4 years.
This is how long it took to gather and coordinate the four Kamchatka photoshoot essentials: The best local team, four world class riders, logistics (visas, permits, tickets, boat, tents, vehicles...), two photographers and a cameraman with unwavering dedication.

After all these years, I had this bad feeling that I was expecting too much, that only disappointment awaited me. The same feeling you get before a New Year's party full of false resolutions. So, it was with a heart full of passion and fear that I began this trip into the depths of Russia.

"Located in the far east of Russia, Kamchatka is a huge volcanic peninsula covering 270,000 km²."

"It was classified as an "ultra secret" military zone at the end of the second world war;"

The peninsula was therefore closed to visitors until the 90s. This has preserved the authenticity of the place and nature there has remained almost intact. Special permits are needed to venture from the capital and there is little to no infrastructure to get around.
The Pacific coast receives swells and winds, and it was there that we would be hanging out.

Mallo is the veteran. After a busy rider career, he is now head judge on the world freestyle tour. He was there for the waves, which he rips with the mastery of an experienced surfer.

Paul is a pure freestyler. After having spent 5 years on the tour, he is one of the most experienced riders. I'm counting on him for some big air/kiteloops if the wind is strong.

Camille is one of the world's top 5 strapless riders. He went to all the MANERA trips and every year his bag of tricks evolves. I know that with 20 knots he can do anything.

Max, the young freestyle prodigy. At the time I am writing this, he is ranked world champion after a great performance in Fuerteventura. At only 19 years old, he has demonstrated great maturity and has a huge passion for the sport.

The team was chosen not only for their performance on the water; they are humble and polite people, and especially passionate about adventure. They master all the disciplines of kitesurfing and are happy to go into the water no matter what the conditions are.

After an 8 hour flight from Moscow, we landed at Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, the capital of Kamchatka. We crossed the city to meet up with the Omega, a Japanese military ship that was converted into an expedition ship.

The contrast between the city and nature is striking. The buildings are cubic, with few openings, and very often in bad shape. A cold and effective Soviet style. Nature is vast, we were in an immense plain surrounded by snow-capped volcanoes. It was very green, we got the impression that it rained a lot. This contrast gave an apocalyptic dimension to the city, which made everything charming. We crossed a military port where old, rusty warships were piling up, then we finally arrived on our boat.

The crew was waiting for us and we met our local guide. Our guide wasn't an old, bearded, tattooed sea dog as we expected, but instead a petite brunette in her thirties: Kristina. Don't get me wrong! She was born in the Kuril Islands, she runs a team of 6 sailors, she knows how to drive almost any motorized machine, she is VIP in the best club in town, and she makes her own vodka...!

She runs the Peleken agency, which was crucial for the success of the trip.

We did not really know what to expect with this ship, especially having seen the condition of the harbour's other ships... Imagine our surprise when we arrived in front of a beautiful 30m vessel equipped with 2 dinghies, 6 cabins, and a sauna... After loading the boardbags and strategically choosing our cabins to avoid the loudest snorer (whose name I will not mention), we finally set sail.

The first meal was a salmon feast, an opportunity to settle down and look at the forecast before cutting off all contact with civilization. The Windguru board displayed a white to light blue color: Less than 10 knots every day... Things were looking rough. We checked the map for any bay that could accommodate a Venturi effect (wind acceleration), but we had no luck. We took advantage of the opportunity to ride foil surfs and spend time on the water. The waves were strangely docile even if the swell had a long period. The take-off was easy and the swell reformed for a long time. There was always a volcano behind the spot, it was as if we were in another world. For the last session, we got into the water at the end of a cape on a sort of mini-slab far at sea. We weren't super reassured when a whole section of the cliff collapsed with a heavy sound right behind us… Getting out of the water, we sailed for 5 minutes by boat and we ran across a pod of killer whales near where we surfed. There is definitely something brutal and rough about this coast.

