======== Newsgroups: alt.surfing Subject: D.J.Files...bits of a surfing life #31 Gold of the Day - djgold.31 [1/1] From: dp025@seqeb.gov.au (Bear) Date: 23 Oct 1996 22:51:12 GMT Disclaimer : Some of the 'Files are fiction, bordering on fact. Or vice-versa. The D.J.Files #31 Gold of the Day... 1: Saturday: 'Everyone' has piled into cars and vans and headed west for a comp. The surf is picking up. It's a little rugged, with the lumpy bits not yet sanded off the top of the lines. But its rideable. Contest stuff. 2: Sunday : Whoa! The surf's too big to hold the contest. 'West is pumping and thumping. Getting outside is an impossibility. So the contest is being moved. Rent-a-crowd vacates, heading east. A handful of vans and cars remain. 'Tanks' had a shift of sand. Now it had a steep shorebreak at the high tide mark. The guys stood there, Waimea-like, waiting for a lull to run and jump in. Patience is a virtue. The couple who don't have it and go in, get thrown back like dead jellyfish. Eventually they all got over together and paddled across a rare inside channel to wait at the outer impact spot for a lull there. Someone commented it was like being overseas. 3: Monday : Most of the guys are back at work, of course. Andy and the Poser are off. They head for R&R Beach. A few others are there. It's flat. They can't believe it! Where's that big swell. Aaaargh! In desperation they head a bit further west. At Double L an hour or so later, they find the tide well off low and pushing in some waist-high stuff. They go out and get a few rides, but it's not what they were expecting. They have to work that evening. Those guys working during the day "know" it must be pumping and are just dying to get out and play. Rave's one of em. Steve Philips is another. When they finally do, they don't even bother checking R&R. From their separate directions they head directly toward a golf course, turn onto an almost hidden track, wind up their windows and buffet and bump their way to the surf, across cattle grids and around a duckpond. When they get there, a handful of guys are there and getting changed "Anyone seen Andy and Poser" asks Rave. Yeah, someone has, says they went away...Double L maybe? "What!???? Went away??" Rave says, pointing at the watery perfection It's only been like it for a matter of minutes, why d'ya think we're just getting changed? ...is the gist of the response. Rave is speechless. Yeah. I think only _really_ good surf _can_ make him that way. But he can go either way, even then. It's one of those champagne, long summer evenings. Latitude 52 gets some long days in summer. But the climate spoils a lot of em. Not this one tho. The sun still has a long time before it sinks, but already it is copper-arting the water. It's like someone's just poured olive oil on the surface. And it's absolutely the glassiest, peakiest, make-you-wanna-dance- like-Gene-Kelly-ish evening they've ever seen. Paddling out leaves a long wake, like liners at sea. Californians can yawn...but this sorta perfection is rare elsewhere! They are so stoked with the whole thing, they watch their wakes roll away: little mini-swells. When they take off on these overheaders, it's fast and smooth and gouges the water. They've only seen this in mags. up to now. Most of this crew have a couple of years experience, so only silliness or sheer overload surfing makes them lose it on any of the waves, which just throw and peel flawlessly. And all this in a totally kelp-free environment (despite the cool water). Rave watches Steve-o upside-down on a backhand off-the-lip as he's paddling out. Woulda looked great on a SURFER cover!! He glides back down the face and sits into a bottom turn and repeats the whole performance, as Rave is bobbing over the back. Rave sits up and turns to look. Down the line Steve-o flows smoothly out over the back. Rave wonders if D.J. is having surf like this, out there in Oz. Be early morning over there now, he thinks. Steve-o's surfing as well as D.J. would, which is what triggers off this line of thought. Both these guys will get over there in a few years from now. Rave and Steve-o are both goofy tho, unlike D.J. But today your podiatral persuasion is irrelevant, because - pardon the pun - you can't put a foot wrong!!! Wave after wave has its glassy face mauled by the few guys out here tonite. It's like a jealous girlfriend long-nailing her faithless man's visage. They're cutting this and smacking that and gouging something else. The only slight smudge on an otherwise perfect balance sheet, is when Steve-0 falls out of a throwing lip straight onto dry sand (and is joined by his board a micro-second later. Ouch!) after doing one-too-many lip-smacks. Half the Atlantic collapses on top of him, apparently. When it slurps back, he staggers to his feet, sand in everywhere from ears to rectum. The sun dips low, the sand flies come out (there had to be a small down-side to such perfection, otherwise we'd think "heaven on earth" or some-such silly notion) and it's time to leave. "I guess that'll be the end of that" Rave says to Steve-o as they head off. But they both said they were gonna come down tomorrow evening too. 4: Tuesday: Rave has seen Poser and Andy and knows he's one up on them, for a change. Yes! (not nice really, but we all feel that way sometimes). He cruises down again expecting it to be flat, or at least small, anyway. Surf over more than 2-3 days here is a hall-of-fame job. But he still doesn't bother to check R&R, as it's a nice, warm and sunny evening again so it'll be nice just to go back over 'the Farm'. When he pulls up onto the little headland in sight of the surf.... it's _still_ there; still working. Virtually the same crew as the evening before. They're already in, except for the odd straggler. It doesn't look quite so glassy. Maybe, say, glassy...as compared to glaaaaassssssy. The thing about 'absolute' perfection, is that 'ordinary', 'common- or-garden' variety perfection looks almost 2nd rate. And such is the case tonite. Oh there's nothing wrong with it. It's a great session, in great surf. But there is just an oh-so-slight texture on the water. Quite normal. Nothing to upset anyone; nothing to catch a rail on or anything. A day like this would get most surfers around the globe stoked. And it does get them stoked. And they rip the shit out of it. But they keep thinking of yesterday. But, you know this feeling... eh? *** P.S. and the next day was 3-5 foot...and the day after was 2-4!!! but they are another story. -- Bear