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My best wave this winter
(I'm feeling happy)
For the past week I have been trying to surf almost every morning because it's not that often that we get a good swell here in the southland. Last saturday I woke up at 5:30am and drove an hour to catch some nice rides but was rejected since the tide was too high and the surf was not worth getting into freezing cold water. Two days later I got up at 5:30am again to try to catch a big swell that was hitting us and i failed because i was just simply too tired. The next day I wanted to catch the left over swell and I set my alarm clock at 6am and snoozed for 45 mins and finally got a text from my friend that it wasn't worth it. Yesterday, i set my alarm at 6am and for the life of me I couldn't get up because I was up late the night before. Then I got a text from my friend that it was fun. WTF!!! Keep in mind that I can't really get much sleep after snoozing, so I haven't been getting much sleep.
So this morning I was determined to surf no matter how tired I was. I set my alarm at 6:30am and snoozed for 30 minutes and I thought about not surfing. But if i go back to sleep, I can't really sleep anyway so I sucked it up and got up. Put all my gear in the car and headed to the beach.
Once I parked my car, I got really excited to see solid waves. (You can't really see from the video but it was about chest - head high and the sets were even bigger) I hurried up and changed and ran to the beach. Stretched for a min and waited til the set was over then went in the water. I paddled and paddled and paddled and the waves kept hitting me. After what felt like 15 mins of paddling I looked back at the beach and it was about 10 ft behind me. I thought to myself....I can totally do this, if there are surfers out there I can get out there. I kept paddling and paddling and the beach was still about 10 ft. behind me. F*ck that! I have been swollowing sewage beach water and choking a few times, I was tired, my arms had no more energy, and the waves just kept coming. I thought about walking the walk of shame back to my car. People would ask how the waves were and I would just put my head down and sigh.
At this point my arms were so noodly and I was splashing water instead of paddling. Then I saw 2 waves coming at me with nothing behind it. This was my chance to try again! So I put all my energy and the last of my juice into paddling out. I got hit by the two waves and then there were smaller ones coming towards me and I just paddled like there was no tomorrow. My body was aching and my arms had no more energy but I had to keep going. I finally made it out and it took me about 10 mins to just catch my breath. I looked at my watch and I had been paddling for about 35 mins.
My first wave was awesome. I had a short ride because I didn't want to get caught inside again. The water was cold, I started to not be able to feel my fingers and toes, my legs were cramping up. None of this mattered because I caught my frist nice wave and I was happy. Time to go to work... I caught one more wave and it was the best I've had this whole winter. It was definitely rewarding!
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