jack you so high!

S: But kiteboarding gear they accept, but golf they don’t. So we came in and we’re like “Oh yeah it’s golf gear in there” and they’re like “ok. It’s $100”. And then we’re like “No way! It’s golf gear!” and they say “Yeah, it’s $100 for golf gear” and we say ” Well then it’s kiteboarding gear” and they’re like “ oh, ok! It’s free then!”.
It’s kind of the opposite of the western world.

Stance: Have you guys made it to places where it’s completely foreign to kiting? Where people don’t know anything about it, where they’re like “What in the world are you doing? What’s going on?”

C: There were a couple places in Thailand, where we didn’t stray super far from the main spot where everyone was riding, but may be 30-45 min away, and people were just gathering around, they have never seen anything like that before so… that’s’ pretty cool. Dave and Miguel did some stuff in this one little town and people were just going crazy!

Stance: And what’s the best riding spot that you found as of now? Which has been your favorite?

C: My favorite has probably been this place called Tung Wa Laen beach, in Chumphon. It just has like nice Maui style kickers, with quite a good separation between them so you can have some nice flat water.

S: At the same spot, you can rent a scooter, that does like 70 miles per hours, (C: for like $3!) which is wicked, then you can drive to this little lagoon, with the mangrove, and it’s really really good. Almost like Brazil. Super flat, the water is very dirty but the riding is really good.

C: The scene as a whole is actually bigger than we thought it would be.

S: It’s not super crowded beaches. You’re gonna get like 12-15 kites in the sky.
And once you get over here, it’s really inexpensive. You can live on $20 a day, including accommodation, bike rental, food, everything.
If you flew in and just went to one of the spots, and you didn’t travel around or anything, you could do it super super cheap.

C: Some of the spots you can do easily for under $10 a day. The only tourists there were kiteboarders, and it was really cheap. But if you go somewhere else where it’s more backpacking, the prices go to almost double. But if you budget about $20 a day, you’re living pretty well.”

 

Click here for the rest of the interview and start planning your trip today!