Whispers from the Sea

EVER SINCE MANKIND SET SAIL ON THE SEVEN SEAS THEY HAVE BEEN RETURNING WITH TALES OF NEW DISCOVERIES, FAR AWAY LANDS THAT MAY EXIST OR SEA MONSTERS SO BIG THAT THEY WOULD CRUSH ANY BOAT THAT WOULD DARE ENTER

THEIR LAIR. Then came the tales that we as surfers would be more entertained by, of giant rogue waves that destroyed fleets of ships in one foul breach of a swell. Since the birth of surfing the link between those that worked the sea, and those that rode it has been tight. After all, who better to do all the ground work as they actually work the coastlines and return with descriptions and locations of waves they had seen. As far as pioneers going out to actually discover new surf breaks [deleted], these are by and far a small minority - although a certain surf company did take on the services of a legendary pioneer who discovered the Mentawai’s Island chain, navigating their way across the Indian and Pacific Ocean to find, surf and document the virgin waves. However the majority of new discoveries or rumoured waves that find their way to surfers with a passion for adventure, come from fisherman across the world.

As a grom I spent a lot of time in the Far North and I remember fondly the mythical stories we were exposed to by the older fishermen at New Year’s parties. Stoked on our day of scoring perfect point waves at three to four foot, all day with only a couple out, our claims would be overruled with the sound of a drunken slur - “Ohhh groms, you don’t know what big waves are! Today while we were out pulling pots I looked through a wave so big that when it barrelled, I could have

driven my boat through it, , it was like Hawaii 55-0 5-0 [a 1970’s TV series that used a giant barrel in its opening credits]”. Drunken bull talk you could say, but ut NO! If these guys had been mere fisherman on the booze trying to roast us then we would have laughed it off and told them to have another beer. But on days when the local spot out front on the biggest swells of the year really started to grind, these were the guys that began to show what they were made of, real surfers working the sea. So when they spoke we listened, and those stories burnt into the back of my mind for many years. The one thing that we always wondered, as they spoke in awe of this wave, was how the hell would you ride such a thing?

Fast forward 25 years and it’s funny the pathways that open up during your lives, but somehow from that mesmerised grom sitting around the New Year’s bonfire absorbing big wave stories, that very thing had now b become a huge part of my life. life Having been involved with the big wave movement since the year 2000, when jet skis started to become a tool to surf massive waves, along with good mates throughout the length of the country that shared a like mind for adventure and discovery, we would all come together from our various locales to become one unit, sourcing out new waves and going where no man had ridden before. Many of these waves that we were chasing had been through tip-offs from fisherman, others we found along the way, and over the last 12 years it would be safe to say that we had discovered and ridden around 10 breaks that were never known to exist or had been deemed unrideable prior to the tow surf movement. Not always was it by