The Making of
PROJECT:
CLOUD 9 A Snowkite Documentary
WORDS: Patrick Nedele PHOTOS: Charles Braden The idea of the “Project” formed because we wanted to explore the best snowkiting destinations in the US and film the action for the third snowkiting DVD by Paul “Motz” Macaj, aka Fuze Productions. I bought a Toyota 4WD RV from eBay and named it Clark (after Clark Griswald from the movie, National Lampoon’s: Vacation). Motz and his filming partner Charles Braden jumped in and we were later joined by Guillaume “Chasta” Chastagnol who flew in from France for our month-long adventure. Driving through snowstorms with white knuckles and bloodshot eyes to reach each destination was par for course. We had no idea if we would get lost, stuck or frozen like popsicles inside the camper— but we were willing to take the risk. The trip took us through the most blizzards we’ve ever seen on the plains east of Denver, Colorado, the Snowkite Rodeo event in Montana, 4-feet of snow in Hill City, Idaho, snow-covered sand dunes in St. Anthony, Idaho, the Ozone Snowkite Masters event at Skyline, Utah, warm spring conditions at Lake Dillon, Colorado and extreme backcountry sessions out my back door on the Continental Divide in Winter Park, Colorado. We got to kite the some of the best terrain, with some of the best possible conditions, and met some awesome people. We were on Cloud 9!
The Colorado Blizzard December delivered three major blizzards in a row to the eastern plains of Colorado. It covered most of the sage brush and cactus so we could kite anywhere for the first time since we began snowkiting years ago. We had been asked to leave some private property and ended up finding a 3,000 acre ranch that was legit to ride. We rode close to the road for a day before finding this cliff. We jumped over a barbed wire fence to get to the cliff, which was probably the sketchiest thing we’ve ever done. Unfortunately I looped my kite into a Yucca plant and popped it. I had to post-hole for about two miles to get back to the road.
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Clark Takes Us On An Amazing Vacation” I bought this sweet Toyota camper and borrowed a trailer from Windzup. Motz had a pop-up named Cousin Eddie, like the guy from National Lampoon’s Vacation. So I named mine Clark.In this shot, we had just washed Clark at the Mt. Pleasant car wash. We were putting an Ozone sticker on the side. They were our only sponsor for the Project. The brakes went out on the way down the canyon from Skyline the day before so we took it to the place behind. Maybe if we had gotten more sponsors, the brakes would have lasted, because they never worked well again.