How to ‘Water-Proof’ Your Child

Posted on November 21, 2014 by Erwin A. Dence Jr. under northwest surfing, surf adventures, surf illustrations, surf sessions, surf stories, surfing tales, Uncategorized

“Daddy, is that what will happen to me if I go in the (pointing) ocean?”

“Well, yes; it could. I mean, no, no; that sea lion was probably old and… The ocean (pointing) is a dangerous place and…”

“Will a seagull (pointing at the carcass) bite my eyeballs out?”

“No. No. Probably not. Usually some… (fluttering his eyes) small fish will…”

“But… (points) you go in the ocean; and you don’t get eaten.”

“Well, yes; but that’s because… (points to himself) I…”

“Do you have… (puffs out his chest, strikes pose) super powers? I mean, when you put on your costume, and…”

“Super? Well; sometimes… (puffs chest, strikes several surfing poses) I get a super ride; a head dip or, um, three; but usually…”

“I want a blue and red costume when I get super powers. Okay? Oh, and, Daddy; you know… (walks closer) you’ve just given me Post Twamatic Stwess Disorder… for life, and, someday, when I’m older, with or without my superpowers; I will have to sue you. (long pause, looking into each others’ eyes) Oh, and about swimming in the pool, later; I won’t need the waterwings. I’ll just watch.”

“No, no; watching’s good. You know I’m supposed to be watching you. Right? Well, if Daddy catches a few waves…”

“Sure, Daddy; But remember it when you give… (removes a glove for effect) your deposition. (smiles somewhat menacingly) Later. Much later.”

Thanks to Adam James for the photo, one of several from a recent James Family trip to the Long Beach Peninsula area of Washington State.

Celebrating the Wave

Posted on November 17, 2014 by Erwin A. Dence Jr. under northwest surfing, surf adventures, surf illustrations, surf sessions, surf stories, surfing art, surfing tales, Uncategorized

Other than hydrosexual (in love with all sports water-in any form-related) Stephen Davis and me, there were only two other surfers out on this particular section of track. Track, I say, partially because Stephen described the inside section, after the late-takeoff-only drop, after the first bowling portion, as a ‘racetrack.’ Yeah, but this was a morning when the dark swells approached, lining up way up the point, and advanced toward us like high speed freight trains, heavy. spinning.

I’d love to make some comparison to cement mixers, though they’d have to be backing up, the barrels moving, counter-clockwise, one just to the right and behind another, picking up the chalky water flowing out of the Olympic Mountains, approaching, closer; and as each wave did, it would pick up that gray-green color characteristic of cold, cold water.

With the sky threatening, layers and splotches of muted greys, near-blues, and the surface glassy, reflecting those subtle tones, and another four wave set (one each) moving steadily toward the little point in a long sweep, one of the other two guys, looking up the long lines, gave the wave the universal gesture of celebration, of jubilation, of appreciation.

A bit farther down the track, I turned and paddled.

Bro-dads

Posted on November 10, 2014 by Erwin A. Dence Jr. under northwest surfing, surf adventures, surf illustrations, surf sessions, surf stories, surfing art, surfing tales, Uncategorized

The word HODAD, back a ways in surf jargon, was used to identify people who had all the proper items necessary to look like surfers, you just never actually saw them surf. It should be mentioned that no surfer believes another person surfs if that person hasn’t been observed by that first person, surfing. And, even then, if the possible Hodad isn’t seen actually catching waves, the possible-poser might be merely relabeled as a KOOK. Even having multiple surfboards, wearing the proper semi-authorized surf garb, having appropriately cool stickers on your appropriate surf vehicle, and having a working knowledge of surf spots from Mainland Mexico to Alaska, and having the ability to drop names of surf legends/stars, and some local heroes, from Bob Simmons to Robert Kelly Slater, and having conversational/storytelling skills that would hold up in parking areas from Swamis to Velzyland, and… wait a minute; I’m sort of describing myself.

No, no; it can’t be.

I’m not nearly friendly enough to be a BRODAD. And besides, most of my beachside surf wear comes from Goodwill, my wetsuit is ragged, patched with cutouts from old wetsuits, my surf rig smells like mildew and, again, old wetsuits; my boards are dinged, yellowed, the wax dirty.

Oh, yeah; I know how to look like a REALSURFER, BRO. Except, BRAH (and I never really use either of these terms in real life), I do get in the water.

To surf.

