I feel like I’ve just woken up from one of those dreams that you enjoy so much that you desperately try to go back to sleep the minute you realize you’re awake. Unfortunately just like not being able to get back to sleep, I have a horrible feeling that this winter is over. This winter was just like a dream. Literally it went something like this, wake up about 5:30, have a bowl of cereal while doing a couple of e-mails, leave for the beach at 6:15 in the water by 7:00. Surf for two to five hours. As a surf starved stand up fiend it was the closest I’ll ever come to nirvana.
If the strength of the trades is any indication of what we’re in for this spring, it’s time to store all of the sessions in the data bank close to the top for easy recall, so that in the middle of July I can remember back what it was like to be living the surf dream. Hopefully that will get me through till next November.
Bottom turn and a might tasty wave.
Cutback
Fwack
Off the top
I think one of the best things to happen to me this year was the adoption of the ten man rule at Hookipa. Had it not been for this rule, I would not have been as motivated to find alternative surf spots on a regular basis, but because it was implemented I constantly found myself alone or with a friend or two surfing outer reefs that far out shine Hookipa’s crowded line up with all the chirpers. So in reality I should thank all those surfers that were strongly opposed to the presence of stand up surfers in the line up, THANK YOU, seriously. I found at least four new spots that I have not surfed before, and as far as the north shore goes I thought I’d surfed just about all of them. Unfortunately most of these spots are difficult to photograph so I don’t have much physical evidence of these sessions. In reality that may be better so that as time goes by I can exaggerate the size of the waves without fear of being contradicted. There are a couple of photos though to remember this winter by.
Hopefully spring will prove me wrong. The winds may die for a little while, the Pacific could blow out a couple more swells, and just maybe I can get back to sleep, for just a little while longer, so that I can finish this dream winter.
Aloha,
Dave
Hi Dave, What’s the 10 man rule? Just 10 surfers on a break?
The ten man rule is really a windsurfing rule, if there are ten or more surfers on a break you can’t windsurf there. It only applies to Ho’okipa. It makes good sense for windsurfing–you can’t see surfers well when you’re ripping on a windsurfer, and if a break is crowded it’s likely that someone is going to get run over, so the lifeguards recommended a ten man rule and it became a regulation–ten surfers in a break and the windsurfers can’t use it.
A bunch of long-time Maui SUP surfers got together and recommended that SUP surfers use the same rule at Ho’okipa because it relieved the tension between surfers and sweepers. It’s not a regulation for SUP, just a recommendation, and we sweepers at Ho’okipa have pretty much adopted it. You rarely see a Stand Up Paddler at Ho’okipa these days, but I think it’s more because we’ve figured out that there are so many fine spots to use that it just doesn’t make sense to crowd into places that already have too many people.
As you can see from these pictures, it we fan out a bit we can find plenty of places to play that prone surfers will never go to–they are just not that easy to get to so we’ll always have them to ourselves.
I knew you guys would find unknown paddle spots… but dont forget Hookipa, she loves it when your there,
loving to see the paddleing on the right with a nice 30 ft, swell… yeah … thats nice..like butta