About me

Ing. Jana Hrabalová

Jája to friends. As a kid I built a paraglider out of blankets and plastic sheeting. Today I kite on water, snow and land, and I like to go on trips with a group.

How it started

When I was little, I was driven to the dentist in Ústí. From the car window I'd see a group of people in a meadow by the road with something flying above them on long lines. I thought it was paragliding. Now I know they were kites. I wanted it so badly that I still remember those drives.

At nine I drew a plan and built my own paraglider out of string, blankets and plastic sheeting. I was not the technical type. Our garden is on a slope, so I ran down the hill expecting it to carry me over the greenhouses and into the field below. It never left the ground. It was great fun and a big disappointment. It didn't occur to me that I needed proper wind.

Then it was school, school and more school. My family wasn't well off, so a paragliding course or a wing of my own was out of the question. I put the dream away.

At 24 I came across a landkiting video on YouTube. A meadow between blocks of flats and the sea, riders jumping on mountainboards under inflatable and foil kites. It looked so easy. I thought: this is the life I want.

For Christmas I got a one-day landkiting course. I was looking forward to the mountainboard, but the instructor didn't even bring one. First a trainer kite, then a 6 m Punch in orange and blue. I was so hooked that I bought it from the instructor on the spot. We never covered safety. No quick release, no launching, no landing. The instructor launched the kite, handed it to me, and the two hours in the field were mostly about the thrill.

Nobody showed me what to do with it. We launched it, it pulled me, and all I could think of was to hold the bar in tight. The kite started looping and pulled even harder. A friend jumped on me and it dragged us both across the field, again with every loop. We both ended up grazed. I wouldn't recommend a Punch to anyone today.

I'm mostly self-taught and never did a really good course. I was lucky to fall in with people who knew what they were doing, went on kite trips and took me under their wing. Every free moment I spent on the fields around Krupka: Fojtovice, Moldava, Nakléřov and Petrovice. A mountainboard first, a buggy later. Water didn't appeal to me at all.

Then the snow came and I wanted to learn snowkiting. A new kite was beyond my budget, so I bought an old 10 m Apex. It had no proper release: even after you pulled it, the kite stayed with you. I took the bus up to Fojtovice with the kite and a snowboard I couldn't ride. It was foggy and blowing hard. I laid the kite out and stood over it, not knowing what would happen once I let it go.

Just then another kiter rode past. On skis, with a smaller kite than mine and far more experience. It was the first time I'd ever met anyone on a spot. He stopped and asked what I was doing. I said I was wondering whether to launch. "Pack it up. It's blowing way too hard and it's foggy." He offered to get me back to the car, and was quite horrified to find out I couldn't ride a snowboard. I walked to his van, and he and a few friends drove me home to Krupka.

That was Honza Procházka. He took me under his wing and taught me everything about safety. Today he's my best friend and the man behind Big Day. Ever since, I've known who to turn to.

Around the same time a friend spotted a guy flying a kite in a field near Krupka and got his number for me. We met in Fojtovice the next day. Mirek is another of my best friends now. We ride motorbikes together, and my free time around Krupka is spent with him and Honza.

Honza loves Lake Milada, so I started thinking about water. I bought a wetsuit, a helmet and an impact vest and went to Milada with an 8 m Flysurfer Peak to learn body dragging. The local riders told me straight away to go and learn in the shallows at Wiek on Rügen instead. I tried anyway, ended up in the reeds and had to admit they were right.

I asked in a Facebook group whether anyone was driving to Rügen. Iveta from Kites.cz saw it, took me along and gave me a one-day course there. It was blowing about 8 knots (4 m/s) and I insisted that was enough. Iveta said it wasn't. I ran into the water with my 12 m Flysurfer Speed 5 foil kite and drowned it. Iveta jumped in and pulled it out. Then she gave me a 14 m kite another student had bought, and I rode my first metres on water. Thanks to snowkiting I was riding tens of metres straight away. I made mistakes, but I was riding.

On the drive home I sat in the back of Iveta's van and said: "Iveta, this is how I want to live." "You can," she said. "Learn it and you can teach at our school." That's how I became an instructor. I grew with the school, taught at Wiek on Rügen and spent May to September in a caravan, working on SEO and web projects between lessons. That was me living my dream.

Where I ride now

I don't teach any more: there's a lot of work and I can't do both. I keep going back to the kite safari in the Red Sea. I'd love to put a group together for every trip and go together.

In spring 2024 there were eight beginners on board with us: the first day looked hard, and by the middle of the second everyone was riding.

At home in Czechia I ride on lakes, in winter I snowkite in the Ore Mountains at Moldava and Nakléřov, and on land I ride a kite buggy. For wind I travel to the Baltic at Wiek on Rügen, to Bärwalder See in Lusatia, to Neusiedler See in Austria, to Sicily and to Hurghada. I fly Harlem kites (Thrive, Peak, Force) and Kitech foil kites (FreeRS 1 and 2, Magus), and on land Flysurfer Peak in 4 to 8 m² and 11 m².

Why this site

I carried the idea of this site around for a long time. I want new kiters to find everything in one place: safety, what to watch out for, an overview of spots and a gear guide that isn't an advert for one brand.

On the spots I see what happens without it. Someone buys a crazy second-hand kite without knowing what they actually need. They do a two- or three-day course and think they can ride. A year later they turn up with that kite and are a danger to themselves and everyone around them. Kites end up in trees, on rocks or on parked cars. Courses today are often rushed, and neither I nor Mirek nor Honza like it.

You can start in an ordinary way, with very little. I started in a field with a second-hand kite. It just has to be done safely.

I'm not a big-name kiter. I can't do huge jumps or tricks. What I can do is build good projects and point you to the right people.

What I love about my work

I'm an SEO consultant and have worked in SEO since 2012. What I enjoy most is working with AI, marketing and building my own projects, and this site is one of them. It's built on data you can check: wind statistics, airports and maps from OpenStreetMap. And I love local AI, language models that run on my own hardware rather than in someone else's cloud.

Who I'd like on board

A group we get on with off the water too. People who have something to share and like to learn something too. On Rügen or on the boat in Egypt I want us to dream things up and build them together after a session, and especially when there's no wind. If you work with AI, in marketing or on your own projects, I'll be happy to swap notes on what works for whom. If that sounds like you, write to me: I'm putting a group together for the next safari.

What you'll find here

The kite safari in Egypt with dates, prices and what is and isn't included.
A map of kite spots with wind across the year and the nearest airports.
A kite size calculator.
Guides on gear, learning and kite destinations.

How I write

Every number has a source, listed under the guide.
Island descriptions, prices and dates of the safari come from the organiser, Paradise Kitesurf Red Sea, and the page says so.