Our last European event was in Amsterdam and oh man oh man,
what an ending to a truly great summer. Live Love SUP put on four AMAZING
events and sponsored two other races in the US, UK, Switzerland and now, the
Netherlands.
Our Live Love SUP Brand Ambassador Morene Dekker organized
this event to perfection. With the help from her brand of Boga Boards, as well as Fanatic
and F-One, it seemed that almost every SUP in the city of Amsterdam was on the
water!!! Over 75 SUPs going through the Amsterdam Canals on a Friday night and
it was extra special to share it with Vintage Apple Photography (Nick’s
sister!). For tons more photos, click here and like Vintage Apple Photography on Facebook!
The weather forecast was for grey skies and a high chance of
rain but that was not the case leading up to the event. Blue skies and a thin
cloud cover was present for most of the day but then an hour before the wind
picked up and the clouds rolled in. This didn’t deter many people, if any, and
we were all on the water by 6.30pm ready for a two-hour paddle. It was amazing
as apart from the rentals from MM-SUP (Boga), SUP Spirit and the Fanatic and
F-One distributors, people brought their boards in any way they could. On cars,
on boats and even on their backs from the train stations.
We fundraised again for charity: water and the giving of the
rental peeps was so generous as they gave half of their rental fees to charity:
water. This kind of generosity shouldn’t go unnoticed so thank you very much!
In return, Live Love SUP gave those renters a wristband to say thank you for
their donation. Browsing through the photos you’ll see a large number of them!
The canals were great and we stopped traffic everywhere we
went. Boats stopped to let our long SUP train through and people on bikes,
bridges and boats couldn’t take enough photos! At one point we stopped for some
Bos Ice Teas and drew a massive crowd. Yes, that’s right. We even had a Bos Ice
Tea boat on the water following us and giving out free ice teas to all
paddlers. The tea was awesome too!!
Whilst we got rained on a little, we all had an amazing
journey on the water together. Jen and Nick got to meet so many paddlers and
hear their stories of stoke. A special mention must go to @hesteroz who was
one of our first followers on Twitter. We got to meet and paddle with her
finally! Pictured here at the front, black shirt and red fanatic board.
Our HUGE thanks to Morene (and Hans for being the silent organizer
of the paddle permits) for organizing all the board companies and boats to
follow us. She was one of our first Brand Ambassadors and she did us proud. The
fantastic photos were mostly shot by Vintage Apple Photography but thanks to
Hans and Hester for additional photography.
