Our interest in windsurfing started in 1978 when we saw some while we were on holiday in Crete. The following year in September, we went on a sailing holiday in Fornells, Minorca with the intention of selecting a sailing dinghy that we could share.
We sailed various dinghies without any conclusion but found we could have windsurfing lessons. After an afternoon of instruction and practice, we forgot about dinghy sailing and planned to buy our first windsurfer on our return to England.
We bought a Sailboard Delta with two sails. Very soon after we also bought a 'storm' sail; ie a sail of 4.5 sq m. By the following year, we had another board and more sails, all basic triangles. The larger sails had short battens in the leech, these and other features were modelled on dinghy sails. The largest sail was 6.5 sq m and required a boom of 2.6m because the mast length was only 4.5m.
We soon noticed the chill in the water in England so wet suit construction was the next step. I had made a wet suit in the sixties for SCUBA diving. At that time, the foam neoprene was not lined and putting a suit on involved large amounts of French chalk. By 1979, lined neoprene was easily available but it lacked the suppleness of later materials. The result was a wet suit with 'fits-where-it-touches' properties. These suits were really wet, every fall resulted in blasts of cold water and swimming pumped water through the suit.
The number of local windsurfers slowly increased and the Colne Valley Boardsailing Club was formed.