On the Road with Kristin Boese: Driving and Shooting, Shooting and Driving

Posted Tuesday 2nd October 2007

Sept 10th - 30th

Fortunately, at the KPWT in Portugal I got to relax and rest a little bit due to the no wind conditions, as after the trip to Portugal I really needed every bit of energy.

After the contest ended, I went back home to Germany where I had 2 days to pack all my things for the next 6 months (I’m on an around-the-world ticket now and might not come back home for quite a long time) and to take care of my tax report which was long overdue. I am still amazed that I actually managed to finish everything. I left home the next morning at 6 AM in a rental car and started my journey through Germany.

First I went on a 6-hour drive to “Nuerburgring” for a car race where I had a meeting with my manager and a potential sponsor. It was a very exciting day and I got to sit in the race cars and everything was explained to me. Well, it is quite amazing how much money there is in that sport and, no questions, how professional car racing really is. As for the success of the meeting, I will let you know as soon as possible.

Car race

After an exciting day at the race, I now had to drive another 7 hours … I had to be in St. Peter Ording, Germany, for a photo shoot for Mazda the next morning at 10 o’clock. So I drove and drove and drove and arrived in St. Peter at midnight, got into my hotel room and kind of slept in the next morning. At 10 AM, the whole shooting crew got together for a first meeting and we made first plans for the day before we were off to the beach about 30 minutes later. The weather was unbelievably nice and we were so lucky: blue skies and strong wind. Perfect for our shoot! So we kept working all day until dark, getting all motifs done with and without Mazda, with and without the kite, with me and with Nils (the other model) and with a lot of fun and driving and kiting and so on.

A little lifestyle shoot

A little action shoot

Me getting my makeup done in the window (it mirrors in the window)

It was great! The crew was awesome, the photographer Gudrun Muschalla super fun to work with and the pictures really nice.

Gudrun Muschalla

I will post the 4 pages advertising as soon as I get the layout and am quite curious about how it will come out myself. But now my journey through Germany had to be brought to an end, so I took off the next day to drive to Düsseldorf Airport (another 6 hour drive) to fly to Portland/Oregon for a week. Here the journey was to be continued… Sky picked me up from the airport and we drove to Hood River. We kited one day at the sandbar and then found out that the forecast for the Oregon Coast looked great and that photographer Lance Koudele was on his way out there to shoot with us. So Sky, I and our friend Dreu from Western Australia took off early the next morning to arrive in Lincoln City for a perfect wave session.

Lincoln City spot

Dreu and I were happy to kite in some waves here in Oregon and Sky was super happy that he finally got to show us the coast with good conditions. We slept the night in Newport, had dinner at the port and went to visit the sea lions, but had to drive back to Hood River the next morning as Sky had to be back to test kites with Ken.

The beautiful Oregon Coast

Newport Port

Me and the sea lions

In Hood River, we kited every day for a week and had the nicest conditions too … blue sky every day, pretty constant wind and not too many people on the water. We shot some more pictures here with Richard Hallman, in the afternoon light, in the sunset and in the moonlight, and I really hope you can see some of the results in some of the magazines soon. But now it was about to say good bye to the Gorge for this year. I really enjoy the beauty of the Gorge and the lifestyle there and I will be back for more of that next year.

From Portland, I flew to Brazil which was a major trip again… 6 hour layover in Chicago, 7 hour layover in Sao Paolo and then finally getting to Fortaleza. It is kind of nice to be back in Brazil though now! Nice warm water and wind every day! I am getting ready for the competition that starts in only 3 days now. Will keep you posted about that one too!

~ Kristin