Hi all, so Victoria has been pretty shite for waves over June/July but the last 2 weeks has made up for it with consistent swell patterns & N/NW winds. Of course right before the first swell hit I decided to travel 2000 kms up the coast to Byron where there was bugger all surf! Always the way! On my return to Victoria I was greeted by a grumpy old tradie, on the bus back from the airport, who saw my boards & chimed in with "it's too cold to surf down here mate!"" Oh well, just get out there"! That's what I say! When the waves are good, it doesn't matter how cold it is!
Yesterday, looked perfect for the Bells area with 4ft of swell predicted with a late pulse in size & N/NW winds, lucky i'm unemployed at the moment!
I drove straight to Winkipop which had 30 people on it & looked good, the swell was really straight! I walked over to check Bells & the tide was pushing in so the Bowl wasn't doing it, but Rincon looked ok with only 2 guys on it! It looked extremely well suited to my Larry Mabile quad Fish actually, so I drove down to the main Bells carpark. As I open the boot to pull the fish out, I here, "Hey mate", I turn around and a fellow waterperson says to me "You know there's a shark out there right?, that's why there's no one out there"!.. Makes Sense! I thought to myself, "yeah right, you just want the lineup to yourself you greedy old bastard", then I got to thinking, "wait a minute what if there is a shark out there & what if I paddle out knowing full well Mr. White Pointer is lurking in the shallows.... & what if, what if I was made a meal of....then that guy in the carpark wouldv'e never have got the opportunity to say "I told you so"! My paranoia & the stories of shark sitings & bitings emanating from some old crew in the carpark, got the better of me & I got back in the car & drove off. I peeped the grin on my saviours face as I left, I'll never know the truth!
Anyway, on my drive back towards Torquay, I thought "I'm not going to let these fishy,sharky stories bother me & I headed to Bird Rock at Jun Juc, a heavily localised righthander, that tunnels down about 100 m of reef, where you can score the shack of a lifetime on its day!
The tide was getting fuller & Birdy looked sick from the carpark with only 3 guys on it, I suited up & grabbed my 6'4 Josh Dowling shape & I was out there with the shark paranoia well faded. As I paddled out I noticed afew other kids with the same idea as me, so this made 7 in the lineup! Within 15 mins there woulda been double that & the take off zone is so small at Birdy that it can get really hassly with 15 crew on it. I pipped 2 smaller ones on the inside for starters & I hadn't surfed the Dowling board for a while so I needed to re-adjust to it. It felt good, so I started paddling deeper & paddled into a set wave, I didn't have the paddling strength on this one & I free fell out of the lip, exploded with the wave & got dragged down the reef about 50 metres, then copped two more of that set on the head....fun! I paddled back out & got another good 1 & thought i'd call it a session, but then it started to really fire & guys started getting barrelled of their tits! I dropped into afew solid ones & got caught behind the curtain, but then got one where I stalled it off my bottom turn & set up for it & got shacked for like 5 seconds....I was stoked!
All in all it was a perfect West Coast Vicco day & i'm glad I didn't let my paranoia get the better of me!
Oh yeah & please check out my friends board company http://www.joshdowlingshape.com,
he has some sick hybrid shapes & is doing some pretty interesting stuff with different woods & stuff. Buy a board from Josh Dowling!!!....not a shaper who doesn't shape & just signs cheques!
Peace,
Gustaverson.
1 comment:
Shark week on Discovery channel too.
Showed and told about some wake boarder getting towed
then bit in Freakin HALF.
Post a Comment