By Kristina Korsholm July 27, 2013 in Life

I’m now offcially a certified Kite Surfer

Once a year the American slash Danish side of my family goes on a ‘National Lampoon’s Vacation’. Literarily. I’m not kidding. It’s pretty close to the Chevy Chase version. We are all super nerds in each our fields and together it is a comedic disaster to say the least.

Anyways, the premise of our yearly vacation goes something like this: about 6 months in advance we decide to go either some place we have never been before or to take an adventure we have never done before. A lot of times our vacay involves both. This year we decided on kitesurfing, shooting automatic rifles and camping in the mountains.

So my family came to LA to meet me and then we drove south to Long Beach where our first stop is kitesurfing with SoCal Kitesurfing. I have only been in Long Beach once before, when I was shooting a movie years back. I remember that it can get pretty rough around the edges down there so we stayed on the DL last night and next morning discovered a glorious volleyball tournament with hot, tan guys running around half naked chasing the ball. Truth be told I would have enjoyed this scenario a lot if it wasn’t for the fact that we faced 8 hours of concentrated kitesurfing. So I had to walk. My dad is admin about our activities and I respect that.

Ok, so Bart, our kitesurfing coach is this cool dude who owns a kitesurfing school and takes everything with a grin. He welcomed us, talked about wind, introduced a bit of technique and then we got kites, equipment and turned technique into action trying to handle the powerful kites. Honestly, I was scared that the enormous kite would fly me to Tijuana. We heard stories about people being flown into traffic, houses and palm trees. The kite lifts you as high and long as you wish if you let it catch the wind. Damn! Then, later after a few hours of working the different sizes of kites on sand came the wet suits, the helmets etc. and we found ourselves in the freezing ocean getting on a surf board with a friggin’ 10 meter bad-ass kite attached to our pelvis. Oh and PS – just prior to that, while walking into the ocean we are told that there are a gazillion sting rays in the ocean so we cannot touch the bottom of the ocean. I’m like: controlling a 10 meter kite, a board, all my equipment and watching out for sting rays. Is this really what vacation is about???

After 8 hours under a hot sun, in strong and freezing wind and in cold water (filled with sting rays) I gotta say it is vacation. Not once, did I have a moment to think about work. I was so concentrated on not dying that work and everything else slipped my mind. When lifted out of the ocean by a 10 meter long kite, on a surf board you sort of don’t have any time to contemplate about other stuff than ‘the moment’. It is an amazing experience.

After the kitesurfing, we drove east New Mexico bound and when we got too hungry we stopped at this little quaint asian diner in the middle of nowhere out in the desert to get some food. I’ve honestly never seen asian cuisine out in the desert. But it was pretty good and après dinner, we found a hotel across the street and hopped in the pool to cool down.

I won’t lie. I absolutely adore luxury. No doubt about it. But sometimes, stopping in at some random, desert hotel is really fun and low key, which I love as well.

Now it’s time for sleep. Tmro we are going through Arizona and getting our hunting game on…

Here are a few pics from today. Speak soon xoxo KK