58 INTERVIEWMARÍA ANDRÉS
How is travelling the world by yourself
with so much equipment?
Hahaha, it can be tough sometimes to travel with so many
boards and sails! You need to love what you do, if you don’t,
forget about it! It gets too complicated, especially when
planes – and specifically some airlines are involved where
you learn to fly only with the surf friendly airlines. A few
nights before travelling I start to get nervous, because you
never know what mood the person at the check in will be…
but this is just the beginning… you need to get to the spot…
you need a taxi that will accept all your board bags (forget
about it in Europe or USA), or leave everything while you go
pick a rental van in town. At the end, it always get solved and
it ends up being part of the trip! Most important is to keep
calm and in a good mood, you are on a surf trip!
In the windsurfing world we all have lived through this and we
try to help each other as much as we can, like a big family.
I’ve helped people coming to my area in Spain and I have
been helped so much in all of my trips! Without this support
uk
WIND
SURFING
from so many people, I would have never being able to do as
many amazing trips I have done! I can’t write all the names here,
but THANK YOU so much to all those friends that have helped
me during my trips!
I have travelled alone quite a lot, which is so much fun! You have
totally freedom to schedule your activities and you get to know
all the local people, something that isn’t easy when you travel
with a big group.
How is the atmosphere in women’s
windsurfing?
The women fleet is like a family. We spend very long periods
living together, travelling and sharing – we care about each other.
Despite what some people might think, even though we
compete, we also motivate, push and support each other to
improve and get to be a better sailor. Most of the year we stay in
touch and organise trips or projects and we always work together
on trying to make the women windsurfing scene bigger and
motivating new girls to join.