……’$15,000 Sports Council grant some years before………..Well, anyway, Ben and Joan were out tandem surfing one day and, ummm, ah…………………………

Watch for the next exciting episode!

Will they pull off their inside- the-

tube-loop together? Will Ben stab

Joan to death with his credit card?

What will happen to the Oceanic? And

what will the Wasters say? In case

they don’t say anything, you can

finish the story yourself. Start here:

Eventually the full 5 parts to the tale was printed in Wessex Surf Clubs magazine Tube News in Aug 1984 and here is is;

The Exlife File

A Tale of Guts, Thunder and Surfing – by SW & DP

Part One: A Future For The Past?

In the year 2025 the Isle of Wight is a piece of soil, roughly triangular in shape, about 10 miles wide. During the late 1980′s a rapid an unexpected shift in weather patterns led to dominant and very vigorous areas of low pressures tracking east-north-east along an imaginary line from the Azores to Denmark. Complete meteorological nonsense, but who cars?

Ocean swells of unprecedented size and consistency washed out large areas of land from the Needles right through to St Catherine’s so that, in the year in which we speak, the ‘back of the Wight’ as it is known today, has long since succumbed to the relentless erosive power of the sea. Science knew no solution; councils (even Liberal ones), were powerless to resist; the Nettlestone Ladies Circle had a debate about it; and even the mighty National Suss saw all its hard-won lands being washed away by an endless procession of 25 foot close-outs. Fie and lackaday!

The local surfing population, however marvelled at their luck. Between 1987 and 1992 there were only fourteen days without waves, and their only problem was that after particularly violent swells they never knew how the coastline had changed and where they might find themselves tubed next……

Well, medical breakthroughs had become commonplace by the end of the century, so that the invention and production of ‘Exlife’ – the Elixir of life itself – did not create much of a stir. The water supply had long since been laced with all sorts of potions from aphrodisiacs to wart curatives, and society accepted with a shrug when the news broke that Exlife imbued the drinker with increased longevity and a partial return to youthful vigour. But for Rex and Rita, one-time hosts of the long lost Sun Inn, Exlife was the best thing since the ten dollar litre. Aged in the extreme, they snatched at the chance to restore their youth, so that over 90 years old, and with the faculties restored, they took on the stewardship of the ‘Oceanic’, a floating boozer anchored on roughly the same site as the old Sun before it was reclaimed by the sea.

Local Surfing was not left in the soup during this period of explosive development. Members of the Wight Association of Surfing Tube Riders, (W.A.S.T.E.R.S. for short), had multiplied to over 250 by the time Rex and Reet rejuvenated themselves with Exlife. The backbone of their clientele at the Oceanic was mainly wasters who dropped in, and then dropped in for a demi-litre between sets, or rather more at night, to rap about the day’s waves and watch the late, late surf show being performed under the arc lights outside. The Oceanic boasted the very latest in hydro-kinetic technology, (which only really meant that it floated), and it was permanently anchored in the deep channel inshore from Needles reef – artifically laid down with a $15,000 Sports Council grant some years before………….

Well, summer 2005 was a scorcher. Tourists flocked to the Island in unprecedented numbers, stretching the hyperfoil services to the limit. Some may think it strange that the idea of a road link with the mainland in the form of a bridge or tunnel (which had, incidently had its first real public airing  as long ago as 1982), had never actually come to fruition. But the plain fact of the matter was that, with erosion continuing at such an alarming pace, there wouldn’t be any Island to link with before long, so the authorities dismissed the idea asa waste of effort and went off to play golf instead. They would have more than enough to occupy them before much longer, anyway…….

However, this trans-Solent hassle did nothing to dampen the Slicks annual ‘beano’ to the Isle of Wight. Mick Slick drank to his heart’s content in the Oceanic; his wife Daph, spent the entire time horizontal on the beach getting as tanned as possible (but only so she could crow about it to the neighbours when she got back home); Darren and Karen, their teenage kids, took advantage of cheap board hire and thrashed it out in the soup with the masses; and Gran Slick spent the time engaged in a mixture of all three. It was with great regret, therefore, that they swayed off back to London, drink-drunk, sun-drunk, and surf-drunk respectively, but more especially as Gran had fallen in with the locals, had decided to retire to the Island, so it meant leaving her behind. Trading the Big Smoke for the Big Stoke, she called.

It was not just the sun, waves or holiday euphoria which persuaded Gran Slick to hanf around, so much as her new-found friends and their unique attitude to life. Also, it will be remembered that Exlife worked ‘miracles’ and this was the biggest single enabling factor of all. For the locals’ part, they liked her – and everyone agreed it was good to see the old trout stoked. None of this is to say that they abondoned their native style for the surfing cult. Exlife rejuventaed the body, but they still conducted themselves according to their age….well, mostly anyway. Sundays they would congregate on the beach by the band stand, genteely sipping a few pre-surf cocktails, while the strains of the palm orchestra, borne aloft by a light offshore, wafted out across the morning sand to the line up. It is true that gran Slick tended to prefer a few litres at the Oceanic with the lads, but felt she ought to socialise with her peers as well. To both these groups of people, she was something of an enigma, and so her fame began to spread – not least because of her rapidly increasing ability in the waves, which, as the more cynical (and less capable) amongst them remaked, correlated closely with her booze consumption.

Now, it will be realised that the whole south coast, not just the Isle of Wight, was something of a retirement hideaway for folks all over the country. Moreover, those most likely to benefit from Exlife came from the same age group. None of this really occured to Gran Slick, or if it did, it didn’t bother her. Why should it? She was having the time of her life! Keeping wet all day with her mates, learning to appreciate the pattern of tide and swell, two-stepping the night away with the palm orchestra under a red harvest moon, getting more razzed than was proper, but simply surfing it off the following morning…. it was an idyllic existence.

But the forces of nature cannot be easily be tampered with. Little did Gran Slick, or indeed anyone, know that the very substance that had made it all possible – Exlife, the exlixir of life itself – was soon to wreak a most terrible revenge.

Part Two: ‘Arry Devo.

Through the door of the Oceanic, into the smoke, beer fumes, and general boozy hubbub, past the bar, under the videostat screen and into the back room, through a door ambiguously labelled ‘This Room Is Available For Private Functions – Enquire At The Bar’.

Inside, an intense game of shove-dollar is in progress. We enter the scene during the beer break, eavesdropping on a conversation between to crusty locals.

‘Where’s ‘Arry tonight?

‘Sill ol’ bugger devoed yesterday’

‘Oh! My missus said she saw a video report about the government trying to sort it out. Sounds like the usual crap to me…..’

Here he tails off, realising his gaffe.

Part Three: Shoob-Dooby-Doo-Whap, Devo-Do-Wap.

Autumn. The sun again moving away from the Tennyson, or what was left of it after the sea had done its work. Exlife coursing through the veins of the Southern Water Underground Authority, and then down the throats of the population. Gran Slick improving her surfing performance with every tide.

