AWOL

See ya in a couple of weeks...

THROWN IN THE TOWEL

.

My faithful old beach towel - faded & threadbare - finally got retired at the weekend.

This Raymond Pettibon towel would surely make a fine replacement.

Do clickage if you wanna read the little writing at the top.

BELOVED

Forever.

Parts of Kernow have been rubbed smooth and characterless by the many millions of 'relocation' pound notes that were used to transform Cornwall into a handy suburb-by-the-sea for wealthy urbanites. But there remains a place that despite the braying crowds of incomers is still resolutely itself; quite scruffy, a bit rough around the edges and often just a few inches away from anarchy.

It's a place of high unemployment matched by equally high self-regard. A place where three generations from local families still live. A place that knows its own place, in fact.

A small village in a coastal valley where a handful of simple beachside flats - built over forty years ago - are still to this day occupied by low wage-earners and those on benefits. Not pretty buildings by any means, but they're certainly not the generic, unimaginative, over-developed, over-priced 'lifestyle' apartments that have appeared in almost every other coastal town.

Circa 1955.

Unlike so many other similar spots up and down the coast that have become empty places, occupied only occasionally by owners that live many miles away. This understated little settlement has quietly carried on being home to its inhabitants.

It also happens to have been blessed with a beach that consistently manages to produce some of the best beachbreak waves around. But beware, the best of those sweet, steep waves will not be freely available, for they will nearly always be ridden by the best surfers - those who happen to live within striking distance - and they will be on it every time there's a hint of swell.

But it's a special place to me for all the above reasons and more, and I fucking love it.

ENZED WATERFALL

Go-oooooooo!

Nice little set of photos from the land of the long white cloud.

THE BIG BLUE

Jean Reno as Enzo

Should watch this again as well..

37°2 LE MATIN

Betty et Zorg

Must watch this again - makes me feel like Summer again...

i'm thinking about it...

FOXY

via tumblr

GLOBAL CORNWALL

Global Cornwall @ the Asylum 25th July 2011

Event coming soon - with Kneehigh & Chris Hines involved you know it's gonna be interesting as well as good fun.

DEAD SURFERS

Panda Bear - Surfer's Hymn. A tribute to surfers taken by the sea apparently.

SURF GEETAR

.

A lot of surfers play guitar - and a few even play while they're actually surfing.
Wondering just how they manage to do it..? Paddle with the instrument strapped across their back, followed by a very swift grab and strum perhaps?

Donavon Frankenreiter

THE LOKE

Whenever the surf got big, he would appear, without fail. Often there would be no-one out at all; just too wild and wooly, whitewater everywhere, any green waves were marbled with ribbons of white. "Not rideable," was the common consensus on the balcony of the surf club. But he'd stroll across the grass of the beachside reserve often barechested even in the Sydney winter. With his thick brown hair swept straight back from his forehead and a full beard he reminded me a bit of Grizzly Adams. Always in plain red boardshorts, usually a smoke in one hand, his yellowed board under the other arm it was impossible to judge his age. Maybe thirty something or possibly even a decade older. The lack of any grey in the whiskers and the taut athletic body coupled with a brightness in his eyes and a lightness to his step made him ageless. On first name terms with all the usual beachfront crew he was never the less a bit of a lone wolf, always traveling solo.

Most surfers would be fizzing with anticipation as they approached the shore, trotting like nervous ponies across the sands. He never hurried. Just walked casually to the northern side of the bay, not even seeming to check the surf on the way. Not that there was much to see apart from lumpy, slow-moving mounds of water. Occasionally the swirling mass would line up and a wave would form way out the back, offering the chance of a clean face amongst the chaos, but it would be a deceptively heavy, seething, unorganised roller that could just as quickly fold under its own weight and dump itself in an explosion of frothing whitewater.

At the water's edge he'd nonchalantly flick his cigarette butt away, drop his board in the sand and tie his leggie around his ankle. Then without haste or panic he'd lunge into the shoredump and stroke swiftly toward the rip that ran out past the sea pool. With the big southerly swell pouring into the bay, the current was moving fast back out along the north side and he was soon swept past the rocks and out into the middle of the bay.

