Tramontana wind

It gets its name from the Latin word transmontanus-i, which means “beyond the mountains”, and it is a wind that comes from the north or northwest and is characterized by its low temperatures . Thanks to the Spanish orography, the areas where it occurs most profusely are the Balearic Islands and Catalonia.

Through the Pyrenees and the southwest area of the French Massif Central, the wind picks up speed and occurs in these areas with gusts of up to 200 kilometers per hour. Its duration can be up to several days. One of the most obvious visual characteristics when this wind is produced is that the sky presents an intense blue color.

The importance of the wind is such that in some regions, the name is used to designate some geographical accidents, in this way we find the Sierra de Tramontana in Mallorca and the use of the word “tramontana” to designate the area north of the island of Cres or Cherso in Croatia.

As we have previously commented, due to this wind, names have been introduced into geographical accidents and there are clear differences between inhabitants of the same region in which it affects differently. However, the day-to-day importance of this phenomenon is such that many literary authors or artists have dedicated poems, pages, paintings or other artistic elements to it.

Thus, Josep Pla or Salvador Dalí included the tramontana wind in numerous works and paintings, the poet from Ampurdán, a Catalan region, Carles Fages de Climent wrote the Oración al Cristo de la Tramontana, and the writer Gabriel García Márquez, mentioned the tramontana wind as one of the eight winds in his work Twelve Pilgrim Tales. Thanks to all of them we can find great definitions about the tramontana wind and its influence on the societies of the area.

The north wind is a north wind that brings cold winds and does so with strong gusts of wind. Due to these conditions, the wind causes the sky to be clear, with hardly any clouds, to blow off-shore, thereby flattening the sea and reducing the number of large waves when we We are in the North of Spain or in the South of France.

As we descend along the Catalan coast and move away from the French coast, the wind loses some strength and tends to be more sideways, which often causes more unfavorable conditions for beginners but very stimulating for those who already they have good control of the board, kite and sail thanks to the strong wind and good waves.

Towards the other side, the east coast of the French region, the conditions are changing and arriving in the city of Marseille the most predominant wind is the Mistral.

To make the most of conditions with strong winds and low waves, it is best to have a small sail and a small board, within the logical parameters for our characteristics to choose a board.

In this way, we will have an adequate impulse thanks to the strong wind and we will be able to handle our sail and our board in an agile and fast way to counteract that speed and perform tricks more adequately.

In the case of the kite, the conditions will be similar, since with a smaller kite we will be able to have greater control of the tramontana wind that occurs discontinuously and with great force. In the case of going out with a larger kite, it will pick up all the force and momentum of the wind, which will make it more difficult to handle and once we are in the air, landing control will be much more complicated.