In the meantime there were a number of very strange incidents, dotted around the country, which, notwithstanding, hardly even made the local press.. In Aberdeen a respectable solicitor on the verge of retirement ‘disappeared’. The only clue was a large brown mass of material on his office floor.Likewise, a middle aged housewife in Oxford just vanished, apparently. In the post that day had been notification that she had won first prize in the state lottery. The bewildered husband discovered the evidence on the front doormat on arriving home from work: atacky brown mass just inside the door, and the lottery ticket resting neatly on top. These two examples were repeated perhaps half a dozen times more in places a far afield as Penzance and Thurso, Aberystwyth and Cromer.Over a matter of weeks the incidents increased in frquency, made national news and became the talking point in every house in the country.Doctors, Scientists – in fact, all the best brains in medicine – were baffled. There were no common factors to the phenomenon, since it was no respecter of age, sex, class or geographical location. All, that is, except one: the mysterious Brown Mound. Very soon it took on the proportions of an epidemic, there was an emergency debate about it in Parliment (and the Nettlestone Ladies Circle), and eventually it was disclosed that the sudden demise of all these innocents was due to the hitherto undetected side-effect of Exlife. Obviously, the emergence of this most embarressing fact caused problems. The pharmaceutical industry was in uproar; MegaPharm, the offending company, lost credibility overnight, shares plummetted and the board of directors left the country on masse, whilst the Exlife Project Director jumped off the Telecom Tower along with his entire team of research chemists. Um-hmmm!

Perhaps more embarressing still was the unpalatable discovery that these so called Brown Mounds were found to be composed entirely of human waste material..

During these awful weeks of accusation, finger-pointing and counter-accusation, the Exlife Effect, as it offcially became dubbed, continued unabated, Contrary to first assessments of the effect, which said it struck without warning, in certain parts of the country there was a ‘softening’ of the process so that the victim had ample warningof his demise in the familiar form of rather too many visits to the toilet. This might have been due to the hardness of the water in which Exlife was dissolved, (as was the case with Southern England), but everyone was too busy working on an antedote to worry overmuch about that.

In addition to the national chaos, there was a further diruption on a local level. Sparks flew as never before in the hallowed chamber sof the IWCC when it was discovered that council officials had accepted a bribe from a leading tissue manufacturer who wanted to secure a massive contract – this was one of the many emergency measures implemented to relieve ‘distress’. Another included a massive injection of capital into the ‘public amenities’ building programme…… none of which was helped by the striking sewage workers whon demanded a huge wage rise due to the increased workload.

The final insult to the human race came when a government spokeman sheepishly reported on the videostat that Exlife itself was not really at fault, but that confusion had arisen due to a mistake in the mass of written material which inevitably accompanies any major project – and then stammered ‘excuse me’ and rushed off camera looking very full in the face. The blunder had arisen when an overworked secretary made a mistake when typing out the formula for Exlife, for filing in the company vaults. Complications erose because MegaPharm also produces Exlax, an old herbal remedy with an entirely different function to Exlife, and it appeared that the secretary had confused the two.

Meanwhile, the Effest was beginning to pass into local parlance as ‘devoing’ (from the definitive ‘to devo’) or ‘getting the DV’s', both bastardisations of the official work ‘devolving’, first mentioned in a useless government Brown Paper called the ‘Evolution of Devolution’ Hence also the Devo Squad, (coloquially, ‘DS’), which consisted of local task forces empowered to shovel the remains of the victims into plastic sacks and cart them off to collection points for eventual analysis, in the exhaustive search for an antidote. Researchers declared that it was not enough to simply withdraw Exlife from the water supply because once in the digestive system it affected one’s metabolism almost indefinitely, so all they could do was carry on prodding specimens into test tubes and hope for the best.

Part Four: ‘Fiddling While Rome Burns’

“At Least”, said Gran Slick cynically, one autumn day in the line up. “I’ve got an excuse for soiling my suit now, can’t blame it on all those darned outside sets!” “Well your new suits due soon, anyway Gran”, replied one of the other surfers. “Yep”, she answered. “Any day now. One of those Gulskin ones with ‘D’ Seal. Brillian! I reckon we’ve got a responsibility to wear turdproof suits these days…. just a tick, what’s that?… OUTSIDE!” and then, looking down, and with a curl of the lip, “Oh no, not again!”

Yes, pollution at sea was yet another worrying ramification of the Effect – for water folk, at least. It was all very well for devo on land where one’s remains could be disposed of gracefully, but in the water it was a different matter. Even in the early stages, those smitten with the Effect on land always had a sporting chance of reaching a public amenity in time, and ‘do the bizz’ in private. But in the ocean…. It didn’t concern Gran too much: ‘Que Sera’ an all that. Local surfers just carried on in their more or less unflappable way, handling each new swell better than the previous one and since the chill autumn days were now on them forsaking the palm orchestra for the warm atmosphere of the Oceanic whenever they needed refreshment. Strangely, none of their number had done the Big D yet, and though a few pessimists thought it was inevitable, sooner or later, they mainly put their resistance down to an inherent fitness.

It was around this time that great interest was aroused by an archaeological find on a dig on the south west coast of the Island. Bronze Age Skeletons were found encased in a stratum of sandstone about 30 metres up from the beach. At the same time, a descendant of the crank 20th Century Von Mescalin advanced the theory that a human holocaust of a similar nature had occured deep in the deepest past and that the Effect was therefore subtely but indelibly etched into the DNA of the species. Hence, it was only a matter of time and favourable circumstances for the cycle to begin again. Certainly, the Bronze Age finds on the south west coast lent weight to Von Mescalin’s unlikely theory, since the position in which the skeletons were discoveredsuggested that the victims had been deep in a spitting primordial tube at the time of their demise – and that they quite obviously had devoed in the excitement, fright – or a combination of both. Von Mescalin also advanced a meto-scientific theory that environmental conditions then were being duplicated now – ie, massive storm disturbance at sea – and confidently predicted that an absolute mother of a swell was, without doubt, due.

However, none of this took precedent in the media over the central problem of neutralising the Effect, and about the only groups to take much notice of Von Mescalin were those who stood to lose (environmentalists, National Suss etc.), or those who stood to gain (archaeologists, Von Mescalin himself, Gran Slick and friends). What coverage the philosophers ideas did receive  was mainly negative, the official view being that the old fool ought to address himself to more pressing problems instead of farting around in dusty archives with weather charts and back issues of Wight Water, Tube News etc. in order to research his theory. it was also “reprehensible to fiddle while Rome burned”, but all Von Mescalin could say to that was “I’m tone deaf and Haly pisses mme off”.

Part Five: Devologue of Disaster

Gran was on her thrid litre of the lunchtime session on a late December Sunday, killing time during a very rare flat spell. After two days without waves she was a bit edgy, a bit bored. At least she could keep herself in trim by paddling out to the Oceanic instead of taking the amphibus like everyone else. Anyway, it was low tide right now, and the meteocast was about due, so she had the landlord switch the videostate to BBC 9 and settled back with a fresh booze to watch it. Most of the other wasters were there too, jaded and surprised at the lack of swell, so they all clustered around the screen in anticipation of what the meteocaster had to offer. Two days of calm seas were almost unprecedented  in living memory, and so there was an air of expectancy in the bar of the Oceanic that afternoon: surely it couldn’t go on much longer. Could it?

Anticipation boiled over into delight at the infra-red satellite image which flickered onto the screen – for there, like some global whirligig, lay the deepest, most vigorous depression they’d ever see: it was so-oo-o low! So Von Mescalin was right! This was the big mother of a swell he’d been predicting all along. The moment the meteocast was over, there was a second of stunned silence and then the air was buzzing with cat-calls, loud conversation , hoots, round buying and general euphoria as they began to psyche each other up for the appoaching surf. Plans were made, wagers agreed on, strategies discussed….. that right there was an improptu party at the Oceanic, and no-one would have guessed that, only a few hous before a air of despondency had been hanging over the place.

