Your Best,Wave, Surf, Story do tell us sharing!

[oldmansurfer]

Something I wrote long ago..... a body surfing story. The freedom of the summer when you are 14 years old.....hard to beat it. I would wake every morning and turn on the radio and listen to the surf report while I fixed myself breakfast and ate it. If there was any chance of a swell hitting Brennecke's beach or if I just felt like it, I would grab my fins and a buck twenty five and hit the road hitchhiking. Brennecke's beach was about a thirty minute drive away but two hours, 3 rides and maybe a total of 2 miles walking hitchhiking. It was always worth it because Brennecke's was the best body surfing beach in the world and between the waves I could watch the nonstop "bikini contest" going on there on a daily basis. I guess you might say I grew up a lot at Brennecke's. The $1.25 was for a burger and coke at the bar and grill by the beach. I would body surf till noon and then have lunch and body surf a couple more hours then hitch hike home.





Girls all wore bikinis and often lost parts of them in the waves there. Bikinis of that day were not the best attire for body surfing yet many women still wore them (thank god). The best girl body surfer there developed a style of body surfing where she rode the waves on her back so that her bikini top wasn't ripped off. But for the rest I might be swimming back out after riding a wave and feel something in the water. It's a bikini top or even a bottom and at first I would do what I did at Wailua. That is walk up on the shoreline waving the bikini and looking for the owner and try to get her to come get it. After talking to a few girls I realized that many of them were totally put off and stressed out by that so I then would look for the girl who is acting like she lost her bikini and swim over and ask her if she lost it. If a girl lost her bikini she wasn't acting normal and happy so it was easy it figure out which one it was. Then I would ask her to prove it (if I knew her) but then tell her I was just kidding and give her back the missing part. On occasion girls would come to me and ask me for help to find their tops or bottoms or both. Most of the time I could find them but if not then I would go to the beach and find a shirt or towel to give them. I gave up a couple shirts and a couple towels to distressed girls.





While there I also helped a few people in trouble in the water. Mostly they were just tired or disoriented. Once there were two kids in a inner tube that were being swept by the current into the impact zone in front of jagged boulders and reef. I looked for their parents but no one seemed concerned so I swam over and told them they were in danger and helped to get them clear of the danger and back to the middle of the beach. The kids mother came up to me and started scolding me. Clearly she had no clue about the danger they were in so I explained it and her kids told her that they were unable to fight the current they were caught in and she apologized and told me I had permission to do it again if necessary. I told her I wasn't the lifeguard and she needed to be sure they didn't end up back in that situation.





Another memorable life saving if you could call it that was a drunk girl who was upset that her boyfriend had left her. I caught a wave and was swimming back out when I saw some hair floating on the surface of the ocean. I watched to see if it was a wig or someone attached to it then I saw the body and I thought it was drowning person. I grabbed her hair and pulled her head out of the water and tried to bring her to shore. After spitting out a little water she started swearing at me and telling me to let her go and about her boyfriend. I let her go but watched her and she was knocked down by the next wave and once again underwater. I waited a little while and then pulled her up out of the water and again she started swearing at me. I waited again as she was knocked down by the next wave and under water again. Again I pulled her up fortunately we were in shallow enough water that she could walk without getting knocked down and made her way back to the beach swearing at me and ranting about her nasty boyfriend.



Brennecke's was my second home that summer and remained an integral part of my life in later years.

[oldmansurfer]

Some where there may be film of me bodysurfing Brenneke's on about a 10 foot day (15 to 18 feet faces). I took one of the worst poundings of my life on that day. I was hot from hitchhiking and there was a reel to reel camera on the beach and I was shy so I jumped in the water immediately without checking out the surf. As I swam out I looked up and a huge wave was about to break right on me. I went down to the bottom and hugged the sand and got hit by the lip. All the vertebrae in my back popped and snapped and the air got pushed out of my lungs and I sucked in water which I swallowed to get a clear airway. When I got home I noticed abrasions over my hip bones and found sand embedded in the skin there. I had to pick the sand out with a needle.