Soon he was just a small, distant shape, defiant amongst the heaving green and white. He would disappear from sight, nowhere to be seen and then reappear fifty metres away, paddling purposefully even further out to sea as a huge set growled in from around the headland. Up and over the first unbroken wave he went, just a sliver silhouetted against a long wall of rising water. As the next wave seemed to draw itself up in menacingly slow-motion he spun around and paddled hard down the dark slope. The wall grew taller and he actually drifted back up the face with the tremendous flow of water. But gravity took over as the wave toppled forward and he sprang to his feet as the lip snarled all around him. He dropped almost vertically down the face and dug a deep bottom turn. Still, he seemed at ease, although there was now a vitality in his movements, a restrained energy to his body that allowed him to surf confidently with power yet smoothly without wasted effort. So many of the other local surfers, even the good ones, moved too jerkily, overdid everything and were self conscious. Whereas even here, in this angry sea, as he swooped back up the face of a wave that was at least triple overhead, he was surfing beautifully. Just the right amount of torque to send a fan of spray out over the back of the lip, a perfectly timed turn followed by a smooth flowing down the line carve, a long arcing cutback and a quick flickout before the section slammed itself onto the inside bank. It was just text book surfing in the most unorthodox of conditions, the fluid definition of grace under pressure.

He'd paddle back out through the maelstrom to get a couple more subtley epic rides against all the odds and then catch one in. Seemingly satisfied that he'd done justice to both himself and the swell. Back on the beach, he'd maybe have a quick chat to some of the crew before strolling off down one of the side streets, barefoot, still dripping wet from the sea. As he never came by car I assume he lived nearby - a real local you might say.

YES!-terday

More days like that please..

RETRO-TASTIC

Today's waste of time...

1977 - Ty Page and pals.

1979 - Eddie Elguera.

1978 - Ellen Berryman & Bob Mohr. Tight and tash-tastic.

1978 - Bobby Piercy.

1978 - Stacey Peralta shot by Warren Bolster strobe cam.

1979 - Vans advert.

Scarily I remember most of these. With no videos, DVDs or internets in those days the US mags were the only way to access the info and like a lot of kids I used to study those mags for hours, and when I say 'study' I mean 'STUDY!' I would have confidently gone on Mastermind with '70s Skateboard Magazines' as my specialist subject!

AS PREDICTED...

This was Lusty Glaze on Sunday morning.

For once the predictions were spot on - fresh swell, offshore winds and sunshine all day. Hope y'all got some...

Loads of interesting old boards at the Vintage Surfboard Meet too.

VINTAGE BOARDS

.

If you like vintage surfboards - get along to Newquay this weekend where Alasdair from the excellent Vintage Surfboard Collector blog has organised a gathering.

INTERVIEW - JOHN ADAMS

John, Sennen 1975.

John Adams was one of the original pioneers of the West Cornwall surf scene in the 60s. Along with co-founding the Sennen Surf Club and the BSA, he was a music promoter and film-maker producing and distributing action sports films from his base in Penzance. Here he shares a little bit of personal history from those days...

John, where are you from originally?
I grew up in Yorkshire and spent my teenage summer holidays working in my mothers snack bar in Whitby, where I was allowed to buy the weekly 78 records for the juke box. Guy Mitchell, Frankie Lane, David Whitfield ... THEN Bill Haley, Elvis Presley etc. circa 1957/58. In September ’58 I went for three years to Courtfield Catering College in Blackpool where I studied Hotel and Catering Management. Whilst there I used to organise our socials and dances.

What turned you onto surfing?
We would get jobs in the summer holidays in kitchens and restaurants. My close friend Bruce from St. Annes had a friend who had come to St.Ives to paint so we decided to try and get a summer job at the Tregenna Castle. They wouldn’t take us but we found work as joint second chefs at the Grenville Hotel Bude where there existed a surf club and the lifeguard was an icon called Peter Cokes, eventually head of the Cornwall Surf Rescue organisation. A couple of Aussies worked there as well and they introduced me to body surfing and surfing with a belly board and fins. I was hooked from the start.

You had a music venue in Penzance called the Winter Garden and put on loads of big name bands didn’t you? Can you tell us how that came about?
After working in Bude, Bruce and I went to Germany where we worked for eighteen months at two top class hotels in Cologne and we learnt to speak German and later French. When I returned my family were offered the Winter Garden Dance Hall in Penzance from someone in Scarborough who had bought it as an investment in case he lost his licence for his other business. I took it on with the idea of developing the catering expertise that I had acquired and did banquets, buffets, club socials, wedding receptions as well as running the weekly dances. I started Beat nights on Fridays and booked bands such as Johnny Kidd & the Pirates, Wayne Fontana and the Mindbenders, The Fortunes and many other local and national acts.