Monday was awful – like waiting for payday, holidays, the sneeze that never comes and the right wave to try your stick out on, all rolled into one. By evening time everyone was convinced it had to be on the next days tide, about midday. So they waited and waited; minutes turned into hours,each one five times longer than the last, interminable, dragging, endless…..

Tuesday it wass there!! Already it was overhead and building with every set, solid liquid lines marching towards the remnants of the coast. Cool, passive blue consealing awesome power, honed to perfection by a steady north easterly breeze. The depleted island under a pale canopy of winter sun, braced for another onslaught. Nobody ever say such a frenzied rush to go surfin’ as there was that morning at the beach.

Ever got your foot stuck down you wetsuit leg? Tripped over your leash running down the cliff? Had an expectant, thumping pulse before pushing off into the soup?So did they, all of ‘em: Gran Slick almost over the top with it all. DV’s, erosion, Exlife; all forgotten in the headlong rush into the water, so anxious were they for their stoke.

Hands and arms dipping and pulling through cold, thick water, stroking through the medium, head up and eyes in the horizon – watching and ready to react. The board feels right, fresh flakes of wax floating off in its wake: Todays the day.

Gran Slick and the others paddled swiftly out on the rip, taking them under the shadow of the Oceanic, where spectators clustered at windows and out to the artifical Needles Reef, over half a mile from shore. There was much friendly rivalry this day – part of the psyching up process – as everyone laid claim, in advance, to the biggest wave, deepest tube, steepest re-entry; but Gran had become a little detached form it all. To tell the truth, she was just a bit worried. Today was testing time; after her meteoric rise to surfing fame in only a few months, Gran Slick felt she needed to pull out all the stops to maintain respect and keep the kudos flowing.

All the time the swell was building and with each outside set they responded by paddling further out after each wave. It was really pumping – 10, 12, 15? – and yet still not maxed out! Gran’s first few waves were much needed tasters, confidence boosters which were ridden with a competent, if not an explosive finesse. Back at the line up after her fourth such wave, things went quiet for a while – a lull. A false sense of security was just beginning to settle over the area when a call of ‘outside’ sparked off a frantic scratching towards the horizon. This was the Big One! Gran Slick’s insides churned as the realisation dawned that she was directly in line for it as it loomed up before her. No backing out now – this one had her name on it. Blood, Exlife and adrenalin sand in her ears as she swung the board round, paddled deep and hard twice; jumped to her feet and rocketted downwards, fighting the uprush of wind on this waves’s face. A deep, sweeping bottom turn, way out onto the flat, as the fortex threatened to engulf her at any moment, and then another arcing turn off the top sending a sheet of spume high into the air.

Binoculars focussed on Gran Slick from the south west windows of the Oceanic; muted expressions like “Jesus she’s going for this one”, and “Nicely, Gran, shit or bust!” Gran Slicks board performing like a dream, foot to the floor out of the tube and accelerating away with nothing to lose….

She was riding intuitively, riding on nerves and instinct, with no time for thought or rational assessment. It was all happening so fast – yet she’d been on this wave all her life. The stoke was unbelievable! Every manoevre better than the last, flying out of the turns and, well, just plain rad! Ooo-ee!! The boys would love this one! As the wave humped up, steepening for its final attack, Gran Slick marshalled all her faculties – and pulled off the best re-entry of her short career, a vertical magic carpet ride which defied description.

A short career? Too short. Gran Slick glanced up and was horrified at what lay ahead. No time to react, Even less time for evasive action. Shit or bust, she’d said.

As the wave towered over, and threatened to engulf, the venerable floating boozer itself, Gran Slick slammed into the Oceanic – and devoed mightily all over the south west windows.

And so, many years later, long, long after the last particles of soil – all that was left of the once verdant Isle of Wight – had disolved into the ocean, it was still said of the legendary Grans Slick that she brought new meaning to that imortal surfing phrase, “ripping the shit out of it.”

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It sounded too good to be true, after all those years of watching ‘Morning of the Earth’, ‘Crystal Voyager’, Endless Summer’ and other classic surf movies I couldn’t believe we were actually on an adventure to surf somewhere that was still thought of as a secret.

After some great waves on Bali we travelled across to the western tip of the Island and the port of Gilimanuk to catch the ferry to Ketapang and Banyuwangi in Java. I think the Bemo driver was having a laugh with us as he dropped everyone off, but took us another mile down the road where we had to get another Bemo back to the ferry port. On the ferry we met a very friendly Javanese guy who insisted we come and eat dinner at his families’ restaurant once we had disembarked from the ferry.

The train journey ahead was a long one and we were not prepared. Everything we did was on the cheap so to maximise our stay (the full 2 months we had on our visas) in Indonesia. We had opted for the economy class train (it must have saved us at least £2 each) which took about 14 hours to get to Surabaya. What we didn’t realise was that it stopped 3 times at every station. Just before the station to let the street sellers on, and then again after the station to let them off. You can only understand how crazy you start to feel after a few hours of this, if you have experienced it yourself.

Being the only Europeans on the train we got a lot of interest and always had people wanting to talk to us and the sellers always trying to get us to buy fruit, rice and all sorts of other things. It was a great way to try new things and we ate rice out of big green leaves and tried some very spiky and knobbly looking fruit.

Obviously being on a train for that many hours at some point nature calls and I needed to know if there was a toilet on the train. Thankfully the lady next to me said I would need to go to the end of the carriage. When I got to the end of the carriage, which took some time as the train was extremely full now, there were two guys standing in the open door of the toilet. I gestured that I needed to go in there and they just squeezed to one side to allow me in. I now realised that the toilet was just a cupboard with no door and a whole in the floor and the tracks zooming by beneath me, which I was now sharing extremely closely with two other guys. At this point I decided that nature must have been calling someone else and I went back to my seat.

At some point during the journey a young lad/lady (not sure which but you know what I mean) spotted us and started to talk loudly in Javanese to us. We had no idea what he/she was saying but everyone else on the carriage thought it was hilarious at which point he/she decided to sing to us. The carriage was so crowded all we could do was sit and smile politely. Richard Harvey won’t remember any of this because he was so traumatised by the whole experience. Don’t worry Rich, he/she wasn’t interested in us, only Richard Holmes (the good looking ex model – so he kept telling us). Getting no reaction from us the he/she quickly moved on.

After a couple of train changes, travelling through Surabaya and Yogaykarta we eventually arrive at Bandung where we spend the night feeling a little frazzled. We now need to find transport to take us south. It was really hectic, all we wanted was to get to the beach and get some waves. Eventually we think we’ve found a Bemo that is going where we want to go. The driver takes our surfboards and to our horror attempts to tie them to the roof with a bit of string and our leashes, before piling on crates of chickens and suitcases and anything else that won’t fit inside the Bemo. He assures us everything is fine and ushers us into the Bemo. If you haven’t been in one of these little mini buses in Indonesia you will find that they don’t tend to use their brakes very often and just honk the horn a lot. We saw quite a few bemos in ditches, or with passengers helping to turn them back onto their wheels after rolling, luckily not the one that we were in.

