One SUP 17'7 Unlimited downwinding VID

[yugi]

yugi - the first pic in the box shows wind direction and speed.

Err... Looked at pics. I'm not seeing the direction. What am i missing?

I'm  confused by your words.

[Eagle]

Yeah yugi - your original post was pretty close.  In the summer the land heats up Squamish valley up to Whistler and beyond.  This creates a huge void which is filled with cool ocean air.  Hence our nice consistent summer inflow DW conditions.  The wind veers massively around Watts Point as it climbs over that terrain. 

The wind comes blasting in over the mountain range across from Watts.  And this is the direction shown in the pic.  The wind is basically an originating Westerly bombing down Georgia Straight that blasts around the valleys becoming a SW at Watts.  By Porteau it is more a S flow due to the coast mountain land mass.  This hugely veers wind speed and direction up to Squamish.  Once the land cools inland - the wind speeds dissipate - see bottom pic. 

This allows for very predictable wind action in the summer afternoons for DW SUP and kite boarders.  Squamish is a very popular for that.  Most peeps that DW go from Porteau to Britannia because the shuttle is much faster and much less exposed and risky on the water.  The water temps around Watts become very cold as it is glacier run-off.  I personally really like going all the way into Squamish - but most do not.  It can get quite risky when conditions get festive.  Luc was up there one time way back on his Sportster and I on my Touring pintail.  That got me 100% hooked on DW as I planed that board into the river entrance.  Super fun but super tippy.  After that got my Bullet then M14.  Haha.  So much easier.   

[yugi]

Yeah yugi - your original post was pretty close.  In the summer the land heats up Squamish valley up to Whistler and beyond.  This creates a huge void which is filled with cool ocean air.  Hence our nice consistent summer inflow DW conditions. 
…

That’s just what I’d figure.

Your talk about “wind down from the mountains” leads me in another direction. So I totally do not understand.

…
And this is the direction shown in the pic.
  …

I fail to see any indication of wind direction in the pics you post. What am I missing?


Confusing.
Not that big a deal. Was just trying to understand you.

[Eagle]

No worries.  The Squamish valley is to the right and up.  There are some small mountain peaks and valleys to the left of Watts across the water.  The wind moves from left as a WSW to the top as more of a Southerly.  The wind bombs down the Straight of Georgia (way left) as a Westerly and then hits the coast mountains on the right.  When this happens they veer to the top right as a Southerly inflow. 

At Squamish the winds blow over the small mountains to the left which creates the WSW which is represented in the little box with a circle denoting the true wind direction.  If you look closely the wind direction is noted there.  The wind you see the red coming from is from the WSW direction.  This veering is simply caused from the geography as the wind snakes its way up Howe Sound and up the Squamish valley to Pemberton.

[Eagle]

In and around Vancouver and Howe Sound we get a ton of geographical wind shifts.  We race our boats in this all the time.  In that way -> local knowledge is huge as the winds are very predictable if you track wind directions closely.  Most do not -> so they guess where the wind will be coming from.  There is really not a lot guessing actually.  As well we do not have as much oscillating shifts as lake regions.  Mainly we get just get big geographical shifts where we race.  Currents also play huge as you can be going 3 kts faster on one side of the tide line vs the other.  We have raced up and down Howe Sound inlet many times.  Great fun getting blasted by the gusts.  Haha.  Lost a crew member overboard one time because he was not paying close enough attention.