When I got back to Byron, I made another attempt at surfing, but it was still quite windy. The spray was flying horizontally off the crests of the waves, but I kept trying, telling myself that any practice would help. There is so much more to surfing than just the riding, as everyone laughingly told me before I left Canada. First, you have to enter the water, which is why beaches are better than going across the rocks as I found out. The waves are never the same twice, so timing your entry can be difficult. Your ability to ride ends when the wave collapses in a foamy mess at the shore, ideally you want to find the "green" part of the wave, so you have to get out past the surf to start. The easiest way is to pick a place inbetween areas where the wave is steep, cresting, and powerful, but with no two waves the same, inevitably you bear the brunt of a crashing wave. In this case, you can "duck dive" to get you and the board underneath, in my case, my ass sticks up, and drags me back past any ground I gained since I previously got mauled. Once you manage to get past the surf, you need to pick your wave. The wave face has got to be steep enough to get some momentum going, not too steep or it is about to break. Then, hopefully you aren't too far forward on the board (nose into water = eat sand, drink saltwater) or too far back (board doesn't get enough momentum). Next, you give your self 3 or 4 quick paddles with your aching arms, then plant your hands in the MIDDLE (not sides, or board becomes unstable = eat sand, drink saltwater), push yourself immediately to standing position as if you were lying on the floor then jumping up to get a soda, and hopefully plant your feet evenly, or the board fires out from you (= eat sand, drink saltwater). Should you actually succeed at the above, you don't want to take your wave too far into shore, or you have to get past all that surf again. The whole experience of getting out there, waiting for the right wave that's worth all the paddling, bobbing around in the waves, not to mention the ride itself, goes into the experience of surfing. For me, a couple of hours of beating around in the surf would result in one or two 5-second runs. It's all worth it though, when the right wave comes, you get up (it was happening more frequently for me now), and hear THAT SOUND of the board skimming across the water and your visual field becomes a blur. As someone at a party told me, you can't outpower the ocean, but sometimes you can outsmart it.

It's occurred to me a few times that regardless of my failure to outsmart the ocean, there is something about feeling its power, floating in it, seeing the way the sun lights up the shallower parts and makes them glow blue-green, connected by a wispy web of fizzing foam, something about that feeling makes me really happy. You don't get this kind of environment on a lake, or even a northern beach. No, this is strictly a warm, tropical feeling.

Exhausted once again, I checked this time into the Backpacker's Holiday Village, a bit back from the beach, but not nearly as far as the Arts Factory. The vibe here was pretty good, offered free surfboard rentals, parking, and an outdoor area with one long picnic table which was conducive for chatting. Slowly, I got to know the folks here, and decided to stay for the rest of my car rental, which I had until the 16th of October.

A few people around were interested in learning to surf, and typically had to walk the dodgy hostel boards fifteen minutes to get to the crowded Byron Beaches. I mentioned that I'd be going somewhere in the morning, and a couple of the guys in my room, Paul (Ire) and Dave (UK) were interested, and the Surf Crue was born. When I go snowboarding, the object is to get up as early as humanly possible to maximize your time on the slopes and get the most out of your lift ticket, regardless of what you were up to the night before. The same rules applied here.
I managed to roll out of bed at 6:30 the next morning, and sure enough, Paul and a guy from Montreal, Fab, were seen shortly after. Dave was... um.... occupied. We hit Tallow Beach, and a couple of places on Seven Mile Beach near Broken Head, all about fifteen minutes outside of Byron. Upon our return, I think the boys were pretty tired. By this time, it was my fourth day in a row in the water, and I was starting to get through the burn. We went out every morning for the next several days, driving up and down the coast looking for surf spots that wouldn't demolish a bunch of crappy surfers. During one such mission, I spied a guy packing up some windsurfing equipment (yes, we were still dogged by some of that damn wind). After a bit of a chat, I showed him how to rig his sail a bit better, and he let me take his board out for a spin. AWESOME! Of course, we had been walking back to the car after several hours of surfing, so my arms were pretty shot, but I still had a good session out across the bay and back. It felt great, and relieved some of the underlying frustration of being beaten down by the ocean all morning.

The missions continued to evolve so that if I happened to sleep in, there would be someone knocking on my door at 7am. The Crue sessions reached their peak on the 15th of October (my 11th straight day), when we managed to fit five guys plus boards into The Boat, and head down the crazy gravel road to White's Beach by Broken Head. The waves were great (and flippin' huge) here, as now the Head was doing its job and providing a shelter from the wind. I've been refraining from posting pix of family, friends, and fellow travellers on this site, but three or four of us waded into the water every morning to get thoroughly trounced, bruised, tossed, cut, and smothered, all seeking to get that five second ride, so I posted the pic. Left to right is me, Dave, Tomas (Ger, who got me thinking about Bali), Hendrick (Swe) and Paul. Pic on the left is the 5-man Crue and The Boat. When I gave my camera to the girl to take a pic, I had it set on Sepia for some reason.

I still managed to surf right up until I sadly gave The Boat back to Dugi on the 16th, meaning I went 12 days straight. It's pretty good exercise, since most of my time is spent swimming against the waves, and getting in the water is a good way to start the morning after a long night. Besides, we would arrive back at the hostel about noon, feeling like we'd actually accomplished something, giving us an excuse to slough the rest of the day off.