The Bemo drops us off at the closest stop to Turtles and we decide to spend the night in this tiny village. All we knew was that Turtles was near Genteng, so we found a losman for the night and walked to the nearest restaurant. There was one person in the Restaurant, a very tall man dressed in an extremely smart military uniform who came straight over to talk to us. He turned out to be the General of the near by Air Force base and his name sounded something like Superman, I wasn’t going to argue with him. The General turned out to be really friendly and at the end of the evening paid for our meals.

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The next morning we arranged for someone to drive us to Mamas Losman a mile or so from the break we’d heard so much about. When we arrived at Mamas we were greeted by an Aussie, Ben White from Cronulla. Ben was really pleased to see us as he was there on his own and hadn’t surfed that day, saying a couple of others had left the day before. Ben was in the middle of repairing a broken fin on his surfboard and said he wasn’t keen to surf Turtles on his own. We soon get settled in and get our mosquito nets up in our rooms.

Located in front of a prawn factory, the local spot name is Pangumbahan, but known as Turtles because it’s near the Turtles nest. With luck you will surf with the Turtles (I think I was the only one NOT to see any Turtles – Gutted).

Turtles lurches abruptly onto the dead coral reef, making the take-off critical, and then leading into some hooked walls and nice barrel sections at lower tides. It gets classic and is pretty consistent although the south easterly winds usually pick up throughout the day, so best early morning. You must remember to kick out before the sudden shutdown section at the rusty pipe pylons.

We were told we would probably need a couple of boards to cope with what it could throw at us. A quiver here would be shortboards from 5’9″ – 6’6″ (with swallow tail, roundpin tail, round tail) or semi-gun 6’8″ – 7’4″. You need fast board if you want to make the really fast left hand Barrels, but at high tide, you can ride a much smaller board. (Designs have changed a lot since the earlt 90′s so this may be slightly inaccurate now)

The very next morning after an amazing breakfast, (I think it was like a rice pudding but was delicious) we headed off down the track towards Turtles in anticipation. I was quite nervous and didn’t know what to expect. Along the way a dog from the local village joined us darting in and out of the bush chasing something (that didn’t help my nerves).

Once we reached the break, I must have stood there for a few minutes with my mouth open. It was one of the most amazing waves I’d ever seen and quite close to shore. The sea was a gorgeous blue with these perfect head high barrels breaking over the reef. Ben explained where we should try to enter the water, right between the pilings where it looked to be sucking dry over the reef.

Rich Holmes went down onto the beach to do some yoga to warm up and I decided to grab a few pics. As Ben entered the water he made it look easy paddling out to the line up very quickly. Next up was Rich Harvey, he looked nervous and stood and watched it for a while. Eventually Rich went for it and it looked like he got sucked out to the line up very quickly. After Rich Holmes had paddled out it was time for me to get in. I had brought two boards with me and had opted to go with the bigger board which was a 7’4” x 18″ x 2 1/4″ (we were riding very thin, narrow boards back then) MCD semi gun shaped by Kym Thompson (Watercooled surfboards) until I felt comfortable (lol). The other three were goofy footers with me being a natural, it meant I was on my backhand (and I’ve never been great on my backhand).

I stepped up to the pilings and watched a wave come up and jumped in. It all seemed ok to start with and then as the water rushed out to meet the next wave it got very shallow and the reef was only an inch or two under my knuckles. I knew if I’d got this wrong it was going to get messy and it was looking bad as the next wave started to close over the reef. The 7’4” wasn’t the easiest thing to duck dive and with only a couple of inches of water under me, I just made myself as small as possible and shut my eyes. Somehow the last rush of water pulled me just under the lip and I was spat out the back.

Once in the line up the first thing I noticed was that the waves seemed to come out of nowhere. You couldn’t really see much of a wave looking out to the horizon but a few feet a way they would rise out of the deep. With only 4 of us in the water we just took turns grabbing waves. The only problem with this, was there was no waiting to grab a small one for my first wave. The smaller waves through the inside actually seemed to have a more critical take off than the set waves out the back anyhow.

Ben had told us the take off was critical and that we needed to be quick to our feet but I wasn’t ready and first wave up and I went over the falls. It felt like I had been dragged up and thrown over a second time before I came up, but it wasn’t too bad. I went back for more and soon mastered the drop and found I could push as hard as I could, driving through the bottom turns on my backhand.

Once out on the face of the wave, initially I would just try to go as fast as I could to safety, but as the tide pushed up I started having a blast. Rich Holmes was on a 6’6” and he was about 6’ tall. I watched him go over the falls on take off over and over again but eventually he got it sussed, I’ve never seen anyone take off so late. Our first days surf and we were stoked.

Everytime we turned up to surf at Turtles the guys from the prawn factory wwould come down to watch. They were all really friendly but communication was brief as we knew very little Javanese and they didn’t know any English.

When we got back to Mamas two more surfers from Cronulla, had just turned up, Francis Crossle and Ken Cantor. Francis is a physiotherapist who a few years later was physio for Tina Turner when she played in Sydney. Ken Cantor was a water photographer and Knee Boarder who had had two cover shots for Tracks magazine. Francis and Ken couldn’t believe that they had travelled to this tiny remote spot in Indonesia only to find three Pommies already there. It was soon time for dinner and more great food was laid on, with lots of freshly caught fish and rice.

Next morning we were all up early looking forward to more great waves. The comradeship in the water was the best I’ve ever experienced with guys I’d only known a day or two, shouting each other into waves and hooting every time someone took the drop. It definitely helped when it was my turn to go and I was lined up for one of the bigger sets with the other guys shouting go go go…..

Francis would charge anything and Ken was taking some of the latest drops I’d ever seen on his knee board and getting really deep in the barrel.

Over the next few days as we all started to gain more confidence and take more chances. This resulted in injuries and I think I was first with a nice fin cut to the side of my foot that needed paper stitches and busted fins on my board.

That afternoon I decided to keep out of the water but still go and take some pics. The swell had got up, but the wind had picked up too, making some challenging conditions. Francis seemed to be in his element taking some big drops, but Ben who had been getting barrel after barrel earlier was struggling to do the same in the bumpy conditions only making it out of about half this session. After being pitched a few times Ben came in and his back looked raw after being scraped along the reef.

The next morning when we got to the break there was a guy already out. Where did he come from? He wasn’t staying at Mamas and as far as we knew there was nowhere else to stay. The guys name was Ashley from Western Australia and he was staying with a family from the local fishing village with his sister and two of her friends. Ashley seemed to know the break pretty well and was pulling into barrel after barrel.

That night we invited Ashley and the girls back to Mamas for a few drinks and surf trip stories. Ashley and Ben were both on a search for new waves and secret spots. Ben had already spent 2 months in Indonesia and been over to Thailand to refresh his visa (you could only get a two month visa for Indo) and come back to Java. Ashley seemed to know of a few breaks on some of the other Islands that I’d never heard of and it wasn’t long before plans were being made to get to these other breaks.

All this talk of waves and secret spots was great but we hadn’t been in the company of girls for a couple of weeks. Ben and I persuaded a couple of the girls to come down to the secluded beach to watch the sunset.

All that week we had perfect surf. Every morning it was offshore with light winds picking up by lunchtime and dropping again late afternoon. It really did feel like we had found the perfect spot. One morning when we turned up we could see a surf charter boat out to sea, so we hid behind the bushes until it was gone so they couldn’t work out where the waves were. (These days I think lots of people go there by boat and some of the reviews I’ve seen haven’t rated it as a good wave. But if you make the effort to learn about the break and be there at the right time, by getting there early morning and and at low tide it’s epic).

