The legendary right point break of Safi is the crown jewell of Moroccan surfing, so on a good swell it can get a little crowded. But local pro surfer and big wave charger Jérome Sahyoun has figured out how to get the wave all to himself – just surf it by night. Much easier said than done at a heaving barrel that works best on large northwest swells (and also happens to be on Jérome’s backside).
But easy doesn’t produce close to enough adrenaline to pique Jerome’s interest, it takes a healthy dose of fear to do that. “This wave makes me scared,” Jerome said on Instagram. “Only people who surf Safi swells can understand! I love surfing by night but last time was not a joke.”
I don’t know about that, Jérome, I think we all can understand how absolutely terrifying it would be to surf a heaving barrel by night. (For reference, there’s a video of pumping Safi in the day, below.) I’ve done a bit of night surfing myself, and watching this video had me trying to compare my experiences to his.
Mine was by moonlight at Pleasure Point, Santa Cruz on a medium-sized swell in glassy conditions. While I didn’t have the wave all to myself, it was a gloriously tranquil experience of gliding over a near-invisible surface, letting my instincts tell me when to cut back into the power of the wave, and when to race down the line to beat a section.
From the video, it looks like the only thing these two night surfing experiences had in common is that they were at night. Choppy, foamy faces, deep barrels, and a headlight (because I guess you need all your senses working in overdrive to survive such an experience). No wonder he’s got the wave all to himself.
The video was shot by @mustaphacola.
