Downwinders have been popular for many years. What about "round-winders" or rountrip runs? I headed out today with a side onshore wind, from the SE. We are still being influenced by Hurricane Katrina off to the west hence the larger than normal gust range. The waves were about 3 to 4 ft. with 6 foot waves in the odd breaker zone.
It wasn't that hard to move upwind with tacking and it had been quite a while since I had been south down the coast so I had at it. It worked out pretty well with heading a 1/4 to 1/2 mile upwind followed by a sizzor tack offshore about the same distance.
The overall distance was about 9.5 miles combined with tacks and the return trip I would guess the overall distance to be about 25 to 28 miles. The trip upwind took about two and a quarter hours with all the tacking and beating upwind. I stopped off at kitebeach in Pompano, said hi to the guys then relaunched and headed out. I ran downwind for the trip back ripping fast pretty much downwind by sinusoiding the kite. The return took only 25 minutes!