On the second to last day Rich Harvey was sitting slightly inside and paddled for a wave but decided not to go at the last minute. He was too late, as he tried to pull back, sitting back on his board he was sucked over the falls. Rich was slammed into the reef head first coming up with blood all over his face. Luckily nothing was broken but it was enough to put Rich off going in again.

I remember one morning this huge set came through cleaning up everyone except for me. I just managed to punch through the lip of the first wave and found myself alone in the line up and in position for the next huge wave. I started to paddle for it before backing off as I realised that this wave was different and was just closing out right across the bay. As I sat back and watched the wave break, I realised it was going right across the bay and as far as I could see in both directions. I also realised I was a lot further out, and out of position for the reef. The two waves washed everyone else in towards the shore and both waves went right up the sand on the beach. Normally we surfed over the reef on the point which hooked around towards the beach before closing out into a shore break. At the time it just seemed odd, but about a month later I picked up a copy of ‘Surfing Life’ magazine and there was an article about a tsunami that had hit East Java early that morning on that day. Over 200 people had died and many surfers had been caught up in it at the surf camp at G-Land. Had we been caught up in the tail end of the tsunami? I guess I’ll never know for sure but those two waves were very different.

One evening someone from Mamas told us that the wave that broke right out front of where we were staying was sometimes ridden. It was a long way out across the reef but we thought we’d go and check it out. The wave raced along really fast but it just looked much too shallow, so none of us fancied giving it a go.

On the last day we had really good size waves and I had to go out on my smaller board. I found I was taking really late drops and although I pulled into a few barrels, I wasn’t coming out of many (actually I only made one or two). Eventually I pushed my luck too far and got really worked. When I finally popped up, I was right in the impact zone so my first thought was ‘I’ve got to get out of here’. When I finally made it to the line up it was starting to get dark and Ben was the only person still in the water. My leg didn’t feel right and I glanced back to see lots of blood. I shouted at Ben to see if he would have a look at my leg and see what I’d done. Ben went very pale when he looked at my leg and just said ‘you gotta get out of the water’ and promptly caught a wave to the beach leaving me on my own.

Thought’s started to race through my mind, ‘it’s getting dark’, ‘there are lots sharks around (having seen what was at the local fish markets)’ and ‘I’m bleeding a lot’. I very quickly paddled towards the beach and away from the reef. Glancing over my shoulder at my calf I was sure I could see things that weren’t supposed to be on the outside. I wasn’t sure If I’d be able to stand so I stayed prone all the way to the beach. I don’t know what sliced me open but it had made a big hole in my calf.

Ken and Francis came down and helped me get up the beach while someone went back to arrange a moped to come and get me and take me back to Mamas. Once we were back at Mamas the pain had kicked in but Francis took over and went and got his medical kit. Being a physio he had just about everything in it. Francis cleaned up my leg and I think a few of the boys sat on me while they put iodine on the wound (that brings tears to your eyes, I think they use Betadine these days which doesn’t hurt). Francis said he had stitches but had never stitched anyone up before and he wasn’t sure if I needed internal stitches, so he patched me up as best he could.

I needed to go to some sort of medical facility and it was now mid evening and very dark. The nearest hospital we knew of was in Pelabuhan Ratu which was about 5-6 hours drive away. We didn’t have any transport and you didn’t just phone for an ambulance. I was in a remote location in a third world country and I needed a doctor. ‘Oh crap’ is as polite away of saying what was going through my head at that time.

Someone from Mamas very kindly said they would drive me in to hospital in their minibus, but they didn’t have enough fuel. There wasn’t a local garage but they said it wouldn’t be a problem as long as I had money. I grabbed all the cash I had and my walkman and was helped aboard the minibus. Rich Harvey came with me and we set off in search of fuel. I was in a lot of pain and just put on my walkman with some Celibate Rifles cranked right up. I suddenly noticed we seemed to be going door to door around the local houses. The driver was trying to get fuel from people he knew from the village. I just handed over my cash; I didn’t care what it cost.

After a couple of hours we stopped and the driver got out and what looked like a couple of nurses came to the minibus. I didn’t know what was going on as I knew it was at least 5 hours to Pelabuhan Ratu. There was a discussion between the driver and the nurses and then they looked at me. I looked at Rich, he had the translation book. From what Rich could work out, was that this was a training school and they didn’t normally treat people like me but they’d have a go. I wasn’t interested in someone ‘having a go’, I would have rather stayed at Mamas and let Francis ‘have a go’. So we carried on until we got to the proper hospital.

When we go to the hospital I was shattered and still in a lot of pain. I was helped into some sort of theatre and put on the table. It wasn’t quite like being at St Mary’s Hospital. It didn’t look particularly clean and the doctor and nurses uniforms were pretty old and grubby, but at least the instruments were clean. I had actually brought needles and syringes with me that I bought from a chemist in Australia.

Before they would do anything, some forms were thrust at me to sign and I had to pay them. It was all in Javanese so I didn’t have a clue what I was signing. I really didn’t care by then, I just wanted it stitched up and some pain killers. Although I did joke with Rich that I hoped I hadn’t just signed away my kidneys. As I lay on the table being stitched up I realised I was watching geckos running up and down the walls and there were mosquito’s buzzing around my head.

I must have fallen asleep on the way back to Mamas as the trip didn’t seem to take as long, not being in so much pain helped. Once back, all that was left for me to do was to pack up my things. A few of the boys had an early surf and Ben had decided to go in search of more secret waves with Ashley.

Rich Harvey, Rich Holmes, Francis and Ken arranged for transport back to Pelabuhan Ratu where they could get some more waves at Cimaja. On route to Pelabuhan Ratu Francis suddenly asked the driver to stop at a little village. Francis had spotted a guy who was working on the side of the road. He turned out to be the local wood worker. Francis had broken a fin and wanted to know if this guy would be able to make him a wooden one. The whole village seemed to turn out to greet us and in no time at all this guy was shaping Francis a new fin. It was amazing to watch him work with such basic tools and turn out a beautifully carved fin from a tree trunk. We watched the whole process, from cutting a plank from a huge log to the final sanding. Francis was so impressed that he got him to make him another one as a souvenir (I had an email from Francis recently to say he still has the fins on his mantle now, over 17 years later).

We all stayed in one big room in Pelabuhan Ratu and in the middle of the night I heard someone quietly getting cross. I couldn’t sleep as the pain killers had worn off and was very uncomfortable. I’m also a very light sleeper and Francis was snoring for all of Australia. I realised the person sat up in bed getting cross was Ken. I pretended to be a sleep, but in the morning I spoke to Ken about it and he said he hadn’t had any sleep the whole trip due to Francis’s snoring.

The boys came back from surfing Cimaja saying what a great little wave it was but that the water was very murky and they thought they had touched something swimming under water. I didn’t like to tell them about all the sharks I’d seen at the local fish market when I’d hobbled along to the telephone exchange to make arrangements to get home.

From Pelabuhan Ratu, Rich Harvey and Rich Holmes got the train back to the other side of Java to go back to Bali. I went onto Jakarta with Ken and Francis who were flying on from there. My flights home were supposed to be out of Bali but I was hoping that Quantas would let me change my flight so I could leave from Jakarta. Jakarta was an eye opener for me, as on some streets you had people in total squalor on one side of the road and people in suits driving Porches and Mercedes on the other side the road seemingly oblivious to the plight of the people across the road.

