Capturing the Moment

  A rare day off matched up with glassy conditions on the north shore so I grabbed my boards and blasted off across the island. I wanted to check out a secret spot that only a few buddies of mine usually use. I saw a few people out catching some fun waves so I strapped on my leash and paddled out.   I was surprised to see that the  eight surfers out were all unkown to me. Guess the spot is catching on. Luckily there were plenty of waves to go around. It also seemed like the other surfers had been out for a while because pretty soon the crowd was down to three.    I wanted to play around with my new GoPro4 as well and the glassy conditions came out beautiful in the pictures. Add to the fact that it was extremely low tide and in some of the pics like the one on the left you can actually see the colorful coral reef lurking just below the window-like wave. I wonder how many more of these day's I have left here on Oahu's north shore...

North shore is rocking and rolling here in the midst of Oahu's winter surf season. The winds have been kinda shifty on my days off and that was the forecast for today as well but I thought I would make the drive and see if I could catch it early before the onshore winds arrived. I was in luck! The first place I stopped was Chun's beach. I saw a crowd out at Jocko's so I figured it must be good. I snapped on the GoPro and paddled out through a pretty hectic channel. There was a lot of water moving around but I snuck out to the lineup.   Before I could even catch my breath an overhead wave came right to me so I spun, turned, and burned right into the sweet spot. The face of the wave was super fast and smooth as glass. I ended up getting some of my best waves of the winter with a pretty good beat down in between. A little nasal dripage later was a small price to pay for the stoke of a great session.

  Exploring new beaches for shells and sea glass led Heidi and me to some beautiful sights. The long stretch of sandy beach on the north shore where you will find the Bonzai Pipeline and Sunset surf breaks starts just after the ancient lava flow of Pupukea. In this corner of the beach where sand meets rock I have seen lots of shells and sea glass in the past. But the size of the waves aren't the only thing that changes along our north shore during the winter. An extra foot of sand now covered the shells and sea glass. I knew the sandbars off shore shift during the seasons but I was amazed to see the amount of change along this beach. While it didn't turn out to be good for sea shells, the new angle of the beach cause waves to rise up steeply before crashing onto the shore. I took a few pictures to try and capture the moment right before the waves toppled over. Whenever I caught it just right it was like an aquamarine window to the ocean beneath the wave. Heidi still ended...

 The last four days were spent surfing some of the best waves in the world, all right here at home on the North shore of Oahu. Ben flew over from Maui and joined on the surf mini vacation. We explored a lot from the northeast all the way to the secluded west coast beaches to find the best conditions for surf. Ben and Jonathan surfed Makaha for the first time ever, then we found a new wave at Maili Point. It was pretty amazing to find such a nice, fast left amongst all the rights on Oahu's west shore.    But the real sparks were from the famous North shore waves. We stopped to look at pipeline and it was pretty flawless. The crowd was pretty intense as was the current on the inside. Jamie O'Brien and others were making the wave look much easier than it actually is. After watching a couple of surfers going over the falls into that shallow inside section we decided to move further down the beach to massive triple overhead waves at Sunset. At the end of the four da...

  The first north swell of the season filled in over the past couple of days here on Oahu's fabled North Shore. These early swells are some of my favorite because of the lack of crowds. All the pros are in southern California for the Trestles ASP event, and other surfers are waiting for the peak season to fly to Hawaii. When I paddled out to this secret spot that I call "Big Lefts Oahu", there was only one other guy out. After a few waves he paddled in and I had the break all to myself for a couple hours. Glassy conditions and head high to overhead waves...can't ask for more than that.

Dive into Oahu's Beautiful North Shore Heidi exploring an underwater cavern It is September here in Hawaii which means those big winter swells are just around the corner. Heidi and I wanted to get at least one more North Shore scuba dive in before the waves arrive so yesterday we drove across the island and rented tanks from Surf and Sea and headed to the left of shark cove for a shore dive.   The conditions were still very nice for diving. The water was pretty clear but did have quite a bit of suspended sediment. The clouds above cleared and let the sun shine through. And the water temperature was hovering around 80 degrees.     We found some amazing underwater rock formations. Lots of swim throughs, a huge cavern with multiples exits, and encrusting sponges and coral covering it all.    On the hunt for unusual sea creatures and good photo opportunities we came across this young green sea turtle. I noticed it swimming toward the surfa...

Shark's Cove, North Shore, Oahu Ed and Heidi descending    My friend Ed had just become a certified scuba diver before coming to Oahu and Heidi had recently procured an underwater camera so we were all anxious to check what was below the waves of Oahu's North Shore. We picked up tanks from one of our favorite dive shops located in Haleiwa, called Hawaii Eco Divers. The three of us packed in our dive gear and Jamie came along to do a little solo snorkeling. We headed to our favorite North Shore spot called Shark's Cove. There is a pretty easy shallow entry near the entrance to the huge tide pool. Lots of huge boulders give fish plenty of places to hide near shore and excited snorkelers who don't want to stray to far. Ed, Heidi and I headed away from the protected area out to the point where we were going to drop down and start our dive. Just before we arrived I heard Heidi's tank banger and whipped around to see a pair of spotted eagle rays gliding under us....

Turtle Photos for Sale   On a recent scuba dive at Shark's Cove on Oahu's North shore I had great success finding and photographing sea turtles. After that I decided to return to the North Shore with freediving gear so I could follow the graceful reptiles to and from the surface with ease. Sea turtles have lungs so they need to come to the surface every once in a while to replenish their oxygen. It is hard to bounce up and down while scuba diving. The freedom and maneuverability that comes with freediving can be a great way to photograph marine reptiles and mammals. "Breath of Life"   I took out a 24mm prime lens on my canon 5d mark ii in my Ikelite underwater housing. I also had two Ikelite strobes set up on either side of the housing to provide some light. The strobes are important if you want more than just the silhouette of the turtle while photographing from below. Turtle Reflection Among the Clouds   It took about 45 minutes to find the fir...

Galapagos Shark   A few years ago I went on the shark cage dive tour on the North Shore here in Oahu. They took us three miles out of Haleiwa harbor, dropped us in the cage and we were able to see lots of pelagic sharks in very clear, blue water. Since then I have been wanting to lead a mission back to this spot with our own boat and jump in for pictures without the cage. Another Close Pass Curiosity   I put the mission idea out there to some friends of mine on the North Shore and was surprised how quickly the plan was put into action. My buddy Alex has a jet ski he uses to tow surf into big winter swells. Now we just had to wait for the perfect morning with light wind conditions. With room for three on the ski our friend Nani jumped on board and away we went. Now we just had to retrace my steps from years earlier to find the cage 3 miles off where the sharks gather. Nani with 2 Galapagos Sharks   The first buoy we came across must have been for fi...