======== Newsgroups: alt.surfing Subject: D.J.Files #'N' ...excerpts of a surfing life. - djbyron.'n' [1/1] From: DAVID PRITCHARD Date: Fri, 20 Sep 96 17:19:50 PST Disclaimer 1: Anyone looking for chronological or any other kind of sensible order to and in the 'Files....is wasting their time :-) Disclaimer 2: only the facts are true in the following... :-) D.J.Files #'N' ...digit forgotten in the haze induced by one of the Northern Rivers biggest cash crops Byron Bay...some time or other D.J. saw Byron Bay in a surf movie. He's forgotten which one, but remembers the images of 2 dogs running around on the beach and Nat Young in a large floppy hat. So, this is it eh? Shit it's smaller'n Newquay he thinks as he rolls the V8 Holden Station Wagon over the railway trax and pulls up at the pub for a coldie. The people in the bar are more-or-less equally divided between the ordinary 'ocker' character you can see anywhere in the Wide Brown Land and others who have "alternative lifestyler" almost written on their foreheads. Some of the latter are your gen-u-ine hippie folk, but many are up there "dropping out" from Sydney, with degrees and professions and backed by the big bucks they made down in the 'Smoke' they profess to hate so much, but where they spent long enough to now live comfortably and buy up the cheap part-acreage here. D.J. manages to get himself a bar job, so he's got plenty of daytime free for waves. This place is the most easterly point on mainland Oz, so if there's any swell going, it'll get some. It's flat for the first 2 days he's there, but on day 3 he gets to surf Watego's...not big, maybe waist high, the swell out of the S.E. with a following wind, so it's no good around the corner. Here under the lighthouse tho, it's lining up and fairly glassy. Longish rides. Plenty of locals out, but no aggro. Nice and mellow and "G'Day mate" Round the other side of the lighthouse is a sandbar (probably over rock) break next to the headland that's a sucky left on a good day. And he gets one fairly soon, rail-grabbing his way into backhand coverups. He gets a bit jittery after the locals tell him all the shark stories... but, hey, _they_ are in there! There used to be a whaling station here and the sharks used to go into feeding frenzy on the throwaay stuff. But that place shut down in the 50s. Still a few noahs about tho :-) He gets to know a few locals. He starts working for himself making stuff for the craft markets. He can't believe how much 'grass' is around here. Every 2nd person seems to be smoking it...well that's the impression he gets. There are some great breaks in the surrounding area too, including the famous Lennox Heads. Down the coast a bit is Ballina, with a few breaks of its own and at the top of NSW the Gold Coast starts, with its multiple points: Snapper, Greenmount, Kirra and Burleigh. By this time 'Krakatoa' is living in this plastic wonderland. Shit, the old crowd are all over the place eh? He visits a few times, gets a couple of reasonable, barely head high sessions at Burleigh. Gets one only similar size day at a very crowded Kirra. It's not a good time of year, and the predominantly S.E.'ly swells have to wrap in here. With that, the crowds and the hype he prefers to spend most of his time further south. D.J. paddles out at Lennox for the first time at head-high plus. It's a week day. There's only about half a dozen guys out. Amazing. He takes off, thinks it's going to eat him as he comes out of the bottom turn but just makes it to the lip and sets a speed line thru a crisp section, then there's time for cutties and stuff. When he pulls out he realises just what a long ride it is. Next wave he pulls a few turns and this time when he sets up for the fast section he gets inside for a few seconds before emerging onto the shoulder and chucking a roundhouse cuttie. Bang! off the soup and back into a series of gouge off the bottom, slash off the top. Not a bad wave this...And there are _lots_ of sessions like this over the next...how long?? Time seems to drift. Sometimes....you can't quite put your finger on it....but somehow life's, well....too perfect?? Who knows. But sometimes just when every thing seems to be as slotted as a Grajagan coverup.....you move. Later in life you look back and think "Jeez that was a perfect time for me" and maybe you'll wonder why you moved. And maybe it's just that a city boy needs the bright lights now and then.....or is it just the Bruce-Brown-like search for the perfect wave... ...whatever, D.J. moved on.