bay at the bay

simple pleasures

For all the obsessing about wave buoys and windspeeds, weather charts and sandbars, for all the agonising over dimensions on your next board, for all the stressing over how long it is since you last surfed, the rushing to create a precious slot to make it to the beach, for all that surfing is and isn't................

it pales in comparison to the simple joys of time with those you love, there can never be enough of that.

my faith in human nature restored!

Big public thanks to "buttons" for picking up the aforementioned lost mandala and getting in touch with it's very very grateful owner to return it. A pleasantly suprising and happy outcome to what i had very much assumed was a sorry tale!

The pic, by the way, is of our newly restored 73 bay making her maiden voyage to Putsborough. Apparently it's too nice for me to put sandy wetsuits and boards in so the trusty rusty T4 is staying as a mobile board store for now!

Velo sim stoke!

Huge, massive thank you's to Tim Mason who battled the traffic to drop off this beauty today. 5'8 Point Concept Velo sim designed by Ryan Lovelace and shaped in the UK by Tim. It's mini simmons-esque but way more foiled than the Baugess caspers with a hull entry into a single concave through the ply fins.

First impressions from a brief session in sort of surfable chest high junk were really fun. It feels very much like a hull crossed with a fish, smoother and more laterally fast than a keel but more user friendly than a hull. I think it's going to go really well in a much wider range of conditions than the hull but still have that feeling of super fast trim.

Proper report when i have a few more sessions under my belt

footprints

This is from the first roll out of the diana toy camera i was given for my birthday (thank you mr Gardner!). Typically mixed results, personally i think this shot was the pick of the bunch. Weirdly, in exact opposite to the holga, the view finder shows far more than the shutter sees and that scuppered a fair number of the shots on the roll. Nevermind, at least i know that now and on the plus side they were all pretty well exposed.

I sit typing this a while before it's going to appear, still buzzing from a super fun surf at sunset p-land. Mostly friends in the water, strong offshores and a swell building with the tide added up to very fast, fairly hollow zippers. When i got there, it was most definately log size and i rode the dano from the post below. I had a feeling it would like the wave there and i was right. Cutting back it felt far more alive and the speed and hold in the pocket on the nose was incredible. I had one especially memorable head dip cheater five where i was certain the tail would break out and it never did. It's a really fun board and my opinion of it gets better each session!

As the tide pushed up so did the size, as is often the case at p-land. It started to get a little too exciting on such a big board with no leash so i broke out the hull and rediscovered the joys of forward trim again, and burnt a lot of brownie points as a result. Still you have to make the most of these long evenings, all too soon the nights will start to draw in, slowly but inexorably......

sunset special

I'm not going to lie and say it was epic. Too high, small, one turn and your done p-land. But the sunset was beautiful and it was just what the doctor ordered tonight.

p-land

Like many other locals, i've had a bit of a love/hate relationship with this spot over the years, lately i find myself ending up here more and more. It's the site of my first proper surf beating after an ill judged decision to paddle out during my first year surfing and it's one of those spots where it often seems to look better from the carpark than it is or better 50 yards down the beach until you paddle there and decide it looks better where you just came from. I, like many others, have had some frustrating trips here.

I'm not sure if i'm just better at sitting in the right spot now but over the last two years i've had some epic waves here and it definately has it's charms. It can be a good noseriding wave when it's small, a fun wave on a shortboard when it's bigger and a godsend when the wind swings southerley. It's definately underated. Interestingly, unlike the other local spots, it doesn't really have it's own locals, it's more of a melting pot of refugees from the other breaks when the wind dictates, which is kind of refreshing.

all washed up

Free your ankles!

wading out

WOW!

So a little update on my continuing hull experiences. As i type we've been a little starved for decent waves (though hopefully that will change this week) but there have been odd little semi clean sessions. I've been surfing the hull a fair amount and had what can only be described as a pretty shocking wave on it on my last outing. Paddled into a chest high right which stood up as it hit the inside bank. I dropped down the face with a fair bit of speed as the wave prepared to section a good fifteen feet ahead, i crouched, banked over on my inside rail and a split second later i was past the section, trimming in a high line at what felt like mach ten. Felt like a true glimpse of the speed hulls are known for. In fact someone dropped in on me, past the section (i'm hoping because he assumed i wouldn't make it round, not just because he was a kook!) I had so much speed i actually overtook him on my next bottom turn before kicking out as the wave prepared to close out.

I paddled back out hooting myself and sat for a good few seconds slightly bemused by what just happened. As i've said before, they aren't for everyone, they are quirky to ride and probably more about the individual experience than impressing passers by with your radness, but they sure are fun and i don't think i've experienced as much speed with as little effort on a wave that size before!

anyone remember summer?

Maybe it's my rose tinted specs but i'm sure a few years ago summer was filled with balmy light evenings, the beaches graced with small clean logging waves and the world's cares were far from the minds of the locals as we traded waves & smiles. I'm probably just getting old but the last few summers seem to have been woefully lacking in perfect summer swells, the crowds seem bigger. I started this summer full of optimism as usual and May didn't really disappoint but July and August have seemed like midwinter in parts. I remember a few sessions at P-land battling horizontal rain which made the beach look more like January. Already there's a nip in the air in the mornings and the light is fading faster in the evenings. Our best hope is for another good september filled with light winds and deep lows pitched in the mid atlantic. There's always hope...

early bird..

Often a bit of sleep deprivation can end up being a good thing as far as beating the crowds and wind go. We definately reaped the rewards on this morning.

wave come....