Kneeboarding competitors get to grips with Taranaki
THE world's hottest kneeboard surfers took to Taranaki's waves yesterday at the start of their quest to find the best.Surfing New Zealand executive officer Greg Townsend is pleased with the field of 80 international and 40 New Zealand boardriders who have travelled to Taranaki for the 10-day World Kneeboard Surfing Championships, which officially get underway today.
My story...
There was this Guy who went to my church that married a girl from New Zealand. Every April he took his wife and kids to Wellington for a month. That way she could have long visits with her parents.
"I surf all over the island every time I go." Guy would say to me at church. "If you ever want to surf New Zealand you should come out." He offered.
I took him up on it.
In April I flew all by myself into Wellington for a 10 day "surf" trip. When Guy and his in-laws, whom I'd never met, pulled up to the airport, they found me puking in the trashcan outside. Like a dumb-ass I drank wine on the long flight to Auckland. At that time I didn't drink much of anything and wine was headache-in-a-bottle, but hey, everything is free on international flights so, it's foolish to refuse, right!?! The shame was, that on the flight from Auckland to Wellington, I could have had a delightful conversation with one heck of a good-looking flight attendant with a charming accent. But instead, my drunk ass tried to sleep so I wouldn't have to ask the model-hot steward for a barf-bag.
The first couple of days Guy and I checked the surf at Lyall Bay only to find nothing over 3 feet. It didn't take long to notice that Guy really didn't surf like he said he did. He had a hundred reasons not to go look for surf. I came to think of him as a poser. His wife noticed my frustration at the way things were going and she suggested we take a two day trip up the North Island and surf the Tasman Sea. Guy hesitantly agreed to the trip and we loaded up the car...family and all.
Taranaki...
We arrived at Oakura Beach the day after the kneeboarding contest. After Guy's family settled into the rental place, Guy and I went to check out Stent Road. The waves were 8 to 10 feet and the winds calm. There were two guys out. Without hesitation I pulled out my wetsuit. Guy hesitated.
"Don't you want to paddle out?" I asked Guy.
"Naw. It's not that good."
"What!?! It's perfect!!!" I grab my kneeboard and flippers.
"The tide is too high." Guy said. "I'll just stay up here while you surf."
"Really? You're just going to sit here." The truth was, I wasn't really surprised at his decision.
Consequently, I had to figure out how to get to the break all by myself. That pissed me off.
The waves were fantastic. Long cut-back rights with a nice set-up for a tubed finale. It reminded me of K38. The other two guys out were locals and wanted to chat about Huntington Beach and Cape Hatteras. They were very nice and gave me any wave I wanted. The problem was, the whole time I was out all I could think about was Guy alone up on the hill. It put a damper on things. When I came in after two hours he commented, "You were out for a very long time."
"I surfed your hour for you." I told him.
He didn't even take pictures with his expensive camera.
Waikato...
The next day we all drove up to surf Raglan. Again the waves were a spectacular 8 to 10 feet and Guy didn't want to paddle out. I sat with him while he gave me every excuse in the book (and some he invented) for why it wasn't good enough. As he whined, I watched how people were getting out into the line up at Manu. Indicators was far to crowded and Whale wasn't as good as Manu. Once I figured it out I told Guy, "I'm paddling out," and I put on my wetsuit. I think he got embarrassed because he decided to paddle out with me.
After jumping in I got hammered within 30 seconds and bumped into the rocks. But I kept focused and stepped it up. Before I knew it I was right in the lineup and good to go. Guy had made it out too. My first left was a little shaky because there were people to dodge, but, once acclimated I was having a blast. Guy stayed out with me the whole time. He never took a wave.
New Zealand landscape is breath-taking, and, I liked very much all the little places we stopped at to eat and chat with the locals. But, the drive back to Wellington was full of surf-checks and grumbling. I wanted to paddle out and Guy wanted to get home. The rest of Guy's family didn't care wether we stopped or not to surf, so, in my book Guy was the surf-pooper.
My last days in NZ were spent surfing Lyall Bay and chatting about Rugby. The waves had picked up a little and were crowded, but fun. It was nothing like Stent Rd. though! Guy paddled out with me in Wellington and I finally saw him stand up...and fall. I never saw a kneeboarder.
But in 2003, totally serendipitously, I saw a girl kneeboarding in front of my house at Kure Beach. She was from Christchurch and had family that owned a condo across the street from me. We surfed up and down Pleasure Island, and I took her to Wrightsville Beach to surf. In turn she let Mark make templates of of her two kneeboards. I hadn't seen many kneeboarders over the years so it was hard talking progress with anyone. Her boards were new and refined. For one, her fin placements were higher up and her wide spot was further back. I liked the looseness of that combo. To date I ride a 5'2" and a 5'7" that Mark shaped using her boards as models.
A Floyd wave
On Sept. 15th Hurricane Floyd hit us. After surfing Topsail Beach Mark and I packed up the hurricane camping gear and, once again, spent the night at Hot Wax Surf Shop. Fortunately we were able to get on Pleasure Island faster than we did after Bonnie, and, we caught some of Floyd's big waves with a strong off-shore wind. However the ocean was extremely polluted due to the flooding and river runoffs created by Floyd's massive rains. For days the Atlantic was burgundy red and smelled like gas. Floating debris passed by continually. At one point I had to dodge a wooden corner of a small building that drifted by while I was riding a wave at the Cove.
The news told surfers to get vaccinated because during Floyd's heavy rains, pig farms leaked all their poo into the rivers, rivers that that ran into the ocean. Animals that had drowned were also floating down stream. It was really gross, but, the waves were far too good to ignore. Mark and I got vaccinated.
Fiji
In October Mark and I made another trip to Tavarua. When I was there last I had appreciated getting out of Fiji without a major injury. I began believing that going back to surf it's big monsters was pushing my luck. Personally I wanted to start traveling Central America because it was less expensive and had isolated point breaks just waiting for exploration, but, Mark had balls for big surf, so, we headed for Cloudbreak once again. By now Tavarua had expanded their visitors list and were in the process of re-modeling. More people were allowed on the island and hence, more people were out in the line-up. This made the two main breaks on Tavarua crowed and dangerous. Even the boat-men had stopped calling non-Tavarua visitors out of Cloudbreak's lineup. This added to the frustration and fear I had of busting my butt on a late take-off.  The waves didn't get very big this year however, and I found lots of ways to entertain myself...  Snorkeling Cloudbreak By the end of the two week trip I was pleased that, once again, I could leave without a major injury. This was the year I hit the bottom of Restaurants and scraped a good gash in my leg but, that's nothing compared to what can happen. I asked Mark if we could go somewhere else next year. I didn't want to push my luck anymore. The big perfect waves were to continue however... ...good thing I was an avid yoga doer and cardiovascular weightlifter. |
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