Interesting bit of surf history
Posted: Thu Apr 30, 2015 5:27 amI was just listening to Surf Stories which is a radio talk show about surfing that is on every Wednesday at 5:00 pm HST online at http://kkcr.org/ . They had Ben Aipa and Larry Bertleman talking and it turns out that the guy who made all my surfboards back when I used to surf long ago Joe Kuala was the guy who stimulated Ben Aipa to learn to surf really well and also to shape surfboards. I never heard of him back then and just met him by accident because I gave his wife and daughter a ride home when they were hitchhiking home because their car broke down. I was headed to the south side because there was no surf on the east side and I saw them on the side of the road and I had a van with lots of room so I gave them a ride and decided to take them to their home because I wasn't in a hurry just cruising looking for surf. She asked me if I surfed and I told her I did and she told me her husband made surfboards. I just happened to be looking for a board at the moment an told her and she agreed to get her husband to make me one. I really didn't want to impose on him but he was nice and talked to me about surfing and what size waves I was surfing and what I liked to do and made me an awesome board. It was a yellow tinted 7 foot diamond tail and it flew like a magic carpet. That board was so awesome, it was a step up from the board I learned on a 6'10" diamond tail. He made me about 5 or 6 other boards over the years and I loved every one of them. He also made the 9'6" longboard I used when I relearned how to surf. He would still be my shaper but he passed away. Anyway it's funny how things work out in life. I was so lucky to meet him. He charged me $90 for that first board partly because it was missing a small chunk of foam. Surfing has been the best thing for me. Still is but if not for him things might have been different.