That day was huge and closing out. The ride was just down the face and then take a pounding. If you free fell from the top then you might be able to turn under the wave and swim like heck to keep from getting sucked over the falls. But on a typical wave you take off drop down then attempt to cut out as the whole wave closes out. You get sucked over the falls and slammed down toward the bottom although I rarely hit the bottom, I would arrange myself to land on my hands and knees. Typically then the water would cushion me from the bottom and I would go back up and over the falls again and back down tot he bottom where once again I would orient my body to land on my hands and knees. This repeated about 5 or 6 times on the bigger waves and then you go into the washing machine cycle where you get thrown every which way and basically can't control anything. Then it lets up and you can get a breath of air but may get hit again. Sometimes if I hit the bottom usually on the first or second time over the falls, I would push off the bottom and shoot out of the whitewater and get a breath of air. I did this mainly as a change of pace since I didn't need the breath and it never lessened my pounding. In the movie Endless Summer there is a body surfing session which may have film from that day. You can see the guy come shooting out of the whitewater like that although the wave seems a little smaller than that day.

On slightly smaller days I used to tuck into the lip if it seems to be closing out. This would result in me going over the falls which may seem like a bad thing but really it decreased the amount of pounding I took. If I went over the falls I would land on my elbows and knees and brace for a second as the wave pinned me down then for a second or two I had a chance to swim backward out of the wave and escape any further pounding. If I didn't swim back out immediately I would get sucked over the falls and do the whole bit. For fun I would hold my nose and wave at the people on the beach or hold out a peace sign. I am sure everyone thought I was getting pummeled but really it was far better than trying to cut out. On that particular day I didn't do this because it was bigger and I had gotten really pounded already and wasn't looking to push things at all.

On other thing I did for fun was to swim up the face of a huge wave and it would launch me into the air letting me look out over the lineup and see what else was coming in. I could get about 6 to 8 feet of air off the bigger waves maybe more.

[oldmansurfer]

When I was younger my friends and I would go looking for breaks around the island. There are hundreds of breaks basically the entire island is surrounded by waves breaking. Some of these were popular spots and some unridden waiting for the first and some that should never be ridden due to dangerous circumstances. We found a break that required us going along a dirt road where a pineapple field had once been. Then we had to hike down a dirt hill to the beach. It broke over a shallow reef in a long and fast left that tubed pretty nicely. On small days it was too shallow and not safe but once it got some size it was fun. You had to look to the left side to see the peak come in. If you looked for a peak straight out like you normally do you would never see it in time. After a while we figured out the lineup and where to look and we would see two peaks over to the left in a certain spot. If you watched it would shift over toward you as it hit the edge of the reef. We called it Brassieres for the two peaks and it was a wave that I did well on even though I was backside. I did better than some of my goofyfoot friends for some reason. I would be getting tubed and making it and they would be wiping out and I might be taking off on the far (deeper than them) peak. I don't know I just liked the wave and it's two shifting peaks.

I was used to the shifting peaks from my paipo boarding days. I used to paipo board at Waikoko which can be really hairy when it is big (over 12 foot faces). At that size it often has cleanup sets (16 or more foot faces) that would come in and catch you too far inside. These waves had a shifting peak too so I learned where to look for the cleanup sets and if I saw a peak way over in that area I would scratch for the horizon before it got there or just be prepared to swim to the bottom and go under the breaking wave. The wave would leave about a foot of water over the reef fairly undisturbed so you could safely swim under the breaking wave. This knowledge helped me to safely surf that break when it was big and it was one of my favorite surf spots when the rest of Hanalei was crowded because it was big. I got to where I could catch the cleanup sets because I saw them in enough time to get outside and be ready to take off.

Why are there so many nice lefts?

[oldmansurfer]

My most embarrassing moment surfing was back when the fly on surf shorts actually worked like a normal fly. I was surfing at Kealia beach and having a great time. I noticed a group of girls pointing at me and I thought "Oh yeah I am so good." So I ride a wave all the way into the beach and start walking toward the girls. Then I notice they are looking down and not at my face so I look down and see the fly is open and I am hanging out. I turned beet red and turned around and went back surfing till the girls went home .

Funny thing is I should have known that because I was body surfing and had a similar thing happen to me. This is for sure why they no longer make board shorts with working flys.

[peazz]

So, Im paddling out at bondi today and the swell started increasing, the odd small barrel / overhead wave... for once i was not scared..

Ive started paddling for an amazing wave no one was taking, so i paddled my little heart out, got into my first overhead wave and come out in one piece.

