It needs some red.
– Calvin
After the beautiful insanity of Tunisia, we barely had time for laundry (as in clothes, not line laundry), and we were back on the road for yet another kite festival – one much nearer, shorter in time, but much, much bigger in space.
I mean, just look at the map of the kite field:
Jesolo Beach & Kite Festival. Two thousand meters of sandy beach, divided into nineteen arenas for kites and kiters.
It was the fifth edition of the festival, which started humbly but then grew almost exponentially under the auspices of Filippo, Nat, Angelo, and the team who handle this humongous happening impeccably.
This year’s Jesolo started a bit unusually for us, as we tend to arrive on Friday evening, missing a third of the show – but we were ready to roll already on Thursday afternoon!
Therefore, the first day of the festival was… cloudy and heavy, like our heads.
Friday was, in general, a tough day — and not only because of the hangovers and general tiredness. The wind was oscillating right around the minimum for our kites to fly – which meant constant vigilance was needed, and there was a lot of huffing and puffing – that is, pulling – if we wanted to make a proper aerial show for the Friday crowds.
How tough it was? Well, Ivor here was not flying a stunt kite:
No, it was a manta being naughty …
Amongst all the huffing and pulling and putting the kites in the sky just for them to fall down, picking them up and launching again, and again, and again, one easily begins to question this Sisyphean endeavour. What the… hell are we doing?
A show like no other!
Something really beautiful!
For the kids!
It’s a circus and we are monkeys!
All true, of course – but the most eloquent explanation of what we do was offered by Calvin from the Calvin and Hobbes comic strip:
And voilà:
We are improving the sky.
This superlight red delta is not just a kite. It’s a piece of aerial art made by master Fabiano Vignali himself – and Ivor won it in a silent auction, outbidding everyone literally at the last minute.
And it works in every sky setting:
See?
But that’s not all! After the auction, the old masters were evaluating the loot – looking at the seams, weighing the spars, contemplating bridles – and Roberto, as he later claimed, wanted to “check the air permeability of the fabric” by putting his lips on the kite and blowing through it.
In other words: he kissed the delta.
OHMYGOD! Roberto kissed my delta!
I didn’t kiss it.
Blessed by Roberto’s kiss!
I am telling you, I didn’t kiss it!
Kissed by Santo Roberto di Cervia!
I was just checking the permeability …
Bacio di tutti baci! My blessed delta wil now fly every time!
I’m gonna smack you with this chicken.
He did. But it didn’t help, as a long line was winding the next day over the sands of Lido di Jesolo, people holding their kites, waiting for hours to get them kissed and blessed by Santo Roberto.
Oh Your Grace, please – my trilobite! – kiss it and make it fly again!
Luckily, he was on the other end of the beach, so we were safe from his heavenly anger.
The Jesolo kite festival is enormous – so huge it’s almost impossible to grasp its size. We were at Arena 4, Cube 3, near the western end of the kite field. Roberto’s kite-kissing booth was in Arena 13. The other end of the beach – Arena 19 – was at least two hours away.
It’s not two hours.
Try walking on this goddamn sand.
Ok, but I could take the pathway in front of the hotels, it’s paved.
Yes – but it’s totally crowded.
It wasn’t crowded. It was chock-full of relaxed Italians having their afternoon stroll, looking for a nice Aperol Spritz on the beach. Two bloody hundred thousand of them.
Which presents a problem – kiters can interact more or less exclusively with their arena neighbours. All the friends are all over the place, some of them an hour or two of hard walking through the soft sand away (Filippo and the team are aware of this, and they make it up in the evenings, gathering us all for fantastic dinners with plenty of socialising time). And sometimes our mischievous energy is a bit much for serious old-school kite flyers. This year, our primary victims were Robert, Andrea, Romy and Lucas, and their most patient and nice dog – and Petra with Gunther. Organised, professional… German.
I’m just going to get a coffee, could you keep an eye on my kites for a minute?
We can do better! We can sell them!
A ha ha ha … hilarious.
Kites Petra and Gunther brought were really beautiful …
So we just couldn’t resist … pranking fellow kite flyers is the salt of a festival.
What’s this?
A kite?
Yes, I can see that, a nice butterfly for kids. But where is my manta?
Well, you said we shouldn’t sell it …
Yes…?
So we traded it for this beautiful little butterfly!
Gunther wasn’t angry. Disappointed, a bit sad – but not angry.
How could he be, when the sky above Jesolo looked like this:
And Gregor shared with him te great secret of the Indonesian sand anchor!
Postojnska jama!!!
– Robert
Our flagship kite, the magnificent subterranean flying monster made by master Janez Vizjak a.k.a Dr.Agon, flies rarely, as we take great care in preserving it, because it is heavy and therefore expensive for air travel, and because at least certain cultures (like India) do not respond well to the sight of a, well, a (white) skin-coloured 25 meters long … shaft.
But in Jesolo? We had to fly it! And our neighbours at Cube 2 instantly recognised the enormous endemite from the Postojna Cave they visited and saw the animal live in its natural habitat: Proteus anguinus, the olm!
It barely flew – the wind was at its lower limit, and the sand that gets everywhere probably added a couple of kilos to its tail.
But it did fly!
It was a beautiful kite-flying day, and everything – everything! – was in the air, so a perfect opportunity to do our core business: kite aerial photography. We are the KAP Jasa team, after all.
It’s tough doing kite aerial photography at such a huge festival, as there are kites and lines everywhere – even with the trusted, steady Original Blue rokkaku by Dr Agon, it gets very nervous navigating the sky. Especially since the kids fly their own little kites, and the line of beachfront hotels creates a vicious wave just above their roofs.
And, as we found out on landing, the Insta360 threw a tantrum and stopped taking photos somewhere in the middle of the flight.
But the Jesolo festival was fantastic – the kites the masters brought and flew were really really beautiful – so it was a great, rewarding KAP session after all.
While St. Roberto of Cervia might have been on the other side of the beach, heavens couldn’t be far away – because we met an angel.
It’s your turn.
No.
Yes, I went yesterday.
Damn … give me a minute.
I am thirsty.
Me too, but I am dead tired. Just a minute.
A classical bickering – about who shall do the ultimate sacrifice and drag his battered body to the store to fetch a couple of cold ones – went on end on, when suddenly …
No … is this a dream?
An otherworldly light shone on our arena, a magnificent organ chord sounded, a choir of crystal voices started to sing a hymn … and an angel was walking towards us.
Are our prayers answered?
It was Petra. Carrying manna from heaven – that is, a couple of cold ones.
A perfect way to end a perfect kite flying day … to end a fantastic, exceptional kite festival, one of the largest in Europe and in the world, one that we are proud to take part in.
There are so many people we owe big thanks to for this awesome weekend in Jesolo.
To Filippo, Nat, Angelo, and the diligent crew that created this amazing, incredible, fantastic Jesolo Beach & Kite festival.
To Mayor Cristofer De Zotti and the city of Jesolo, the staff at the great Hotel Souvenir (especially the breakfast ladies!), and everyone else who made the festival possible.
And of course to all the kite flying friends we are so so lucky to have … our arena neighbours Robert and his family, Petra and Gsnther, santo Roberto … and all two hundred and more kiters that improved the sky above Lido di Jesolo so much.
Thank you – and see you again soon … somewhere on a kite field, with a line in hand.
Thank you very much for this fantastic report on the Jesolo Kite Festival.
We were really delighted to meet you and to have been your neighbours at the kitefield.
Here’s to seeing you again soon!
Robert with Andrea, Romy and Lucas
Thank you Robert – and yes, see you all soon! 🙂