– Pat Deakin is the Economic Development Manager for the City of Port Alberni. He can be reached at 250.720.2527 or Patrick_deakin@portalberni.ca.
PORT ALBERNI – Nicole Eden has one of the most envious lifestyles I know. One way of describing it is to borrow and play with a couple of lines from a 19th century song by George Leybourne: “she flies through the air with the greatest of ease, that daring young woman on a flying trapeze…of sorts”. If you guessed from that and the title of this column that Nicole is a kiteboarder, you are correct.
More precisely she is the owner of a company called Girl on a Board that teaches people of all ages how to kiteboard. Her mission is to ‘empower people through sport’. She spends her winters in La Ventana, Baja, Mexico and her summers in Port Alberni.
She knows she has a great life and is constantly expressing gratitude for the nature of her business, her two young children, her partner, her other female instructors and the support she gets from the two communities she operates in. She became intrigued about Port Alberni after hearing about it from some locals who went to La Ventana in search of their own version of the endless summer.
As most Business Examiner readers will know, Port Alberni is well-known for its summer heat and water sports. Moreover, folks say you can pretty much set your watch by the time the wind starts picking up (around noon) then blowing steadily till about sundown.
Although a kiteboarding focus is relatively new (this is Girl on a Board’s second season here), Nicole maintains the wind is almost as consistent as La Ventana and while the water may be a bit cooler, the wind is fully warmed by the time it travels the 40 kilometers up the Alberni Inlet to China Creek where her school is located.
She also says that one of the nice perks of learning at China Creek is that it’s not busy yet and while her students may sometimes share the waters with fishing boats, the operators always give the kiteboarders a really wide berth, following the rules of all good mariners.
Girl on a Board’s season here runs from May 15th to August 31st. Nicole can be reached by Facebook Messenger or email: girlonaboard1@gmail.com. Her website is girlonaboard.org. She uses radio helmets for easier instruction, new Cabrinha kites and provides jet-ski support. China Creek is located 7 kilometers south of Port Alberni on the Bamfield Road.