only sheep bear witness

windswept seclusion = joyful memory

coastal cruising no.2

Happy New Year one and all, yes i know it's slightly premature but reading blogs will doubtless be low on all your list of post celebration things to do tomorrow morning so i'm getting in early!

The last couple of years i've listed my top three "funnest"  boards of the year at this point but 2011 has been a year of transition in my quiver with a bit of a clearout followed by some new acquisitions so i thought i'd list them all as they stand right now, when i'm happy with all of them and not bored of anything enough to sell right now!


So here goes:


5'2 Tyler Warren for Hobie Bar of Soap.
5'6 Gulfstream twin keel fish.
5'6 Jeff McCallum Mford
5'8 Larry Mabile classic keel fish
6'10 Spence by Tim Mason displacement hull
9'4 Bing NR-2
9'4 Gulfstream CP model diamond tail saunton foil or "old faithful!"
9'4 Squire Dirk of doom (gato death dagger inspired pointy log!)
9'5 Dano Old Pleasure
9'6 Classic Malibu Jai Lee 1 model

If i'm honest, it's the bar of soap and the mford that i'm most excited about surfing at the moment, both different branches of the simmons inspired tree, both blazing fast and loose, both great on our frequent average days as well as the good ones. Of course ask me in a couple of months and i'll probably give you a different answer!

Incidentally, the photo is topanga in case you were wondering!

coastal cruising no.1

 

carp 

 

les dunes

flathead

 

black rock

Relaxing in North Cornwall on a warm summers day, remember those? Incidentally here's a random question, are we the only country around that has windbreaks? The americans don't. In all probability people in countries with proper warmth dont bother to go to the beach on a day that's windy enough to need one!

where the streets have no name...

well they do......... it's just in french!

wood is good

a minor disaster...

So in my minds eye this was a cool little set up for a photo of a new addition to the quiver (it's a 5'6 Mccallum Mford just so you know!) All good until i dropped the camera about ten minutes later...... Much of the charm of taking pictures with toy camera's like the holga comes from there cheap build quality yielding quirky images. It also means they are very much basically cheap crap plastic!

So i dropped the camera, lunged for it, nearly grabbed it, watched in slow motion as it bounced off my outstretched hand onto the pavement, inwardly groaned as the back of the camera flew off exposing the nearly finished roll of 35mm to bright daylight...........in the words of the great homer simpson DOH!

Thankfully i only lost a couple of pictures, a few were unscathed and these two i sort of rescued in iphoto. All part of a fairly crappy week where my laptop died taking a load of files with it and i came within an ace of rolling my van but thats another story!

I'm going to write a proper report on the board when i've ridden it more but first impressions are that it's really fun, even in utter junk surf, up and planing early with a really shocking amount of lateral speed with a real positive on rails feel and without the slip slideyness of wider tailed simmons shapes. Oh and it looks beautiful, a real eye pleasing shape with a real organic tactile feel, much like a nice hull has........anyway......

hobie split

There are a lot of beautifully maintained hot rods and busses around california, a lot of occasions when i wasn't quick enough with a camera as they drove past. This beautiful splitty resides outside the main hobie store in Dana Point most of the time though so it's an easy target.

This weeks essential reading is "uncle Skello's what's hot and what's not" published every thursday on the Gulfstream blog. Everything you need to know to chart your way through the sartorial and cultural minefield that is staying cool,

Remember, support your local otter..... shaper, sorry!

ruby's

So Ruby's is a chain of classic american style diners that are scattered along the coast. They are based on the stereotype we all have.... red vinyl boothes, waitresses with 50's make up red gingham dresses and white pumps, malt shakes etc. This one in laguna has some period correct cars out front too. Sounds kinda cheesy doesn't it? But you know what, it's fun and they make superb burgers!

doho

Both trips to California, i've spent a fair amount of time surfing at Doheny, mostly because it's convenient for a quick session before family duties.  It's a measure of how many quality waves there are on this stretch of coast that a spot like this is relegated to also ran status. Yeah for sure it's not killer Dana and it is a bit mushy, the preserve of longboarders and the butt of surfer magazine jokes. The truth is that with some sunshine, a little south swell and a log it's a really fun wave with a mellow friendly local crew who are happy to share a few sets with a traveller.