All i can say is an hour later I am totally stoked and still have a perma grin across my face and cant wait to head north on the 7th!

Being confident in your fitness and paddling abilities goes a long way to keeping your fear in check.

[oldmansurfer]

So true peazz. Fear is a tricky thing. It can paralyze you or mobilize you. Confidence in your abilities helps you to use the fear to mobilize yourself.

[peazz]

You hit the nail on the head OMS, Im so stoked and happy right now, words cant explain.

Today has been the best session in my 3 weeks in aus, paddling back and forth for 2 and half hours, constantly catching waves...I feel really fit right now.

3 weeks ago, I couldnt even paddle out without the fear of not being able to get back in

[surf patrol]

I get stoked quite often just making a good turn.
So this is about a break that I surfed on Oahu when I was attending University of Hawaii. Sometimes there just isn't much surf but oddly I found that my surf partner and I could find an uncrowded break almost any day on Oahu even with the incredible number of surfers there. Anyway on a couple of days the only waves were off the side of rabbit island. Looking out form the shore it breaks off the left side and I have linked a photo to give you an idea how far out we had to paddle. It's about three fourths of a mile from shore and takes about half an hour to paddle out to. That is how far you need to paddle to get outside at Hanalei or Pakalas on big days however the current helps you there. To get to rabbit island the current is no help or not much hindrance either.

We had driven over an hour without finding anywhere else that had waves worthwhile. My friend was not from Hawaii but he was a gung ho surfer and up for it and me I was just thinking I paddle that far to surf sometimes and there wasn't any strong currents to worry about so I was up for it. So we paddle out kind of just cruising realizing we needed to paddle back in at some point. As we got about half the way out an aluminum boat pulls up alongside us and asks us if we want a ride. It was a group of young surfers and my friend was suspicious they may just take our boards or something so I tell him to get in the boat first then I will hand the boards to him and get in too. Everything goes well and they don't try to beat us up and take our boards. They anchor outside of the break and we all go surfing. We had to go back in before they went back in so we thanked them and paddled back to shore.

The next time we went there we ran into the same group of guys but had reached there already. we surfed for a while and I was super tired because I had been up all night partying and only slept about 4 hours. So I went on shore and laid down on a big boulder on the shoreline and napped a little. Then they gave us a ride back.

[oldmansurfer]

One of the places I surfed on Oahu while going to University of Hawaii was Diamondhead. You park on the top of a bluff overlooking the surf and walk down a paved trail to the beach. There are at least a couple of breaks and back then it was never overcrowded and the crowd was friendly. My surfing friend with a car Greg liked it because he never got hasseled there. I didn't have a car while at UH so we went where ever he wanted to and me... I was just happy to go somewhere. On one of our journeys there Greg is in a hurry to go surf. I stop to wax my board and notice a completely naked women laying on a towel with her mouth wide open. I think "OH NO! She is having trouble breathing or seizuring or something so I look around and no one else is nearby so I go over and ask her if she is OK and she says she is. She tells me she is tanning the inside of her mouth. I notice since she is completely naked that she has a completely even tan all over. Anyway we chat for a while and I figure out she isn't crazy or sick but just mislead or mistaken about the benefit of the sun.....helplessly so ....so I get back up and go out surfing.

On another surf session there I get tired, all surfed out and come into the beach. I guess I had been somewhat hogging the waves or just lucky to catch ever single wave I could. So I go in and wait for Greg to get his fill of surfing. There was a group of local guys hanging out so I go say hi. We are over there talking and many of them are drinking but I still have to go to class so I refuse a beer. Then they start complaining about the girl who is "making shame" nude sunbathing and I look down the beach and it is her, the same girl I talked to earlier. I try to tell them she means no harm but some of them are kind of drunk already and it does no good. They are arguing about whether to beat her up or to rape her. I tell them I will get her to leave the beach and go over and talk to her. I walk up to her as she is standing on her head with her legs spread wide open. OK.....So I know exactly what she is thinking and don't need to ask her what the heck she is doing. She is tanning the inside of her .....well you know..... I say hi and talk to her a bit then tell her I think she should leave the beach now and that I will accompany her up the hill to make sure she gets to her car ok. She tells me that she does this all the time and never had any problems. I tell her she has offended that group of guys over there and they are getting drunk and if she doesn't leave soon they will get drunk enough to do something stupid and she should just leave now before that happens. I guess it convinced her and she puts her clothes on and I walk her up to the parking lot and she leaves. I never saw her again but only surfed that break a few more times.

