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Sjoh, it's been a 2 week break.

If you think I've been neglecting this, you should see how i've neglecting my boards.  My wetsuits also going to have stiff feeling like its grumpy for being left out when I next put it on. 

Well, back from a little sojourn in the desert.  We walked the Fish River Canyon, which is second only to the Grand Canyon in scale, I'm told.  It's pretty impressive and I will put up some pics here in due course, so you can relax. 

In the meantime, I've got a few writing projects on the boil, so that's keeping me busy.  So here's a little pic to spice up your chilly wednesday if you're in the Cape.  If you're some where warmer - then go get some of this on your retinas for real.  If you're anywhere colder - go skiing.

Liquid Vision by Freddy Cerdeira

Autumn Awesomeland

Last weekend we left our boards behind, and instead packed our spades, hiking boots and heavy winter mountain gear.  We went to the Cederberg which is about 2 hours north of Cape Town, quite high at 2000m and often gets below freezing this time of year.  That's cold for us.

Technically, we were going to a beach, we were just a bit late - by a few hundred million years.  But the gnarled sandstone formations was once beach sand, and if you go high enough to find the band of shale that runs through all the Cape Mountains, you can easily see patterns of flowing water etched into the sand on which trilobites roamed (possibly, not entirely sure of my paleo-geological timing there, but then neither was Spielberg when he made Jurassic Park.  actually, no, now that I think about, I think i'm right about that.).

Anyways, on the topic of extinctions, the main aim of the weekend was to plant some ceder trees.  Our local ceders are on the brink thanks to excessive logging back in the day and climate change and all too frequent fires these days.  As beautiful as the mountains are, when one visits the last thick stand of surviving trees, one begins to imagine how amazing they must have been in past.  So, it's good to put a trowel into a stony ground and do a bit of environmental engineering.  It felt good and in 100 years or so, I may have offset the carbon I've expended these past few weeks chasing waves around the coast.

chillos on the way up

At home in the cold

Another one goes to earth

up close

We partied pretty hard on the Saturday and I did my usual stunt of crashing early.  But that was fine, because on the Sunday morning, there was a dusting of frost which made everything shimmer.  Depending on where you live, this may seem normal, but for us Cape okes, we dont' get this thing to often.  At a higher altitude, the climate there is more temperate than meditterranean and this sort of transports you further from your home than just the distance.  With some leaves still turning on the trees, it had a crisp autumn feel to it.  So, not a winter wonderland, but an autumn awesomeland.

I got a few snaps, which I hope you enjoy.

back light sparkle

An untrodden bridge

Frosty grass

Some autumn shades

the bottom rung of the ladder

So we got our nuts out yesterday and paddled out to Sunset.

To us, it was big and scary.  But, to those who know it well, it wasn't big at all and apparently not worth paddling out for as we were the only one's out.  It was very much entry level stuff, and so a good point to start off there and get a feeling for it.  There was slight onshore blowing which gave it a bit of a lump, but the wave tends to be so big that the face sits in the lee of it, and so is relatively smooth.  It's also better than a howling offshore trying blast you off the back.  As I was on a longboard (that's how they used to do it, right?) this is even more of a problem.

I caught two nice ones - a left and a right.  It was really peaky so there wasn't much of a wall, but the drop - particularly the left - is always a thrill. 

I also took a proper beating on my first attempt.  It just dropped out from under me and I splattered into the trough and got sucked back over for a second thrashing.  It rolled the cuff of wetsuit sleeve up past my elbow.  Such is the power.

It felt about this big.  In reality, it was probably about a third as big, and a 20th as heavy. Incenditally, I can remember the day that this photo was taken.  I was nowhere near it, but was making my own tentative steps on waves that seemed enormous at the time.  Simon Lowe, by Nic Bothma

We came back in with whole boards and a feeling of further ancipation.  There are no real claims or bragging rights.  It was confidence building but we are wary of biting off more than we can chew.  If you push yourself slowly in increments, you get somewhere.  We're climbing the ladder one step at a time.  If you try to leap upwards, you risk falling down badly.  Each step up is progress.  A bad experience is regression and can set you back month, years or make you walk away entirely.  It's a mental game as well as physical one, if not even more so.  To have confidence shattered remains our greatest fear.

New Jersey

Here's a pic of a beachy going unridden on America's East Coast. Yes, it's a bit over-shopped, but whatever.  You've all enjoyed a little bit of airbrushed skin from time to time.  So what. 

It looks pretty sick, but I reckon there's a crew of guys sitting behind the peak there and this one slid past unridden for some reason.  That's why it's here on an unridden wednesday. 

My wednesday looks like it may be going unridden this week.  Last week a nice swell pushed through and we drove around before surfing a spot that was either a death slab or a bit further down, a shoulder too soft to paddle onto.  so, we chose life and scratched furiously before doing the paddle-in of shame.  This wednesday were viewing the swell with more scepticism and are sending some guinea pigs out ahead before we burn precious fuel and waste more time.

And no, I'm not going to acknowledge the exitstence of a certain reality show set in the coastal vicinity.

Via Magic Seaweed

*I actually wrote most of this yesterday and was going to put it up before realising that it was still tuesday.  It's ok, 2 weeks ago, I thought it was already June.

Gabrial Medina - perfect 10 tube

So, the Volcom Fiji Pro is running at the moment.  While, us Saffas might still be dragging the proverbial primate that Jeffrey's was chopped from the tour, it's good to see Fiji back in the mix.

But, in order for us to see it, it means assuming a nocturnal state and foresaking the much needed session at matress reef for a laptop in the wee hours.  The plus is that there's a lot of free bandwith and so it runs pretty smoothly.  The downside is, well, you have to stay awake at 3am.

So, I was having a little toss and turn (sis, I know what you're thinking) in bed last night and gave up and put the webcast on.  My insomnia paid off and I got to see Gabriel Medina post this solid ten with an unbelievable tube.  When I say unbelievable, I mean it in the true sense - not like awesome, incredible, or fantastic gets chucked around these days.  Although, it was actually awesome and possibly fantastic in the true sense as well.  It was unbelievable, because the commentators and even the cameraman wrote him off as he slipped behind the curtain that then raced down the reef.  It was right at the start of round 2 heat, and one of the mic-jocks was about to start saying how the prodigy hadn't had such a good start to the year after his stellar performance at the end of last year.  Then, as if to live the metaphor, he came screaming out of the throaty as if to say:  Don't write me off.  I'm still here.  No-one watching could believe it.

On review from the camera in the channel - similar to this angle, he still slipped out of view.  That's deep.  He put in two solid gouges and kicked off to a unamimous perfect score.

Well, done, sir.

Watch the Volcom Pro when it gets going again here.  Thanks Joli and these guys for the pic.

small stuff

So I hired a macro lense for another project and then turned it on my surf gear.  Here are the results.

Wowee.  That was amazing.  And here's a word that seems relevant to the above: ummm... perspective.

Ok, back to work folks.