When we got to the airport Quantas were very kind and changed my flight arrangements free of charge, but there wasn’t a flight out until the next morning. Ken and Francis weren’t flying out until the next day so we went and found a place to stay. That night we spent the night drinking in the bar and I spent the last of my money drinking bottled Guinness, something I hadn’t had since I left the UK some 12 months previous.

Ken and Francis dropped me at the airport early as they had to get off and I suddenly realised how difficult it was with two boards, a huge rucksack and my camera gear. I had help all the way to the airport but now hopping about on one leg with all my gear it was quite difficult.

A very kind lady who worked at the airport called Monica Retno saw me struggling and came over and helped me get my gear onto a trolley and then got me to my gate. I had completely forgotten that I needed to pay airport tax and had spent all my money in the bar the previous evening. Monica must have seen my look of panic and paid my tax for me. A ‘Huge Thank You’ to you Monica if you ever read this.

Once on the plane, I found that the plane was completely packed and was so pleased that I’d managed to get a seat. Then I realised that I was sitting between to huge guys who seemed to be taking up the whole three seats. I squeezed into my seat and was just thankful that I was going home. My leg had started to hurt quite a lot and I was worried that it had gotten infected. Francis had been changing my dressings regularly but in the climate and the fact that it had taken so long to be stitched up, the chance of infection was high.

Once back on the Island I went straight from the ferry to A&E at St Mary’s Hospital as my calf was throbbing. The nurses couldn’t believe the state of my leg when they removed the dressings. The wound had to be opened up again and cleaned thoroughly with all the infected stuff squeezed out of my leg. I was then advised to leave the wound open and let the air get to it. After getting a tetanus I was allowed to go home.

After seeing my family the first thing I wanted to do was go to Compton. I couldn’t go in the sea but just wanted to get back to my home beach. I jumped in the car with my brother and drove to Compton. Walking along the beach I bumped into lots of friends and it suddenly dawned on me how so little had changed, yet I had experienced so much in the last year and I had changed. It was kind of comforting and I appreciated what we had here on the Island a little more too.

The accommodation was really good at Mamas but sadly Mama’s has now been sold and is now a surf camp as far as I know. I have also seen reports of illegal surf camps right on the beach in front of the wave ‘Turtles’. They’re built on environmentally friendly land that’s there to protect the turtles habitat. Many of the charter boats that look for surf along the Javanese coast visit Turtles too now. I have also heard reports of it being dangerous to visit as there are certain religious army training camps near by. I hope this is not true as it is an amazing part of the world, very beautfiul and very friendly people.

The BBC Countryfile team turned up at Compton on Thursday morning in style with a lovely blue VW Camper from Isle of Wight Camper Van Holidays. Ellie Harrison met up with Scott Gardner of Wight Water and son of Geoff ‘Ned’ Gardner, (one of the first to surf on the Island back in the sixties) to have a surf lesson.

The car park was a busy place while the film crew got ready for the days shoot and Scott got Ellie set up with a board. Ellie got a few tips from Sid Pitman one of the first members of the Isle of Wight Surf Club that was formed in 1967.

The conditions weren’t ideal with strong onshore winds but the sun came out and there were waves and Scott went out and grabbed a quick wave showing Ellie how it’s done. After a few lessons on the sand and a some warm up excersises Ellie and Scott finally hit the water for the lesson.  After a couple of initial tumbles Ellie looked like she was getting the hang of it and having a blast at the same time. By the end of the lesson Ellie was up and riding waves and getting huge cheers from everyone on the clifftop (sorry I missed you standing up Ellie, I’d gone to pick up Archie’s surfboard).

Rob Drake-Knight from Rapanui (and recently ‘Come Dine with Me’ fame) went in the water as spotter for Jules Benham the BBC Countryfile researcher and water cameraman. After Ellie’s lesson some of the guys from the Isle of Wight Surf Club went out and grabbed a few waves too. I just got back in time to see Joe Truman take out a 1970′s Tiki single fin surfboard to try out.

Ellie then went onto speak with Matt Harwood (Chairman of the Isle of Wight Surf Club), Mart Drake-Knight (Rapanui), Alan Reed (British Masters Longboard Champion), Mark New with Betty Tricket about Archie’s surfboard and wetsuit from the sixties.

Alan Reed then got to take Archie’s homemade surfboard  for a surf. Archie had surfed until he was 74 and the board hadn’t been in the sea for 15 years. Betty was really looking forward to seeing the board in the water again and remarked as Alan started to paddle it out that it reminded her of seeing Archie paddling the board all those years a go.

Al came in after catching a few waves saying how well it rode and it was a really lovely moment when Betty walked up a agve Al a big hug. Archie’s surfboard got a lot of interest and many of the the boys said how the shape of the board was actually ahead of it’s time with quite a lot of rocker in it.

At the end of the days shooting I bumped into Steve Williams who remembered Archie when he used to turn up the beach in his old Ford Anglia and walk down past the wreck to catch  a few waves. The episode is due to air on the 12 February 2012.

British Hovercraft Corporation (B.H.C.) had an apprentiuce hostel and training centre located in the old Naval Hospital in Whippingham on top of the hill in East Cowes and near to Osborne House. There were dormitories, workshops and a drawing school in the old wards which was a row of long buildings connected by a covered walkway. The dormitories were probably a bit like old being in a boarding school with rows of beds along the sides and lockers in the middle. Each dormintory could hold about 30 apprentices.

This is where Alan Hunter, Geoff ‘Ned’ Gardner, Derek ‘Cosmic Leashes’ Thompson, Tad Ciastula, Dougie Clark and Bob Booth started their working lives as Apprentice Engineers. The other apprentices were either from the mainland or came from parts of the Island where there was no sufficient public transport to be able to get them to work on time so they stayed at the hostel. The apprentices were a mixed bunch with Islanders, ex public school boys and lads from the ‘Metal Box Company’ in Croydon, London and the ‘Metal Box Company, Carlisle, Scotland who did their first years apprenticeship at the Training Centre on the island.

It was a melting pot of different people, many of whom went onto great things. All around the hostel were the old Saunders Roe Test Centre, with test tanks, windtunnels and various works. At the back of the dormitories was a big tin shed which would always be a hive of activity. The apprentices would spend their free time working on there own personal projects from bikes, motorbikes, scooters, cars, fly by wire model aeroplanes and shaping surfboards. This tin shed was just as essential to their learning as the Training Centre was.

Alan remembers that Tad’s father was a designer on the Saunders-Roe Skeeter, a two-seat training and scout helicopter. The Skeeter has the distinction of being the first helicopter to be used by the British Army Air Corps.

The apprentices were paid very little and out of their wages was taken rent/keep for staying at the hostel too. So on a friday morning they would trek over to Cowes to sign on as the government would subsidise apprentices wages. Some of the apprentices were lucky enough to do some cash work on a saturday morning reapiring hovercraft skirts for the Seaspeed Hovercrafts. Alan remembers being told of a story of when Tad was winching up a hovercraft to get at the skirts to repair them when the winch malfunctioned and tipped the hovercraft on end. Alan said if it had gone completely over the hovercraft would have been completely written off.

