Ride With Rui Meira

From competing in the PKRA, being a judge on the PKRA tour, running a successful kite school in Portugal ESCOLAR RUI MEIRA and testing products with the BEST R&D Team, Rui Meira is one of the most well rounded kitesurfers in the industry. He was one of the creators of the GP kite (Guincho Project) as he and fellow team rider Michael Schitzhofer worked diligently with the R&D team until they came up with what we think is the BEST C Kite we have ever made. Recently Rui took a trip to Morocco with some friends and wanted to share his experience with us!





The ups and downs of a kite trip.
By: Rui Meira

After thinking a lot about my next destination i finally decided to visit Morocco for the 3rd time. This time i wanted to go to Essaouira which I can only say good things about. It's a great place to travel to and one of the most complete in terms of culture, wind and waves.



I took a group of friends down to Morocco so it was a fun trip from day 1 until the end of it. You might say it was the best trip in terms of wind and waves because we didn't have them at the same time. The windy days had great wind for my TS and the biggest one I used was a 9m down to my 5.5m and always together with my 5'6" Shortstick, a board I came to like a lot after these intense days of riding with small waves. I explored the bay as much as I could and it's a great place to ride with side-off winds, parts with onshore winds and even some really good point breaks downwind. After a long downwind, you can always come back on a camel. You have to do it at least once in your life despite all the pain it causes to your legs.



As I said, the wind was great and once again the forecast looked great but it just didn't come true so we ended up with really strong winds but super small waves. After that we took a lazy day to relax and visit the Medina and taste some great tea as well as doing everything a big group of tourists do. The wind was gone for the rest of the trip and the swell finally arrived so it was time for some SUP and surf and that was exactly what we did.

Overall I can't say it was a bad kite surfing trip because the ups were much bigger than the lows and I'm sure we will have better luck with wind and waves on the next try. Next month, I will be in Portugal hoping to score some waves and some north winds and a new video will come out so stay tuned!