"The waves were pumping. Six-foot sets, six waves in a set. I was so stoked." Photo: Mike Smolowe
I knew it would be pumping as we drove along the coast road. All the indicator reefs were showing white water, and a few of the other spots were almost breaking. The southernmost tip was going to have waves, I was sure. Also, I had SMS’d a friend of mine who lives on the island, and he had confirmed that there should be waves. I was going it alone, hitching a long distance ride in a local taxi.
The taxi driver was a surfer too, constrained by the reality of a wife and three daughters on an island that doesn’t have much industry apart from tourism. He was a slave to the wage, working for the man, another brick in the clichéd wall. He knew his place in the system though, and quickly showed me some photos of himself surfing when he was young and carefree and full of the joys of youth, before the horror of reality kicked in. Still, he was upbeat, and reckoned there would be waves.
When we arrived at the hidden away little car park, a set came through and closed out the reef pass. “Big waves,” he said to me. “You alright with big waves?” It wasn’t that big, probably six foot, but the reef pass closed out on six foot sets, and a rip from hell washed out the gulley in between sets. It was my fifth trip to the island, so I knew my way around the spot.
The paddle took a little less than 25-minutes, as with the bigger swell the lagoon was draining. All good for the paddle out, not good for the paddle in. Still, I was committed and continued on my way. One other guy paddled out in front of me. I got sucked out through the pass, hit a left and paddled hard to get out of the suck and into the line-up. The other guy, a goofy-footer of average ability, took off on a bomb and went screaming past me over the coral.
The waves were pumping. Six-foot sets, six waves in a set, and the odd big set that would close out the channel and that would need to be duck-dived. I was so stoked. The other surfer, who had just had a wave, paddled up behind me and I turned around with a big grin on my face, ready to jabber about the bomb he had just caught.
“Be very careful out here!” he snapped at me. “This is my wave!”
I looked at him, totally bemused, ready for this.
“Are you from South Africa?” he asked me interrogatively.
“Yes, I’m from South Africa.” I replied.
“Well this is not South Africa, and these are not your waves. Remember that.”
I was deep on the inside, so I paddled just past him and sat on my board next to him.
“No problem. You get the first wave and I’ll get the second.”
He looked at me, grunted, and paddled a bit deeper, as another six-wave set approached. That’s six waves.
So commenced a session of him getting the first wave, me getting the second wave, and us sitting together on the small take off zone, glaring at each other. It was silly, he wasn’t going to make conversation, and our memorable surf was held in miserable silence. Perfect, barreling waves, and only two surfers sitting miles out to sea.
Eventually a few other locals paddled out, a few friendly words were spoken amongst us all (except for the grumpy dude) and we all got on with the task at hand – surfing perfect reeling lefts over coral. I stayed out of the way of the one guy, and he watched me closely and paddled past me on every single occasion he could.
Is there a lesson to be learned from this little surfing tale? Maybe it’s that surfers should be given the benefit of the doubt before they get judged in the water. If a surfer paddles out at your break, there’s no real need to be stinky until he has made a transgression. He might be completely mellow, or he might be a friend of a friend. Who knows? In the words of Owl Chapman, “He might have a good looking sister.” As soon as he snakes, drops in, or acts like a pig, then the gloves are off so to speak, but until then, leave I and observe.
As for this miserable bastard, it turned out that he wasn’t such a good surfer after all. He went deep a few times when there was just the two of us out, and as the coral floored out on him he was forced to straighten out over the reef on numerous waves. It gave me great pleasure, sitting on the edge where I had been told to sit, to catch his waves in the correct take-off place and ride them all the way to the channel while this bully floundered in the manly impact zone.