The apprentices were paid on a thursday and with what little they had, they would always be seen crossing the fields behind the hostel and around the back of the St Mildred’s Church at Whippingham and down to The Folly Inn. Geoff  ‘Ned’ Gardner was fondly remembered as a real character and for entertaining the other apprentices with impressions while they were at the pub. These were not your normal impressions but were amazing impressions of outboard motors. Alan remembers his impression of a Seagull Outboard Motor being started up particularly good.

Sunday nights were also spent at the Folly Inn, usually sitting out on the decking listening to the Goon Show on the radio and drinking scrumpy. On a few occasions Alan remembers Tad, Dougie, Derek and himself taking a couple of rowing boats from the slipway at BHC and rowing to the Woodvale Hotel in Gurnard for a few drinks.

Alan remembered buying a huge old Bilbo surfboard from Dougie Clark in about 1968/69 but admits he never really got into surfing. Dougie on the other hand wanted to make surfing his lifestyle, deciding to no longer wear shoes or socks as he wanted to harden his feet for surfing, and also decided he wasn’t going to wear a shirt and tie anymore, opting for a sweatshirt. The managers at BHC went absolutely mad but Dougie would not budge on the matter and insisted he would not wear shoes or a shirt and tie anymore.

In the tin shed/workshop at the back of the dormitories Derek Thompson brought in his old Lambretta Scooter anouncing that it looked really tatty and the spent weeks hand painting it in the workshop. When it was finished Alan says it was the most amazing paint job on a scooter he had ever seen. Derek jumped on the newly painted scooter and rode off down the road. After a few hundred yards one of the panels fell off and scraped along the road getting really badly scratched. Derek was gutted.

Tad and Dougie spent some of their time out in the old tin shed designing and shaping a knee board like the one George Greenough rides in Crystal Voyager with a scooped deck. Dougie also had an old 105E Anglia car and Tad and himself would always be driving off to the beach at Compton when they could to get waves or just to be at the beach.

In the dormitories Tad used to do this thing where he would stand on the edge of his bed and fall forward only putting his hands up in front of his chest to catch the fall as he landed flat on his bed. One day on the beach  when Tad went back to the car Dougie and Derek dug a huge hole where Tad had put his towel and then carefully laid the towel back down again over the hole. When Tad came back he stood at the bottom of the towel and dropped (just like he would on his bed), but this time he fell straight through his towel and into the huge hole. Alan says it was very dangerous and Tad was lucky not to have broken his neck, understandably Tad was furious.

Alan remembers one day Ned getting a really nasty gash across his head that needed stitches after pulling into a barrel at the bay.

Another surfer Alan remembered was a girl called Merry Hughes who went off to the south of Fance and Biarritz for a whole summer. When she returned from France Alan says that all of a sudden she got lots of attention from the boys as she had blossomed into an absolute stunner.

I told Alan that I’d been in touch with Tad and was hoping to speak to Bob Booth soon too but wondered if he knew the where abouts of some of the other apprentices. Alan says he remembers Dougie Clark heading off to Morroco to teach English language but hadn’t heard from him since and the last time he saw Derek Thompson was at Alexandra Palace at a Wind and Surf Exbo in the late 80′s advertising his leashes and Mountain Bikes. At the same show he said Tad had a special booth where he was shaping boards, which would have been about the time of Vitamin Sea surfboards.

Alan said he always used to try and keep in touch or at least find what the old apprentices were upto and it was great to see the write up on Tad and Sue and that they were still living the dream.

Alan also remember one day down at Little Hope Beach waiting for the waves to pick up when Carrots came flying down the hill right from the top on his skateboard until he hit the curb at the bottom and ended up in a heap.

The area to be evaluated runs along shoreline of the Island on the South West side, along the line of the Military Road and go out into a large triangle in the channel. This covers most of the most commonly surfed area of the Isle of Wight and is in an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) and a Heritage Coast.

The Government awarded the licence and now they have to go through the local planning process with Isle of Wight Council. They will have to advertise the planning application for the onshore part of the operation-probably in the County Press. Once advertised public will be able to give comments. The company already had an onshore licence (PEDL 240) area on the Island, which they were awarded in May 2008.

A new company, NP Solent Limited, is being formed to carry out the business. This will be the majority licensee, along with four other companies.

Image care of Rapanui

What does this mean in terms of disrupting marine life, surfing ot potential for spills? Stakeholders of the local marine environment, including recreational nearshore water users, are disappointed that rights had been awarded to prospect for Oil in the AONB.

Island surfers

“Island Surfers including Surfers Against Sewage, the Isle of Wight Surf Club and Wight Surf History are disappointed to see oil exploration taking place on the Isle of Wight, in an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. We hope the strongest possible safeguards are in place to prevent any damage to the environment, beaches and recreational coastlines on the island. We call all the whole Isle of Wight surfing and beach loving community to be vigilant for any pollution in or damage to the coastal environment, beaches and surf spots arising from this project and report any such incidents to SAS or your local SAS reps. It’s vital that the whole community engages with any new consultation processes for associated onshore infrastructure, new or related oil drilling projects. It is within public consultation frameworks that SAS supporters and the wider public can officially voice their concerns.“

“It is worrying that in the same Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, we struggle with the acceptance of renewable energy but continue to look to polluting and finite sources of energy such as oil”

Mart Drake-Knight, Rapanui

So, here we are again, more babble because once I start talking about surf it’s a difficult task trying to shut me up. This will be about a surf trip, I think, but there is a preamble. I was having a conversation with a surfer, we’ll call him Ben because that’s his name but that doesn’t matter. He doesn’t live on the Island so you’re never likely to meet him, let alone chew the fat over a glass of beer like I did whilst discussing the lost art of communication.

He was telling me about his travels in South America a long time ago as a kind of continuation of my story about making friends, breaking the ice, knocking down walls, call it what you like but it’s just communication. He’d got off one bus in El Salvador with a mission to surf but first he’d arranged to meet a friend in a one horse village in the middle of nowhere. He was trying to board another bus to said village when an old guy took him by the arm and started trying to pull him back. Through a combination of hand gesture and broken Spanish/English he told Ben that he was boarding the wrong bus and that his sister lived in the village he was looking for.

Ben trusted the guy and went along to this village and the old guy was right. His friend never showed but for the next two weeks he was treated like part of the family as they shared what little they had with him. Through a little bit of trust and more importantly the communication of this stranger Ben had an experience that he would remember for the rest of his life, (he still had a glint in his eye when he recounted it to me nearly 20 years after the event). The catalyst for this discussion was a story about breaking the ice with locals when you’re surfing in somebody else’s back yard on a surf trip. It will make the experience that much better if, at least by the end of the session, you and a local are shouting each other into waves.

So, it reminded me of a trip we, my partner and I, took the year before last to the end of the west country and back again. The idea was to drive the VW, very slowly, to north Devon and surf/chill my way down to Land’s End along the north coast then back along the south to home. So far so good but by the time I’d got to lands end I still hadn’t ridden a wave. It had been flat, hot and sunny for over a week. We started making our way back along the south coast and after a quick phone call to my friend Nigel, pleading him to check the internet, I was told that a solid 3-4ft groundswell was on the way.

By now I was somewhere near Porthleven. Knowing that I probably wouldn’t get a look in there I pulled a map out and looked for west facing beaches. There was a small one on the Lizard peninsula so the next afternoon we drove down there. It’s a bit of a trek but as I came over a dune and looked out all I could see was perfect lines and swell with nobody on it. In all the years I’ve been going west I don’t think I’ve ever seen a line up completely empty. The place is quite rocky but the wave breaks far enough out and away from them to not be a problem. I suited up and paddled over to the corner of the bay where the best take off spot was and had wave after wave on my own.