Can you remember your first green wave?
I had my first green wave at Sennen.

You were also involved in creating the BSA (British Surfing Association) weren’t you?
I met a couple of brothers, Mike and Tony Hole, who I had been at school with. They knew I was interested in surfing and we agreed to buy Malibu boards. At the time Bilbo had a three month waiting period so we got our boards from Fred Bickers in Newquay and paid £30.00 each for them (a lot of money in those days). We were the first surfers at Sennen and formed the Sennen Surf Club. We met other surfers from Porthmeor (who nicknamed us ‘the Sennen Spastics’!), Porthtowan and Newquay.
Mike ran a clothes boutique in Penzance called Modern Man and with Tony this became the office for the British Surfing Association of which we were founder members and Mike became Secretary.

John Adams (left), pictured with Dave Swift who wrote the renowned ‘Talking Surfers Blues’ original song featured in the 1976 epic ‘Getting Wet’.

SIREN CALL

Bentley Rhythym Ace rocked the tent last Friday night!

They cranked up the siren and got funky in a field - fuggin ACE!

HARBOUR WALL

Few waves peeling along the wall last night.

[click 2 c big]

RAINY SEASON

I can't help but wonder if we now have an unofficial rainy season here in Kernow.

This is the fourth year in a row that Spring has delivered scorchio weather followed by mid-Summer rains.

BLUES

How sweet does this look...

Found it on Tumblr - loads of good visuals on there.

GOLD

Couple shots of yours truly enjoying the sunset recently - snapped by Andy Garner.

.

..

click to embiggen

THE GOOD OLD BADLANDS

Had a quick surf in the Badlands last night.

Got a few rights into this corner...

... but you certainly don't see ships moored up here these days.

LESSON FROM THE TAO

The Second Noble Truth.

"The second truth is that suffering is caused by craving and desire. We will suffer for example; if we do not get something we want, if we expect other people to conform to our expectations, etc, etc. In other words, getting what we want does not guarantee lasting happiness. Wanting can ultimately deprive us of contentment and happiness."

Last night I watched clouds scudding across the sky, pushed along by strong westerly winds. I felt frustrated that I hadn't been in for a surf that day and was unlikely to either as the wind was still blowing hard whilst the sun began to sink - no evening glass off for me then...

I try to take a philosophically relaxed attitude to surfing these days - the aim being to simply enjoy my moments in the sea wherever and whenever I can. I could quite easily become obsessed with wave-hunting etc, but would rather make the most of the life that surrounds me and not potentially let my desires turn to sorrows.

AIRSTREAMERS

If you like Airstreams and that kind of stuff, there's a few quirky ones here..

.

..

...

....

.....

......

.......

........

BDAY BUSH

...

Every May over a couple of weeks, this bush in our front garden bursts into flower despite me totally neglecting it all year - what a top plant! The bloom coincides with the twins birthday so I always call it the Birthday Bush (not sure of its proper name - some kind of Azalea maybe..?)

VEEDUB

Yep, we've finally done gone and bought a new van…

OH GWITH!

??

STREETS OF SAN FRANCISCO

Another awesome pic snapped from CBI

CASUAL MOFO

... stylin!

Grabbed this from LSoRo - lovely colour, great style, really liking the coolness, and definitely no window-winding necessary.

EVER FALLEN IN LOVE

... with something again and again?

For various reasons I've missed a lot of the good run of swell we had recently - but I managed to get in for a late one last night. It was fairly slack and only 2ft on the sets, but I paddled down the beach and found a little bank that was peeling and surfed until the sun went down.

Fell in love with surfing yet again...

supPORT[RAIT] your local shaper

Flicking through the latest issue of designweek... Lo and behold, there's Mr Fluid Juice himself - top shaper and all round good guy, Adrian Philips - moodily photographed by Peter Beavis.

SECRETS OF THE MASTER SHAPERS

In the latest Surfer's Journal there is an excellent feature on Jim Phillips, master shaper/craftsman.

.

..

...

Could the double goggles be one of the secrets of the super shapers?