Uchinada Kite Festival

(click on slide show for additional viewing options and to download the pictures)
Hyunjoo, Katya, Sheryl and I took off for Uchinada around 10:30 to check out the annual kite festival along the beach near Kanazawa. We were immediately impressed with over 10 massive octopus "kites" flying low over the beach. They were brought by a team that flew out from Berkeley, California. Unfortunately only a few traditional large Japanese kites were flying. And my favorites, the bug kites, were rarely seen that day as well. After getting pumped watching the team sport kite competition, we decided to try it out for ourselves. There were instructors that let you fly a sport kite for yourself. It was a rather difficult design to fly since it wobbled a high speeds and it gave a wicked pull in those winds. We soon switched to my own sport kite and continued having fun taking turns flying it until the winds died down at three. You can find Katya's video from this link.