cruisers

factory effluent

Just around the corner from the american road (so named as it's a remnant of WW2 military excercises) i sits this sign. It reads "Factory Effluent" and sat in the middle of a lush green vista, it's incongruity with it's surroundings made me pause for thought.

The shot, sadly, is a typical holga near miss, in my minds eye, the sign was a lot more legible! It's certainly not my best photo but if this truly rubbish run of "summer" conditions continues i am actually going to run out of photo's to post!

 It's on the way back from a short mountain bike loop that BGA took me on. I'm sure he took some sort of satisfaction form watching me hyper ventilate up the hills but the rush of bumpy downhill single-track is worth it and a new pleasure i've been introduced to recently.

Meanwhile the ocean went from flat to howling onshore mess and as i type looks like it's heading back to flat again, while i heroically fought some kind of stomach bug from under the duvet. I hate being ill - i'm really bad at sitting still!

 I did watch Steve Cleveland's new movie "Paradigm Shift" which runs along similar lines to his previous films. It's got some great surfing in it and some clever editing. Jai Lee and Dane Peterson probably have the best parts but Knost, Warren and all the other usual suspects are all present and ripping.

It didn't totally blow me away although that might be because i've hardly surfed at all myself recently and my stoke is at a low ebb. I think maybe watching it made me sad i'm not about to hop on a plane to california this year rather than get me excited about going surfing later as it usually would, which isn't Steve Clevelands fault!
 It might also be because the progression in logging seems to have slowed a little - there's no new noseriding trick that i hadn't seen before, nothing really made me stop and rewind. The level of noseriding is now so high it's inevitable it will plateau a bit before the next climb.
I certainly can't put my finger on anything that's wrong with the film, so ignore me and buy it, you'll love it and i'm sure i will once the flat spell is over!

Jack Coleman's "Polyester" is worth a watch too especially if you're an Alex Knost fan. Be warned it is SUPER arty, all scratched painty super 8, weird angles and a velvet underground type soundtrack. It's reminiscent of early Volcom films and definately in the "art piece" category but a good diversion for half an hour and i really like it.

 There's (pleeeeeeese!!!) a small chance of a loggable wave at this end of the week. If there's anything at all in the way of tiny clean waves i'm breaking the sup or a belly board out, i NEED some kind of sideways sliding action and at this stage i'm really not being choosy!

petro cruising

rolling in SB

Beach cruisers on the boardwalk are a classic californian stereotype in the world at large but the reality is that they are ridden by huge numbers of locals completely without irony. As i've blogged before, cruisers are fun to ride (on the flat) and a sunny beach side path is just about the best place to ride one.

This is a schwinn that i rented in Santa Barbara, a company that have been making these bikes for a long time. Not quite as nice to ride as my electra but a couple of hours cruising the coast path  in SB on this one was one of my favourite parts of the trip.

a couple of randoms...

A couple more shots from the scenic cycle route to our local beach. I'm sure it's pretty obvious that i'm heavily influenced by all things californian and i love everything i've seen of the coast there so far.  One thing they don't have in abundance is lush green rolling countryside, far from busy roads, hiding small coves and rocky bays, some with great waves. I'm really hoping our Californian friends make it over next year so we can show the place off. I think they will love it, narrow lanes, tractor caused traffic jams and all!

 

the american road.....

 

 Well just around the corner from it anyway, near a fun but exceedingly fickle spot that i haven't surfed in a few years.

Despite the sunshine, this was a cold morning, so cold that my fingers barely worked to manipulate the camera. The bike, if you missed the previous shots, is my beloved electra deluxe 3i cruiser. Guarunteed to bring a bigger and bigger smile with each revoloution of the pedals.

Whenever i have to endure a long spell without a dip in the local brine, my dvd library gets a fair bit of attention. I'm a great collector of surf films and have spent probably far too much money over the years devouring the latest logging related releases.

Pick of the latest crop, for me anyway, are:

Rip Shred Tear from Mitch Abshere and crew, full on skinny jean, cutting edge logging and really inspirational. It's no frills and the surfing is cut with random excerpts from 50's b-movie horror films. Shot over just a couple of weeks it makes you realise how consistently good the surf is in the OC from a longboarding perspective.

Stoked and Broke from Cyrus Sutton which is just plain fun and reminds me a lot of "bikecar" the travis parker snowboard film from a few years back. It chronicles a no frills trip around the encinitas area by foot. It has it's tongue firmly in it's cheek but there's some good surfing in it. Logs, fishes, guns, handplanes and square styrofoam blocks!

Final choice is 180 degrees south from Chris Malloy which is big budget and not a full on surf film but has some great surfing and climbing footage in it as well as some quality scenic cinematography. The strong enviro message may be a small turn off  and it could be considered a moving patagonia catalogue by some but it's a good film nonetheless. There's a really cool book of photos by Jeff Johnson that goes with it that i would highly reccomend too!

give me back my teddies!

Really happy to have my pictures featured on quality peoples. a couple of weeks ago

cruising in devon lanes

Electra deluxe 3i, sunshine, devon lanes, a few curious sheep, what more could you need? The nice people at electra just featured one of my photos as their pic of the week on their blog. Very nice to be asked. See the post here.

If you're wondering, she did give the teddies back in the end!

cruiser

Possibly the most impractical bike to own given how hilly it is around these parts but guaranteed to put a smile on my face with each turn of the pedals!