FRENCH NUDITY
SAM WILLIS
Well I had done it, earlier in the year I quit my job and the Mrs and I scraped together our savings, put all our stuff in storage, sent the dog to my mum and dads and we were off on a massive adventure. Starting in Indo, then a bunch of surfboardless missions to England, Amsterdam, Germany, Czech Republic, Italy, Switzerland, Spain, Paris, and back to England again. My first experience of going on holiday without my surfboards was a good one, and I got to be a normal tourist for a change. It was a refreshing experience and when there is no surf where you are, you don’t feel like you’re missing out. We had so many good times that I could write all day about, and made some great new friends, plus I met up with some good old ones as well. The European summer was hot and the beer was cold! Anna took a contract teaching at an international school in Bali so after a couple months travelling with me it was off back to work for her, and after a sad goodbye it was time for me to find some waves! My good bro Felix Dickson was down in Cornwall at a small town called Newquay, where I headed and ended up staying with him for the next six weeks. When you have a couple months off surfing, getting back in the water ,as most surfers know, is amazing and catching up with a great mate living on the other side of the world was sick as well. We surfed a bunch around Cornwall, and I had a great stay making a ton of new friends and managing to save a little $$. I worked at a surf school during the days and in a kitchen during the nights. It was classic doing something different from my sales rep job, but also refreshing after such a long time doing the same thing. The WQS was also in town so I got to catch up with Kiwis Billy Stairmand, Jay Quin, and Matty Hewitt. None of the lads had a great showing in the comp but it was good to get to see all them all and share a surf and a beer. The next six weeks flew by and after the mother of all going away party’s, my next stop was Hossegor, where an old friend of mine from Sydney was setting up the European office for the brand Rhythm. After a rugged journey, due to the weekends activities I had just participated in, almost missing buses and trains, I made it to the airport and was off to France. Hossegor is one of those places I have always dreamed of going, the big hollow beachies, food, and French culture, cold Kronenburgs, and topless women on the beach, who in their right mind wouldn’t? I was lucky enough to be able to stay with Sam and his girl Julia for my first week till I got my feet on the ground. Sam also lent me his scooter for my stay which was amazing. Hossegor kind of reminds me of a bigger version of Whangamata, with a huge influx of tourists over the summer months, and then turns into a ghost town over the winter ones and most businesses close their doors till next summer. The beaches are also sprawling white sand beauties with hundreds of miles of coast and surfable waves all the way up it. Big sand dunes and pine trees everywhere and confusing roads, yep this was me for the next month. After the first couple of surfs it was pretty obvious with the push in the waves that they were coming from much deeper than Cornwall’s flat beaches and my groveller felt like it wanted to spin out. I was lucky enough to meet up with Australian photog Andrew Chrispy. He works
for Volcom full time shooting and videoing and he let me roll with him most days. Volcom have a team house over there with groms from all over the world staying there, so I’d hang there most days and surf, eat and shoot with the crew. It was a sick couple of weeks! The banks at the nude beach were especially good and we ended up surfing there most days, it was insane to be surfing some nice 4 foot punchy peaks and not really too crowded, but man if you thought you’d be looking at hot naked chicks the whole time think again, the place was littered with old men and women 60+ with all their saggy bits hanging loose - so classic. I even saw a nude old couple doing a yoga routine one afternoon, I was losing it. When exiting the line up you had to negotiate your way through 20 or so naked men frolicking in the shore break. After a week staying with Sam and Julia, I managed to suss out a house about 15 minutes drive inland thru the pine forests, which a young kiwi guy named Nick I met a few years back sorted for me. The house was massive and on a big property but was a bit of a weird set up as the owner often showed up unannounced with a new traveller or two who would be temporarily moving in, but not to worry, I had a pad and I had transport. Picture me rolling! The other good news was my good mates Aj Mathews and Felix would be arriving just before the Quiksilver Pro that was coming up. Every day our diet would consist of at least one baguette, I love the things! Getting a fresh baguette every day was our French ritual, smash that thing back with some eggs or pretty much whatever ingredients you have handy... ohh so good. When the swell comes up, La Graviere and La Nord is one part of the beach that cops the swell and gets really hollow. When there was swell I would try and get down there as much as I could, it was only really good at high tide and tons of closeouts, but if you got the right one you could get a mental keg. These beaches also attracted a solid crowd and were also where the WCT event would be, which they lucked into the best swell in a long time. AJ turned up, and a couple days later Felix and his girlfriend. They moved into our house and it finally felt like it was ours! As always it was great to catch up with the boys and get some waves in and have a couple brews, the good things in life! With the WCT starting the mass influx to the beach, followed the huge setup to make this event happen. Watching all the best in the world and having a few surfs with them was amazing. We got to watch Dune Kennings compete in the King of the Groms and make a couple of heats. It was a huge experience for the young grom, and was pretty eye opening seeing how hard kids under 16 were ripping. I am getting old that’s for sure… Our days were spent either watching the event or surfing just to the right of where it was running. It was surprisingly uncrowded when it was running and there were some nice kegs to be had, with just a couple pros out, it reminded me a lot of the beach breaks in Mexico. You would be sitting out the back and could tell when someone in their heat would have got a good one as the crowd of thousands would go bananas. One arvo during Slater’s heat he got a 10 and a 9, and the beach was erupting, it was great to see. We pretty much got a week straight of cranking waves and got to watch some of the best surfing I have ever seen, the finals day was all time and there were so many barrels going down in the comp and just to the side it was mind blowing. A crazy week and one I’m so stoked to have experienced. After the swell faded away we had a couple big nights for our send off, which ended in me crashing the scooter I had borrowed from Sam and loosing a ton of skin from my elbow in the process. Jack Daniels and scooters don’t mix too well! It had been a great month, I’d surfed so much, met some more great people, and had some great times. AJ and I were booked in to go to Ireland next, we picked up some 6/5/4 wetsuits from Billabong and we were ready for more of the same, but in slightly more frigid temperatures. Travelling is amazing and it as much about the people you meet as it is where you are going. Go with an open mind and a friendly outlook and you can’t go wrong.