If you own the extras disc for one california day, it's the wave where tyler warren is surfing his 11 footer., take a look and you'll see what i mean. I'd trade our average local conditions for consistent waves like that!

stuck in third?

sano samba

just one of the many beautifully looked after busses cruising round So Cal.

While you read this i'm hopefully sat in some french summer sunshine, eating good cheese with a baguette and red wine while glassy waves peel offshore...........or something like that!

refugio

What the Santa Barbara area might lack in year round swell, it more than makes up for in potential for fun when the swell does come. This is Refugio, yet another friendly right hander about 25 minutes north of town. Tiny but perfect fun!

z boy

Jake Z, part of the Almond crew, smooth logger, one of the nicest guys you could hope to meet and nearly as surf stoked as me eh Jake? :-)

going right

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.

trim kings....

One really cool thing about surfing in california is the amount of natural life in evidence all around you. Perhaps thats more true of the slightly less urban beaches but there are seals and dolphins swimming through the line up, kelp fronds grabbing your fin and smoothing out chop, lizards scurrying past you feet as you walk down the beach paths and of course the pelicans.

There's something really pleasing about watching a group of pelicans glide past, in formation like WW2 bombers on a mission. The way they glide with wingtips mere millimetres above the water surface, never touching, harnessing the updrafts along a walling wave before climbing high, folding their wings and dropping like an arrow into the water to bob up seconds later, nonchalent and still.

They make our honking seagulls seem yobbish and louche and i never once spotted one attacking a beachgoer for his sandwich!

the dirk of doom

 

Absolutely not a death dagger.........9'4 x 16 x 22.5 x 14.75 x 2 7/8 by the Squire

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, i ordered a surfboard from a wandering minstrel. I didn't get quite what i asked for. I'm not going to rehash the whole story here, the tale was posted previously and you can read it here. I felt somewhat let down and nervous of re-entering the kingdom of kegel again.

As luck would have it, the Squire who hosted the wanderer did feel that something should be done. After measuring the original in great detail he ordered his workers at seabase to shape a replacement, pulling the original template out to the dimensions i'd wanted but otherwise copying the original as far as possible.

The result is the beauty in the photos, which (apologies to john) don't come close to doing it justice. The tint is ace and the finish really out of the top drawer. It's flat, foiled out with soft pinched rails, a hint of concave, a tiny bit of tail kick and some gentle belly in the back. The fin is a slightly raked volan flexy affair, taken from the original gato board. The proof as they say, is in the eating and however good a board looks on the rack, it's in the water that it's true nature is exposed. This isn't supposed to be a noserider, more of a tool for what we might term the new involvement school of surfing, referencing the surfing of Chonoski  and Knost and friends, who in turn are influenced by Nat Young and friends of the magic sam vintage. Namely pocket noseriding with full rail commited turns in a traditional sense. (i know what i'm talking about even if that's confused you!) It's made for waves with good shape and a little pace but not necessarily size.

In the water, it paddles fine, as well as modern progressive longboard. Take off's are a little late compared to a true log but the lack of nose area helps avoid pearling despite the flat rocker. It trims fast and feels responsive and alive under your feet although it demands quick footwork. Bottom turns have a nice spring off the flex in the fin and cutbacks whip around with weight firmly over the fin. In short, a lot of fun and similar to the gato. Noseriding is obviously more of a critical affair with a 16 inch nose but with a steep pocket forming around you and quick feet the board will lock in nicely. In fact, in bowly little waves, the narrowness probably works in your favour making it feel much more manageable. It trims fast and holds really well on the nose through sections and cheating five while head dipping is particularly fun. It will allow a brief ten over though thats hardly the point of the excercise. It is exactly what i wanted and i feel somewhat vindicated that the dims and shape i originally envisaged do perform how i imagined and ultimately how i wanted. It's definately a departure from most of the longboards in the uk right now, not that easy to surf and most definately not everyone's cup of tea but......... For someone like me who rides longboards a lot but has no interest in the 3 finned variety, it's a really fun departure from the norm.

So there you have it, the best and the worst of the custom surfboard experience in one episode! Big thanks to John Isaac for sorting it out patiently and Phil Hodge for taking care with something out of the ordinary. If you're looking for a new board squire are worth considering. contact john here or here

As an aside, if you have read the comments on the previous post you will see that robbie did offer to swap the board for a used one of his or shape me another (at cost!) when he came back to europe this summer. Perhaps unsuprisingly he's already here (& perhaps gone who knows) but no contact to make good on the promise so far.