Travel

Spacious beaches, excellent winds, and shallow waters bring droves of kitesurfers—including world champions—to El Gouna. Kitesurfing aficionados were quick to recognize El Gouna’s enormous potential for the adventure sport due to its accessibility, spacious beachfronts, excellent winds, and shallow waters suited to learning moves.

The main kitesurfing spot is called Mangroovy Beach at the north end of El Gouna. This is a public beach offering access for residents and non-residents alike and is a huge area extending for over 500m to the offshore reef. There is a choice of kitesurf centres all with their ‘own’ kitezones for teaching. The beach is wide with plenty of space for learning to launch and land kites. The whole area is ideal for beginners which is a protected, shallow flat water area. Mangroovy Beach is sociable atmosphere with all the kitecentres and small bars set up along the beach, where you can watch the action yet offers enough space for everyone.

As for the wind, it blows almost always side-onshore from left, in a north-north-westerly direction. It comes directly and unturbulenced from the Red Sea, not slashed by any barriers on its way, so it’s quite steady. A microclimate of the area in fact allows much stronger winds than shown on forecasts, and a “modified wind” feels rather like “gusts” at the spot.

During the winter months (December to February) the wind is not as constant as in the other months of the year though, meaning there are more days with gusty winds, but some are totally flat. And winds usually get freezing, so wetsuite is highly advisable.