Capturing the Moment

  On a hunch I booked it down to Dumps yesterday after work just in case there were waves big enough to surf. Dumps is a beautiful wave with turquoise water that forms a steep left of shallow reef. It works on big south swells sent up from storms in the southern hemisphere so it is mainly a summer time wave. During the winter everyone flocks to the north shore to catch big waves sent down from big storms up near Japan and Alaska.   You can imagine my exuberance as I walked around the last corner of the path to Dumps just in time to see a set of three perfectly formed, head high lefts peeling into Dumps....and one guy out! I literally ran the rest of the way over the lava rocks to get to the entry before jumping in the water and furiously paddling out to the lineup. I couldn't believe my luck. The other surfer did say that was the biggest set he had seen yet, but luckily I was in for a lot of luck during this early south swell surf session!  Making friends in the lin...

 This was my welcome to Bali, Indonesia. I flew in to Bali's Denpasar airport around midnight and caught a cab to the nearby party town of Kuta. This is where young Australians and Europeans travel for cheap partying. As you can imagine it wasn't really my scene so after a day to get my bearings I headed south to the surfing mecca of Bali. From Uluwatu to Dreamland you have peeling waves as far as the eye can see. Waves with names like Padang Padang, Impossibles, Race Track, and Bingin can all be world class waves. I decided to stop and stay at a little place right across the street from Padang Padang and this is what I paddled out to. I was blown away. It was the best swell Padang had in a while. A super fast left that throws up a wild barrel was more than I could have asked for. I can't count the number of barrels I pulled into but I can count the number I came out of, 2. Unfortunately the GoPro had some quirks that made me miss alot of the big action but I still ma...

It has been a slow summer. So it has been until now that I have gotten out into some surf with my buddy's GoPro camera. It mounts on the front of the surfboard and has a super wide angle lens to capture a much larger area even at close range. Having the camera on the board also give you some idea of how big the wave is, although it can be misleading if I am the top of a wave vs at the bottom. The south swell was wrapping into the bay perfectly this morning. The wind was non-existent. And there were only a few other surfers out. A perfect combination.   The tide was low so I had to watch out for shallow coral when the waves would close out on me. I think I stayed in the waves a little longer than I normally would if I didn't have the camera attached. But if you don't have a pro photographer following you to each session the Go Pro can be a great addition. It also lets me critique my surfing style from an angle I have never seen before.