MAUI ON A BUDGET

Setting himself a ridiculously low budget of £700 all in, to cover all costs door-to-door, we hear about JC's mission to fly to Maui to watch the PWA/IWT Wave finals at the Aloha Classic.

- John Carter, Sarah-Quita Offringa Antoine Martin

FOMO

It has been about four years since I last visited Hawaii, which feels really strange after spending so much time there prior to COVID. With the PWA & IWT Tours joining forces this season, it meant that as a photographer, I was only employed for the PWA-run events, so I wasn't on the crew to go to Maui, even so, I still wanted to go to see how the title race panned out, as well as just to catch up with old friends. I made the decision to wait until the last minute and if it looked half decent, I would try and make it to Maui on an ultra-low budget. When I say low budget, I was looking to spend the absolute minimum possible to cover flights, travel to the airport, car hire, accommodation, food, and of course a few icy colds. I set myself a target of £700, which some of you may think is impossible, but making the trip as cheap as possible was the only way I could justify going. Maybe I could also pick up a bit of work along the way, who knows, but I just had it set in my mind that I would regret it if I missed out. Don't they call that Fear of Missing Out (FOMO).

The event was set to run over a ten-day holding period, with a maximum of five days of action, due to permits. When the event kicked off, the forecast looked pretty dire, and despite one day of Kona winds, it looked like all the action would be in the latter half of the event. Although it didn't look epic, most riders and crew were pretty sure there would be enough wind and waves to run the contest. I was personally in contact with Kai Katchadourian, who is a bit of a guru when it comes to monitoring forecasts, finally, I received the message I had been waiting for, which made me pull the trigger: "Wheels up, looks like improvement in the long-term. Maui will deliver!" So, with the green light from Kai on October 27th, I started checking flights and hire cars to see how much this was going to cost me.

WHEELS UP