Despite all our efforts to find wind, we spent 4 days without inflating even one kite... Until a squall passed by: We were filming Maxime skiing in a fjord when we saw clouds arriving with 20-25 knots. We threw ourselves in the dinghies and rigged the gear as soon as possible, knowing that this type of conditions usually lasts 20-30 min. We headed to the beach with the film crew and Max and Paul struggled to follow because the wind wasn't stable yet, the kites were wobbling, falling... But the wind finally came back and we started filming. The dinghy went back to the Omega and we stayed alone on the coast:
"Did someone bring the bear repellent?".
"No...".

The guys filmed and took photos while I watched the plain behind us so as to avoid any unpleasant surprises... Kamchatka has a very dense brown bear population, of which the locals are wary, so we were constantly watching our backs.

We only filmed for 20 minutes, but we were happy. This allowed us to get a couple of action shots.

"It's always very exciting to go on an adventure in unfamiliar lands"

But that means the wind and wave conditions are also quite unknown, so it's very hard to score. This means each short session is a success.

The next day, we stopped to fish in a lake, when two men approached us by surprise... They had hard, cold, and damaged faces; one was carrying a machete and the other one a rifle. They dropped their weapons when they got to us, explaining that they were poachers; their boat had broken down and they had been stuck out there for three days... We decided to help them, but took away their weapons out for precaution. We finally dropped them off at a poachers' camp a few hours away. They seemed to know each other and hugged each other heartily. We probably saved them, but to be honest, it was not a reassuring encounter.

It was the end of our boat trip and we headed back to the port in Petro. The last 5 days had been incredible, but we are still missing action shots and Windguru had no good news for us. The stress started to rise. We overheard a local talk about an extinct volcano that housed an ephemeral lake in its crater... It is an ice pack all winter, but it melts for three to four weeks in July and finally disappears in August. Apparently the timing was good. We decided to try our luck and we rented a 6x6 military vehicle without really knowing what we were getting into.

We spent the night in town before leaving and our guide suggested that we visit the town and have a drink. After a few shots of her homemade vodka, we left the club in a hurry, followed by a group of angry Russians and their girlfriends who had apparently fallen in love with the riders.

The next day, we loaded the Soviet vehicle and left for 6 hours of very rough terrain, moving in all directions and that clearly did not help our hangovers... After driving for a bit on the snow, we arrived above the crater. The first good surprise was that there was water; the ice pack had melted! The second good surprise: There were 15 well established knots!

Paul and Max got out the gear and ran to the water, carving down the long snowy slope to the lake. The filming crew slid down as far as they could. The sun was low and the light was perfect, the team landed their tricks one after another with ease, and the spot was glassy because the chop was cut by the ice packs. They picked up speed on the snowy slope to send their biggest tricks, they slid on the icebergs, the scene was unreal... The ambiance was festive that evening. It was still too early to drink another beer, but we shared a good meal around the fire, and it was pure happiness.

The nights on the boat were very comfortable, but when we got back to the tents that night, it was something completely different: the humidity had soaked everything, the wind was still blowing, and the wet tent was flapping in our faces. It was cold, very cold. As I was finally falling asleep, I heard loud music start up a few meters from the tent: a heavy dubstep. We were the only humans for miles around, so it was of course one of us. I told myself it was a mistake and that it would be turned off, but the music stayed on all night, as loud as it was when it started...

The next day, we learned that the place was often frequented by bears and that they started looking for food at night. The music deters them from approaching (personally, that dubstep would have made me flee too). So we had a nasty night, but at least no bears came rummaging nearby. On the other hand, we found big, fresh footprints below where we had filmed the day before...

The next day, the wind was still there, it was very steady, a kind of thermal wind created by the difference between the 2°C water and the air that could reach 15°C during the day. Usually the riders have a lot of trouble with their tricks during our shoots. The cold numbs the body, the conditions are often unpredictable, and the hood, gloves, and boots do not help to grab the bar... But here they were able to do everything. It was as if we were in Brazil (with 25°C less).

We took advantage of the conditions by shooting from the bank, by drone, and from the water. The riders easily stayed on the water for 2 to 3 hours, but the photographers and the cameraman stayed mostly still and were close to hypothermia in less than an hour. You have to choose the right moment! While the freestylers were shooting, Mallo and Camille had fun playing with the icebergs, gliding/flying along the slope, cutting the ice with their foil... The playground had great potential for fooling around!

