Surf Update - Wave of my Career and England

These are what the waves on the North Shore were looking like this morning, perfect glass sets with a little offshore wind –

Faisel and myself headed down to Manly and it looked beautiful, I could see a small left hander going off in the middle of the beach. A rare occasion getting these sort of waves in Sydney. So we are out waiting for waves, pretty hard to catch because of their nature, I caught a few and it felt good. Then I see a nice big wave coming in and I am located prefectly next to a longboarder, so I paddle into the wave and it lets me takeoff. I stand up and bottom turn into the most beautiful looking wave arc I’ve ever seen. It felt like I was in my own little world (some people think I am all the time), I couldn’t hear any sound apart from the ‘chuka chuka chuka’ sound of the board skimming across the water and the occasional drumming my fingers of my left hand made as I put them into the wall of the wave. I then realised I had been flying down this curve for about 8 seconds and say to myself ‘this is the best ride ever’!! I then hear next to me the wave breaking just behind me at ear height, so a 2.5-3ft wave, probably a small pipe behind me if I could see it. The water was getting shallow and I could see the sand from the previous wave break so I turned to the beach still on the board and look at the first person I see (a surf school learner) and throw my fists in the air as if I’ve just scored a 9.5 on the ASP World Championship Tour (or a ‘wave off’ as Mike calls them). The wave break then catches up and throws me off the board. I paddle out to the lineup with a massive smile on my face and found myself to be physically shaking from the experience. I didn’t get a wave like it again all day, although I tried, a few were pretty cool but nothing touched that one. I’ll never forget it and no accidents today, no head crunching of fin cutting. It didn’t seem that long ago that Magnus, Dis and myself were getting wiped out on every wave.

On another note, Irregular Shed put up some screen grabs of the weather forecast…. can’t wait to get back –

Also whilst I was there I found this picture, thought it was pretty funny. ‘are you thinking what we’re thinking’ – I very much doubt it –