I hear that break became a windsurfing spot but there were none there back in those days. It wasn't a really good spot but it caught a lot of swells and almost always had waves to ride and once in a while a juicy gem of a wave.

[oldmansurfer]

Hanalei is a long right breaking reef break that can be excellent at any size. It can have small knee high waves tubing out for along distance or massive big wave sized waves tubing out for a long distance. Sometimes the swell is the wrong angle and it isn't quite as good but it generally is a decent fun wave to surf. As a kid growing up on Kauai my friends would tell me they wished I surfed so they could bring me along to surf Hanalei so they wouldn't be the only one out. I am pretty sure it's extremely rare or never happens that anyone is the only one out at Hanalei these days (for long). Obvioulsy there is a first one out but that is just the begining of the onslaught of surfers.

Even by the time I started surfing (more than 40 years ago) there was always someone out at Hanalei. Once I decided I wanted to be the first one out so I took my board and my girlfriend and her daughter and loaded up my Volkswagen camper and went to Hanalei the night before. We camped in the camper with the daughter in the popup. I woke up before the sun came up waxed my board and paddled out. I couldn't see the waves because it was dark but could hear them breaking. When I got out there to my surprise there were 6 other surfers out. I surfed till about 10 am when the crowds started to show up and went in and had breakfast cooked over a fire on the beach. It was a fun outing. Waves weren't too great (for Hanalei) but there were lots of them and I surfed with just those 6 guys for most of the time.

[peazz]

with pictures like that OMS, I'm staying at your when i eventually save the money to come to Hawaii!

[oldmansurfer]

If I ever get divorced you are welcome to come stay with me......OH wait if I get divorced my wife will get the house so.... I guess it depends. My wife is just set in her ways and she doesn't want a relative coming to stay let alone someone she doesn't know. But you know that last bit was over 40 years ago and things have changed. I no longer have a VW camper in fact I sold it to get money to make a surfing trip to California, Mexico and as far south as I could get but I never went and instead used the money to put myself through college.

[oldmansurfer]

You know I have been thinking and watching big wave surfers. It seems like the waves I rode at Makaiwas was really nearly perfect for a beginner big wave guy like myself. It had a really smooth wall due to onshore wind and no sets so all the waves were really close to being the same and very consistently spaced. I was able to paddle into it with a 7'2" board which I guess is unusual. I knew a bit about finding a place that I could take off on bigger waves but these were different. At Hanalei I went for the peak but at Makaiwas the peak was so dangerous I didn't want to try it and very likely I wouldn't be here to tell about it if I did. But for tow in or maybe those experienced paddle in guys it would likely be a really great wave for them only they would cut out close to where I was taking off because the tube collapsed and the wave just crumbled over (still a 35 foot face). I was also lucky I had a board that was really fast and could handle going fast and turning on those huge waves.

My first few waves I had no idea how fast my board was in relation to the waves. I was flying with my board making a zippering kind of noise. The first time I tried to make a cutback, I was initially afraid I would get back too close to the crumbling whitewater but then realized the board was going so fast and I could turn it relatively quickly and these huge smooth faces allowed all kinds of turns. I was going so fast that when I did my pop out the fin on the lip, which really was a flat area almost as wide as my board, that I slid 10 to 15 yards sideways before I grabbed the wave and shot back down the face. It seemed like I could slide sideways as long as I wished to, like I was getting some power from the lip in that area. The feeling was like turning your skis sideways to stop when you snow ski so my body was close to the water and I was sliding sideways but still going really fast and not slowing down much. Such a weird turn for surfing and then I was back to zipping down the face of the wave and thinking what else will I do.

I was watching this North Shore Live feed today since there was no Billabong Pipeline Masters today and they were talking about big wave surfing and safety. One of the guys was saying that lots of people would try it and get hurt or scared and that thins out the crop of new guys. For me it was really about going to school and getting out of shape and then ending up working at a job that demanded my time so I couldn't get back in shape surfing (and now I am too old). Otherwise I might have went for the big waves more. I guess the fears about the big waves were less than the attraction to them at least once I saw them. I was much more resistant to the siren's call of the big waves when on dry land. But looking at a nearly perfect wave so huge from the water it wasn't a question of would I catch one it was how do I do it and stay alive.

