Surfs Up in Messanges

I slept late, again, this place is so quiet nothing stirs... 
We once again we started our day with some organic Cereal, and then proceeded to the beach to check out the surf. There were some nice steady 1.5m waves. We sat there just looking at it for a while, i met alot of the local surfers, it seems that there are a lot of people living in the forrest,….. i just still cant figure out where ? 
Edith and i decided to have a coffee, while Manu went to fetch his Stand up Padlling Surfboard, to my surprise i received a Lavazza Cuppucino .. the best i ever tasted, right here in the middle of nowhere… Wow. Respect. 



I have honestly not ever surfed properly……. Yes i have spent hours in the water and can manage to paddle in , get up and maybe carve it a bit if im lucky. 
This was all achieved mainly around the age of 12-13 when i spent my summer holidayswith my family in Cape St Francis… 

These were the good old days , i got my surf lifestyle education….. and attempted to learn to match my knowledge on the water. 

No i did not completely succeed, and at least i admit i am lousy.But behold, i do not lack in enthusiasm, ever, if there are waves ,big or small, messy or clean i will attempt it ,even if im scared to death i will take my mini mal or any available board and head on to be possibly drowned or possibly succeed in getting a wave. 

No i am not paddle fit, Last time i touched a surfboard was sometime in January, we got some 6m swells coming into the lagoon at Langebaan, trust me this hardly happens, but the Cape was lucky to get some monsters, if it was that big in the lagoon, imagine what dungeons would look like ??? Well lets just say the ocean was mean, it was hungry and i in my ignorance jumped in at the end of the sandbags… i didnt come close to riding a wave, i just got swallowed up and spewed out on the sandbags infront of Cape Sport center , my board was severely dented and all three fins broken off completely. It was a disaster. I just found a safe spot on the sand bags and sat there gasping for breath like an idiot. My poor board. I felt so bad. Immediately my mind wandered to all my actions, what had i done now that deserved a nice warning from Karma ?? Disaster. Nothing new in my life. Im kind of a walking talking , blonde form of disaster. Choas and panic are sometimes my best friends…… 

The next time i braved the waves was sometime in February. I went on for a early morning ride with Brad & Dom ( The Mauritians) & Alan Fourie ( Langebaan Legend). We went to Yzerfontein, a spot halfway between Capetown and Langebaan. It was big, a beach break of epic proportions, messy and mean. It was spring high tide and i was scared shitless. I shamed myself, swallowed my pride and took a bodyboard. Haha. I went in. Got one wave. Nearly drowned , took a foamy back to shore and sat watching the Mauritian boys ripping it up for the rest of the time. Since then i had not gone surfing….. 

Today was going to be it. Manu returned, we go tour boards and eneterd the water. What a feeling. I twas pretty neat and i was sticking to Edith( Manu’s girlfriend who rips it up on a surfboard). Manu was on his own mission, standing out above the water on his massive Stand up Paddle board. So at first it was easy, we got straight out to the back line , i was on a 9ft beauty. It was all mellow. I twas cloudy and the water was suprisingly warm, a light offshore wind completed the picture. I missed the first couple of sets, being in the wrong position, but finally… the next set came, i was lined up perfectly and hardly had to paddle, I droped in , got up and was riding. I was so shocked by my performance i nearly fell off,…. i couldnt belive it. I was screaming and shouting. Nobody was listening but i was over the moon. My joy was shortlived within a few second ( even though it felt like an eternity) the wave closed out on me. I started to paddle back , but before i even got there a small little demon of a wave appeared it looked perfect … i caught it and rode it to shore.. but this was the biggest mistake of all…. 
In surfing you have to earn it, i did not earn that little one, and thus i started my terrible campaign to get to the back line again…. Karma would not let me have it, i tried left , i tried right, i tried so many times and i just got eaten by the sets, in a while, i was huffing and puffing like the big bad wolf. I just couldnt get it, With the sweetness of my first success still fresh in my mind i started going crazy. All my effort was useless. I couldnt move my arms anymore, i couldnt breathe anymore. I took a break on the beach every 15min, and then tried again. In the end i gave up , caught a few half ass waves close to the shore . Walking back to the car I was dizzy, and just kind of collapsed into the back . We got home, all of us K.O’d ….. It was decided that after a shower a les petit dodo( A little nap) was the next plan of action…..