Blog envy

Lovers Land - Mikala from Riley Blakeway on Vimeo.


I'm easily led and impressionable. I have become somewhat qualitative of late I like to think.......I digress. I have not only blog envy but also surf trip envy.I have no right to complain, I have been heavily imbibing from the goblet that giveth life. But I wish I had been on this surf trip.

The Pumpkin's wedding day and cheeky ones.

The Pumkin's real marriage as in terms of registering it, took place before the ceremony as seen above. On the day in question the groom and I woke early left in plenty of time and surfed pretty shocking north coast.....who cares right, some days are more important than surfing...ney bother.

 On my way home to spruce up, still with plenty of time, I popped into the south coast cafe for a coffee and chocolate cake, to find that Perranuthanoe breaking top to bottom with mechanical precision, with no due regard to its status as a beach break of average stature. Torn......I phoned Leigh.

 Leigh "I'm on me way."

I was absolved instantly as far as I was concerned. If the groom isn't going to take it seriously, the whole wedding caper thing, then the least the unmarried males can do is play up too. I followed my role.

 Great waves were had, Perranutahnoe really cemented its status as "The Perran Pipe" that day.

 Of course, people came looking for us. 45 minutes from the "I do", Heidi arrived on the slip way, waving like crazy, still .....getting "one in" still managed to include "one for the road".

 Salt on the eyebrows, smiles on the faces, best way to approach marriage.....now they live in Colorado. No cheeky ones there.

 The moral of the story: Get cheeky ones in when you can, even though you think you can't. Because if your in a wheel chair now like Pino or in the Rockies now like Pumpkin.....you really can't.

Report/bitch from the field. Dave "Chav" Devey, on Sumatra.

The Ethics of Boat Charters




I have recently come back from a brief 14 day Indonesian trip. Its not my first, but the waves, the people and the whole Indonesian experience will always keep me going back. But surfing in Indo is becoming more and more popular, and it is becoming harder to find a quiet wave. It amazes me that you can travel for days over land and sea, and not see a western face, then as soon as you turn up at a break, maybe 10 hours from the nearest small town, and boom! There are 20 westerners in the water!

We were at a quiet break in south Sumatra. Maybe 7 losmen allow for people to stay and surf the break and those losemen are quickly increasing in number. (Up from 3 last year). The lineup wasn’t busy by Bali standards, but it was busy enough with maybe 20 people in the water on a busy day including a couple of local surfers. Everyone was staying locally, so everyone had had some contact outside the surf with each other. There was a good vibe. People calling each other onto waves, congratulating each other on good waves caught and generally being nice to one another.



The following morning we were graced with the presence of an additional party, as a boat turned up in the night and dropped an extra 10 guy’s in the water, in the form of the Canaries’ crew. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not racist, nationalist, or surf fascist and these guys could surf really well, but as soon as they turned up the whole vibe of the water changed. These guys were snaking every wave, dropping in on everyone and generally behaving like they owned the place. All of a sudden, it was “them” and “us”. Our waves were just made a whole lot more stressful, a few harsh words were spoken and things generally took a turn for the worse. Surfing well is not an excuse for being rude in the water.

Now I am not criticizing these guys for taking a surf charter. You pay your money and you get your waves. The cost of some of these charters, I could imagine I would feel like I owned a break having paid that much money, but what do you actually contribute? You spend no money with local people, in locally owned establishments. You aren’t contributing anything to the local economy and you don’t meet any of the local characters. You aren’t experiencing anything of the country in which you are staying. Living on a boat, you are just putting money in the westerner’s pocket who owns the boat. Only some of that money filters into the local economy.

I was under the impression that you take a boat charter to go to locations and surf breaks that are otherwise inaccessible. It doesn’t show much consideration to the people who have made the effort to travel overland to these places (in some cases a good few days of local busses and transport) to rock up and start talking all the waves.

Colorado

Its funny the relationship between snowboarding and surfing (just like with skating too). Shaun White, I wonder how he'd get on in the water I'm sure he's tried it. Well I find myself in his beautiful state at present, Colorado and as Winter Park and Vale had 10 inches of snow and the pumpkin and friends were keen we gave it a good go. Having never taken to the slopes in the Americas before I was impressed by the lift queues, manners annd nature of the wide and well groomed slopes, and the backcountry just looks phenomenal. The downer is the cost which at 93 bucks a day can hurt for sure.

paying so much for a lift pass and then walking anyway just seems a bit daft, but that's where the deep stuff is, and it was quiet and good, Still at over 12000 feet it gets the heart pumping.

Da Crew, Harry, Pumpkin, Kaitlyn, Heidi, Blocker + Me

Colorado from Edward Lockyer on Vimeo.

To do bottom turns at pace and aerials with wobbles can really make the heart sing. The landscape here is jaw dropping, massive plains dotted with ranches and wood cabins. And then behind the herds of horse, cows and deer, soaring peaks with pines on the lower slopes that cede to glacier corries with snowcapped cornices.

 Mountain biking, rafting, the Harley Davidson crowd, the hunters, snowshoers, telemarkers, climbers, cowboys...there all here. Its a hell of a drive from California but Vegas will keep you busy, and Zion, Bryce and the Grand Canyon National parks will all serve to lighten the load.

 As a surfer I'm both spoiled with beauty and yet bigotted by its form......It was a lesson gladly learnt that surfing should be about opening windows without shutting doors.

Non Surfing Holidays

I am currently on my first non surfing holiday in many years. The novelty of a bag with wheels and nothing more has plus points for sure. But you  can go stir crazy in Utah and Colorado and as the photos show "idle hands do the devils work".

 Big dumps of powder here though!