Anyway you never know where life will lead you but whatever you do don't stop surfing.

[PommeDownUnder]

Hey thought I'd drop my 10c on this one. Best wave in my limited time surfing was an itty bitty waist high wave one of the first waves I properly caught took the drop and trimmed for a good 100m. Felt like I was absolutely flying saw the lip trying to land on me dropped rite down and sped up. The most incredible thing was the next section had started breaking nice and hollow (for a waist high wave) and it had to be the best view iv'e ever had the sun shinnig straight thru it. i let out the loudest WWOOOOOHOOOO (keeping it kook) and proceeded to smash head long into the braking lip took the tumble with the biggest grin ever!! span round straight out for another!! was easiley the most important wave ill ever ride because I had been struggling for at least 2 months to even catch a wave and had been trying most mornings getting up a 5 to surf before work with no joy was getting close to feeling like id never crack it and I certainly still havnt but that ride made me realise it's totally worth the journey.

Keep The Stoke Alive!

[oldmansurfer]

You will get many more. It is so worth it. Welcome to the forum.

[oldmansurfer]

So nothing major but I got a small backside lip tap on the back shoulder almost tube ride. I was angry because I chickened out on a nice big wave and dropped down then pulled up and crouched and felt the lip hit my back shoulder but I was going so fast It was just a brief thing. I get that front side often enough but backside only a couple times since I restarted surfing due to not feeling comfortable going for the tube backside yet. You know I was thinking...I surfed for three years an average of 30 minutes a week. That works out to 26 hours a year....not much. I used to surf around that much in 2 weeks time before. No wonder I am still not so good at it I did notice something taking off on these steep backside waves, when I stand ...or pop up as you all call it, I do it normally then angle the board and slide my front foot to the inside edge to put pressure on the rail to make it grab I guess since I am just doing it by instinct. I don't recall doing that before and think it is something I am doing with the quad for some reason. I need to work on my backside cutback and off the lip maneuvers.

[oldmansurfer]

Ok so nothing really remarkable other than just putting together a bunch of turns smoothly on my last outing. I was coming in from trying to catch the larger outside waves and caught a smaller wave with a nice wall. I made a bottom turn and the lip looked inviting so I smacked it and went straight back down the wave made another bottom turn and smacked the lip again and straight back down again another bottom turn and the wave was closing out in a section in front of me so I hit the lip and did a floater. It really wasn't too exciting but after I came in a couple people said "Nice wave". Thinking about it now this would have been a common type of wave for me long ago. I might do five or six similar turns on a wave back when I was a reasonably good surfer. I hadn't really had any similar waves to this since I restarted surfing. Anyway it did feel good ....kind of like I was in a flow in tune with the wave.

[oldmansurfer]

I wanted to talk to everyone about drowning. The first account is about one of three times in my entire life that I almost drowned. I was very young (about 5) and may have had minimal swimming skills for sure I could dog paddle real well. Our family was hanging out at the Kapaa canal long ago when the water was clean. I was wading around and my older brother Gordon figured out a way to trick me into stepping off a ledge into water deeper than my height. I stepped into it so to speak and immediately went under water. Then I proceeded to panic and struggle and all I could do was to come up for air splash around a little and go back under again. I was floating down the canal and not sure if I floated into shallow water or brother Gordon grabbed me and pulled me into shallow water but quickly my feet felt the bottom again and I was ok. I just learned that I was doing what has been called the instinctive drowning reflex. This incident was likely why my parents put me in so many swimming classes..... well that and it got me out of their hair and I liked swimming anyway.

The second when I was maybe 10 years old. I jumped off a bridge which was about 20 feet above the surface of the water. We would check the depth prior to jumping to be sure it was deep enough because the depth would change. I jumped a little further out than the others and found myself impaled underwater on an old rusty piece of a railroad tie run up the back of my calf muscle. I was stuck there and tried to swim off it but could not. As I struggled I felt my lungs start to burn and realized this is not good and I need to relax and think. I knew that if you struggled under water you used up oxygen at a fast rate. I tried to reach down and push off the bottom but I could just barely touch the bottom with my toes. I knew I could pick stuff up with my toes and had a pretty good grip with them so I placed my free foot on the tie that was stuck into my calf muscle and grabbed it with my toes, bracing my body and pulled my leg off it with my hands then swam up. I told my friends to not jump over there and they all laughed at me since I would often fake problems and stay under water for a long time ( I could hold my breath a long time). Anyway I had to tell them to wait till I got up on the bridge and I could show them my wound.