After about an hour two other guys paddled out. One of them was a huge middle aged guy on a longboard and the other a kid on a shortboard. I could see the guy on the longboard was getting some good waves and after I’d had a long one I paddled back past him and introduced myself. It turned out he was an ex marine and now taught surfing on the north coast but this was his local break and to his mind it was better than what the north coast had to offer anyway. I asked him if it was always as empty as this and he told me that most people go to Praa Sands 20 minutes down the coast, they like to be seen. Ahh the herd mentality. I kept asking him about this little cove we had all to ourselves and he told me everything I needed to know about it. Best state of tide, rocks and where to go if it got too big to get out. We let each other have waves all afternoon. No hustling required! After the session we exchanged e.mails and I thanked him for his help. The next day it was maxing and try as I might I couldn’t get out. The guy had told me where at Praa I should go to avoid the crowds and a long walk. The private road he’d given me directions for brought me out at the other end of Praa sands. There was about half a dozen people out on perfect A frame peaks and when I looked right to the main beach about a mile away there was about 200 people out. The road he sent me down is no big secret but without him telling me I’d have probably ended up in Praa sands car park and been just another sheep in the herd. The art of communication at work!

A couple of weeks a go I got a great email from Tad and Sue. Tad had managed to persuade Sue to dig out some old pics from the 70′s for us to use here on the website and this is what Tad had to say.

Sue and I have been married 40 years this year. She is still the love of my life and has been my constant companion on everything we have done and the many places we have worked and travelled to.

Shots from  Summer 71 after Sue and I got married in June.

Trip to Biarritz and Portugal

Shaping shots from Portugal.

Some from Canaries 72/73 in tent on south of Gran Canaria.

You can see all the old crew Roger / Sandy /Keith Williams / Tad /Sue/

Dave Mercer don’t see Andrea but she was there (Fitted a new piston in their J 4 van in Spain)

Tony Mac was there – me and him on the park bench.

Really a long time ago – still surfing that will never change. Surfing  never dies –  it will always be a part of us.

Trip already booked to Bali for 3 weeks over Christmas we have a favorite place we always go. The waves are always great and Bali is such a special place. We have loved it from the first time we ever went some 30 years ago!! We will always go back there as often as we can. Working from Thailand it is an easy 3 hr. flight – we even take long weekends when the forecast is good.

Good luck with Freshwater Bay – total crap – greed is the very worst kind of evil.

Best regards

Tad and Sue.

After showing Tad’s pics to Keith Williams, Keith remembers a little more to the trip to France.

The restaurant photo was taken in the restaurant at the corner in Guethary by the traffic lights (later a double glazing outlet & then a Pizza parlour) taken soon after Tony & I arrived in late May or June 1973. I remember that it rained really hard during the meal with thunder & lightning and people eating outside had to abandon their tables to escape the torrential rain. I have a mental picture of baskets of soggy bread & glasses of diluted wine left on the tables outside.

There was another mass dinner on that trip at a little café up in the hills behind Baquio in northern Spain. I went up with Tad in the morning to warn the Senora that there would be 12 for dinner that night. As we went in there were a couple of seedy looking characters drinking wine at the bar & half a dozen flies circling above a table footie machine. That night, we took over a back room & all had steak (horse!), egg & chips all washed down with copious amounts of real Sangria. The bill was split 12 ways and came to 18/6 each….that’s 92.5p! Those were the days! In fact that was a bit of a ‘blow-out’ for us, as, when in Spain, we were living on about £2 per week

I remember the problem with Dave Mercer’s van. Tad & Sue turned up at Somo, where Tony & I were still camped, with Dave & Andrea one evening. Fortunately, I had a tent, ready for when my girlfriend flew out to join us some weeks later, so Dave & Andrea had somewhere to sleep. They were with us for about a week, waiting for a new piston to arrive.

We would like to say a great big thanks to Sue for digging out these great pics and sharing them with us.

I feel like I’m free. I’m riding the tide.

The waves chasing me to the shore.

Arms out, knees bent, water dripping down from my head.

It’s gone dark now. I’m being tumbled and rolled by these wild wet panthers,

I can hear the distant sound of voices, clashing stones and the roar of water.

So that’s a wipeout. I love it.

I can feel myself grinning, I love it.

Again! Again!

I am paddling out in search of the next powerful wave, frothing at me like a dog with rabies.

This is great. Thanks Chris

By Hugo

Sadly Archie passed away on Friday 18^th November 2011. Archies’ funeral will be at 11am at St. Mary’s church, Brighstone on Monday 5^th Dec, and afterwards in the Three Bishops pub, Brighstone.

It was a very peaceful death with many of the nurses who had looked after him for the last two years at his side. Betty was with him all afternoon and he had managed to hold her hand for a while.

Betty had commented to the nurses a while ago that she didn’t like the pictures on the wall in his room and the next time she went in they had downloaded the photo’s of the surf board etc from the Wight Surf History website and stuck them over the offending pictures! It really made Betty smile… such a lovely thought!

Betty has asked a carpenter to make a coffin from the collection of wood he had stored up in the shed…including  a bit salvaged from the pub re-vamp. Something he would have loved!

Archie had been in long term residential care in Shackleton unit in Ryde since 2009 due to Alzheimers. He was looked after with great care and affection by wonderful staff until he slipped peacefully away on Friday 18th November 2011.

Archie William Trickett was born 9^th March 1922 in Brighstone and started work as an apprentice Carpenter with Buckett and sons at 14yrs old. He joined LDV (local defence volunteers) 1940 and later the Homeguard, joining up for the RAF in 1942.

Archie went all round the UK training and eventually went to India and had many adventures, some involving Dutch Nurses! Once home he was very reluctant to ever travel again!!

Archie met Betty at Atherfield Holiday camp and married in 1955. They had two daughters Ann and Sarah. Betty still lives in their wooden house in Brighstone that they built together nearly 60 years ago.

In the mid 1960’s he got into surfing! Archie made his own surfboard and wetsuit and was still surfing in his 70’s. He loved watching the younger surfers catching waves and just wished he could stay out as long as they did, his hands used to go white with cold and he’d have to come in!!

Archies’ daughter Sarah came across the Wight Surf History website when by chance she decided to google her fathers name. Sarah remembers her Dad loading the surfboard up on top of the motor bike and sidecar… it was quite a sight! They also had a Ford Anglia (like Harry Potter!) with a purpose built wooden roof rack on top for the board. Archie would roll up all their ‘swimmers’ in beach towels, put the roll on his head and balance the board on top of that to walk along to the best bit of the beach…(before all the grockles and those weird lot of people who inhabited other parts of the Island over the downs invaded!! – says Sarah)

He carried on surfing into his ’70s and Betty still has that surf board he made all those years ago. He taught Sarah to surf on it when she was about 7. Sarah remembers quite happily standing up on it! Archie also made Sarah her own wetsuit from the offcuts of his homemade suit… Sarah thinks she may have been the first child to have a wet suit on the IOW! ‘I certainly don’t remember ever seeing another child with one,’ she says. ‘Once the zip got stuck and I remember I small group of young men round me with a pot of vaseline trying to get me free!’