When we returned in the evening, a not-so-shy fox came to visit. He came to steal some salmon from us. It was Mallo's birthday, so of course we had to drink again... We didn't have any alcohol, but the drivers offered us a pink beverage contained in plastic bottles that they called "spirit". We didn't have a choice. We tried it in spite of our guide's reluctance.

Our 6-hour drive back was quite similar to the previous one...

We were back in Petro. We finally got an internet connection, and we had to decide on a plan for the remaining 5 days. Windguru still had nothing good to say, but the weather was nice and warm (around 20 degrees in the afternoon), so we bet on a thermal wind. We left for the most exposed coast, a huge volcanic sand beach north of the city. No time to rest, we went from a military vehicle to a 4x4 to chart our way forward.

The beach was huge, dominated by three volcanoes, including one active one. A river ran right next to the camp, perfect for fishing and cooking. The meadow behind the beach is very rough with big craters. A local explained to us that they were created during the last explosive eruption of the volcano. In the meantime, they made great restrooms.

We hardly had time to set up the camp, the thermal rose with a beautiful 15-knot side-on and a rather fun little swell. It was time to get into the water for Mallo and Camille. I knew they had been dying to do their job since the beginning of the trip. It was hard to watch the freestylers binging on the flat when we had already spent 10 days without being able to film any waves/strapless.

"In front of the volcanoes, they surfed waves one after another until nightfall, accompanied by a few seals curiously watching their new neoprene companions."

We lit a beautiful bonfire to warm them up and it was too late when we noticed that the ground under our tents was very uneven. Sounded like another very good night to come!

Since it was too difficult to sleep, we got up at 5 a.m. to surf-foil. The waves were glassy, the wind was off-shore, and the sun rose. We found new bear tracks on the beach, this one was a smaller bear. We looked for the bears all throughout the trip, but found none. It was quite frustrating to be in bear land without seeing a single one. That being said, thanks to the prints, we know that they had probably seen us.

We spent three days surfing in the morning and kiting in the afternoon, but one of the guys managed to get some signal and a rather strong wind from the north-west made itself known in a bay to the south... Our guide agreed to take over the boat and we swung into action to reach the port as quickly as possible. We needed a 4x4 and rented a tow truck to bring all the equipment. It got bogged down 7 times on the road and we had to push and retrace our steps so many times... But we finally arrived just in time on the boat and in the bay, just in time to pump a kite when the wind rose to 25 knots. We were in the open sea at the exit of the bay, the spot was rather hostile but Camille and Mallo were ready to go. We just needed to take off, launching from the boat was difficult since it moved a lot.

"We tried several techniques, the kite first, the rider first..."

The latter seemed to be the most effective, even if it was hard to throw yourself from the deck into the icy water.

It was time for me to change and as I passed the living room, I saw Camille landing a big frontroll through one of the portholes... And that was it, off we went. They landed all their tricks while Paul was boosting some hang-time over the volcano. Camille did a series of doubles, backs, kiteloops one after another... But when he starts doing board-off we hear someone shout:
"Hey, what the fuck are you doing?!!"
It was Olivier the cameraman who "gently" reminded him of the rule: Strapless board-offs were banned. They laughed and Camille did other tricks.

We sailed to Petropavlovsk to spend our last night in Russia, and I looked back on these last two weeks. Was I expecting too much?

Definitely not. Russia spoiled us with beautiful landscapes, encounters, wind, waves, and certainly a little too much vodka. Iceland, Canada, Scotland, Russia, each trip reinforces my belief that our sports are more than just summer sports and that braving the cold is something unique, even necessary for some.

Experiencing a beautiful adventure between friends in the cold is worth it, even with the hours of bad sleep, frozen fingers, a certain discomfort, and all the efforts to be at the right place at the right time.

We do it to inspire people to get out of their homes, put on a wetsuit, and enjoy the ocean no matter what the conditions are. Because every moment spent in the water should be magical.

Stay salty.

Julien Salles