Now a couple stories about others drowning. I was with some friends at the beach and they had their kids along. This was long ago maybe 40 years or so. We were all standing in the water by Lydgate or somewhere along that coastline. The water was up my waist or a little higher and the daughter who was about 5 years old was playing in the water between me and her parents. I noticed she was bobbing up and down and flailing in the water and thought maybe she was in trouble so I asked her if she was. She didn't answer. I know now that this is a sign she was in trouble but back then I was unaware. If they can't answer they are in trouble. Anyway after a while she did say "YES!" and so I pulled her out. Immediately she said "Daddy." I said "No I am not your daddy" and handed her over to her dad. Later on the parents were mad at me because I didn't pull her out sooner. I was unaware of this instinctive drowning reflex behavior. But I remembered back then about the time Gordon tricked me and I did the same thing and I have never forgotten that type of drowning behavior since then although I never knew the name of it till recently. Since then I saw two more children exhibiting the same type of behavior. One turned out to be playing around bouncing off the bottom and the other was practicing acting like she was drowning for her father who taught lifesaving. They both responded to me when I asked if they were ok.



One more story about drowning that I remembered recently. I was at Kalihiwai beach paipo boarding (body boarding) with some friends. They had all gone in and were waiting for me on the beach I finally came in and we sat around enjoying the day when I noticed another friend of mine who seemed to be trying to come in to the beach and not making any progress. I had said "Hi" when I passed him coming in. He looked like he was in trouble so I swam back out and asked him if he was ok. He assured me he was fine so I went back in again. About 5 minutes later he was still in the same place so I swam back out and asked again if he was in trouble. Again he said he was fine so back in I went but my friends on the beach said I should just drag him in since it's obvious he was in trouble. I said "he said he didn't want help." They said "You don't want to have to give him mouth to mouth do you?" I thought about it yeah I mean I would if I had to but really didn't want to so back out I go and tell him I am going to help him. He says he didn't want to make shame so could I not be obvious about it. So I went under water and pushed him then came up and went to the side of him and pushed him with my hand behind his back and then under water again repeating this till I could stand on the bottom and push him. He was so tired when he came out he had to lay down and once he got his breath and was feeling better he told me that he was in dire need of help but didn't want to be humiliated.

Anyway drowning is a real thing and so don't be afraid to ask for help and watch for someone bobbing up and down and help them or at least ask if they need help then if they don't say anything help them. Probably best to just give them your surfboard to grab if they are still conscious.

[oldmansurfer]

I just remembered back when I used to surf 40 something years ago after I got fairly good surfing I would surf switch stance on small days. It was challenging and made the unexciting waves more exciting. I never got very good at switch stance but it presented a challenge for me on small days. One day I was doing that surfing switch stance and I kind of lost my balance a little on the drop and ended up going backside instead of front side which was a common thing for me when I was learning normal stance. Anyway I am going along a shoulder high wave and think it looks like I might be able to get a little tube so I crouched down and got tubed. I came out of the tube and stood up and looked around for someone hoping someone saw me do that because it was so unbelievable and I was so proud of my self for pulling that off since at that point I was pretty proud getting a back side tube with my normal stance. No one saw it. I was the only one at the beach.

[oldmansurfer]

I thought of a body surfing story which I didn't tell you all yet. I was body surfing at a break I never tried before called Anini. It breaks along the edge of one of the biggest reefs on the island. I caught a wave and initially it was pretty good but then I decided to ride it as close to shore as I could get and go in. So I was cruising along and it was a long ride in. It had to be the longest ride I ever had bodysurfing and it kept going but then it was getting shallow and I thought I better cut out but no just a little longer and then I would think the same thing I should cut out because it was really shallow and in fact the only reason I wasn't scraping on the reef was I was hoisted up a bit by the wave but I was so jazzed to have such a long wave I just kept going and thinking I should cut out till finally I hit the reef. Must have been 100 yards or close to it.....almost made it to shore but what a reef rash. No resin to repair that ding.