Taking off

SWR report
June 2, 2008

As with all good trips of any kind, our trip began slow and late. One aims high in getting up early for the glass, but often, especially at the start of the trip, inevitability reaches beyond one’s expectations, and before you realize it it’s three hours later than when you eagerly wanted to jump in. But, hey, it’s summer for these boys and the beginning of our trip was trimmed with all kinds of laughable incidents – Joe and I are prone to laughter.

Our first stop ventured no farther than the local health food store in Sebastopol Calif. There, in a crowd of Sebastopolians, while waiting for organic sprouted chicken sandwiches – a rich motley amalgamation of dreadlock yuppies; jungle faring hippies; yoga sprung soccer moms; bewildered freshman college dropouts; new aged waldorf toe-headed, large and blue-eyed tots; fresh fruit perfumed teenagers; middle and older aged grooved out Rumi disciples; and tough, rugged, organic meat butchers - a thin, wild-eyed, short cropped blonde hair, near-middle aged man suddenly went into a rampage on all things secular, including vegetarianism, global religion, rampant wi-fi infestation, Leonard Peltier, melting ice-bergs, and all things harmful to our environment, our private lives, and our local communities. I admired his audacity. While most of the crowd stood there, stung and not very grateful for the impromptu sermon, Joe and I cheered and whispered to each other how we loved the guy and all that he preached. Sadly, within minutes, the Sebastopol police – an interesting partnership of a bald-headed stout captain of arms and the first dreadlocked policeman I’ve ever witnessed – swooped our speaker away – actually, they just walked him out the store and headed him in the direction of the farmer’s market, where they thought he might be better received amidst the fountain lovers, harp players, and beeswax sellers. We followed our hero for a bit, jumped in our truck, and made for hi-way one.

Our drive was bright blue the whole way. The Golden Gate – I don’t know why, but always raises the spirit a notch – loomed like a vivid postcard before us. 19th street was uneventful, and before we knew it, we traveled that long stretch of one from Daly City past a junked and confused surf of Pacifica, meanwhile sharing the road with the occasional AIDS Life Cycle bicycle riders from San Francisco to LA, all while reading aloud a book a friend lent me called, A Walk in the Woods, by Bill Bryson.

We stopped at the traditional surf spots and sat above the cliffs and bluffs of Cowells beach where a nice four foot swell served at least a hundred surfers to the shore, all happily stoked even after maneuvering the LA freeway conditions out there. The swell looked promising but the tide was high and so we moved a little farther south into the town of Capitola where we found incredible four-foot perfect peaks that loomed one after another beneath the kelp beds. Like gods from below, they slowly rise, peak and break perfectly down the line, a gift, a long wall of cold, blue water, from Netune’s bounty.

And so we dawned our old, dry and crackly wetsuits. Mine had not been worn for a good long winter. It fit way too tight – I had either gained a lot of weight, or something happens to wetsuits after a long dry winter – but managed to get it on with help from Joe and so together, like two stiff middle aged penguins, we dove in.

What can I say? The water was refreshingly cold. All that I had experienced before in my surfing life suddenly overswept me like a big long wave. The swell welcomed us with a few good rides at the beginning. I was testing my rib cage out – the latest injury – but the conditions lent itself to a small little surf, truly tapered to SWR standards. And then, suddenly, as if he needed a long lap from a wearisome day of junior lifeguards, strand walkers, waders, baby dippers, seals, fishing boats, paddle boats, surfers and snorklers, Posiedon laid to rest and fell completely into a dream. We sat, no waves for a good twenty five minutes, but refreshed and wet, and decided to head to our campsite to get warmed by a fire and rested for tomorrow’s waves.