Alternate ‘Power Couples’ with Larger Drawing (same drawing only larger)

Posted on November 5, 2014 by Erwin A. Dence Jr. under northwest surfing, surf adventures, surf illustrations, surf sessions, surf stories, surfing art, surfing tales

I actually started writing this before I wrote the article now behind it on my site; really more a session report than something on power couples. Please check it out, also. I just wanted a larger version of the drawing and most of the copy below came with it. Still, I can’t seem to create new paragraphs since this is really a (protracted) caption. So… There are some surfing power couples I really like: Gordon and Lynn, Cash and Tanya… okay, I’ll add my former surfing trip friend (he has new friends, better friends) Jeff Parrish and his wife, my daughter Dru’s childhood friend, Ruth, who now, since she attended a Holly Beck-led surf camp in Costa Rica a few years ago, is also a surfer. Go Ruth!
It seems that more women are getting into surfing all the time. That’s fine. I actually prefer women (probably didn’t need to say that). And these new surfers seem to be sort of, um, competitive with their men.
That’s all fine. Initially starting the drawing because I find some surfing power couples (the ones that are just too cool- as if they bring the cool to surfing while, obviously, surfing, like wearing really fashionable clothes- adds to their joint coolness- I feel the same way about individual surfers) annoying, I find others interesting and, sometimes, amusing. An example would be the couple that cruised their mini-van into a parking spot at a spot (non-secret) on the Straits of Juan de Fuca, The woman dealt with unlatching their two children as the man threw on a short john wetsuit (it was summer, water still cold), grabbed the SUP off the roof, ran out, caught two quick waves, raced back in, stripped off the wetsuit, switched over to watching the children as the woman donned the same wetsuit (I’m pretty sure), walked down to the water, picked up the SUP, headed out. “I got to surf Westport last Saturday,” the husband said, “It’s her turn.” When I cleared my throat as a sort of question, gave him a nod that, at least, he already caught two waves, he explained, “I was just showing her where to take off.” “Sure. Great.”
I have called couples out, they always denying or amused by the ‘power’ part. I’ve only done this on the beach, after I’ve surfed myself out, when they can’t decide whether to surf here, head for Neah Bay, or cruise back to Joyce for brunch. If I haven’t surfed yet, I always recommend Hobuck. Or brunch.
Now, my power woman, Trish, will tell anyone that she actually rode surfboards before I did. It’s true. Okay, I have nothing more to say on the subject. Maybe later. Next I’m going to draw something on ‘bro-dads,’ a variation on the classic surf expression (in case you missed it in Surfing 101), “Hodads,” folks who have all the trappings of surfers, like to hang out at the beach, but never seem to make it into the water. If you’ve read this far, please go back and read the alternate version. And thanks.

Surfing Power Couples

Posted on November 4, 2014 by Erwin A. Dence Jr. under northwest surfing, surf adventures, surf illustrations, surf sessions, surf stories, surfing art, surfing tales

As Stephen Davis and I were hiking back to my car yesterday, exhausted from the two-and-a-half hour workout, the occasional thrashing (mostly inside the tube) and the occasional thrilling down the line drop-swoop-glide ride (always very close to or in the tube) the waves at a certain unnamed Rivermouth/Pointbreak offered us; surveying the half mile of curved beach, waves peeling in long sections, we both zoomed in as a longboarder paddled for, caught, then dropped, backside, into a dirty-but-glassy-black section. Instantly in the powerful heart, she grabbed a rail, seemed to extend her lead foot toward the nose.

As with almost all of the waves anywhere along this sweep, with unseen sections peeling and reeling around a succession of named spots, there was no real exit. No channel, no deeper water. Hang on, pull in as tight as possible, take the roll. No where better to get rolled than inside.

So, to complete the reveal and the connection to the alleged topic, the surfer was Lynn, the better half* of the Port Angeles surfing power couple of Gordon and Lynn.

“I waited a long time for that wave,” Lynn said on the lawn outside ______’s house**.

Indeed; I first ran into Gordon and Lynn at the NearStraits*** backup/backup spot seven or eight years ago, Gordon was thrashing around on the freshly-purchased, striped (and, I would guess, expensive) Robert August surfboard that had been standing a while at the North by Northwest (NXNW) Surf Shop. They were both just getting into surfing as I was trying to get back into some sort of surfing shape, trying to get back anywhere close to some acceptable (as in not humiliating or highly embarrassing) level of surfing ability.

And they have improved greatly. I have more to say on the subject of power couples, but I have to go. Later. Okay. Teaser: “No, it’s your turn to watch the kids.” “Five waves. Five; that’s all I ask.”

*though it’s only polite to call a woman the better half; I do think Lynn is… no, you’re each as good a surfer as the other. **This was a clue for those who don’t really need a clue, but, after a phone call from a concerned surfer who thinks this is a secret, the name has now been dedacted/removed/deleted. Okay, so now those of you who did read the name, pre-dedaction, please keep it to yourselves; just to keep the crowds down in the water.***NearStraits as opposed to more secret/more mysterious spots closer to the ocean.

Trina Packard Takes (a few) Waves

Posted on October 30, 2014 by Erwin A. Dence Jr. under northwest surfing, surf adventures, surf sessions, surfing tales

Somewhere, probably six or seven years ago, still rather early in my surf comeback, still trying to get to a reasonable level of ability and style (and I’m still working on that), I encountered Trina Packard on the inside at my most-frequented spot on the Straits. It was an above-average day (the real, every-day-counted average probably somewhere close to flat), with quite a few rigs in the parking area, and it was a session in which I noted, and, no doubt wrote to my old surf buddy, Ray Hicks, I caught eight waves before I ever actually made it to the outside lineup.

I was pretty proud I had improved enough to go to my old approach; taking a few on the head, dodging a few surfers on waves, dropping into a few.

Paddling along the rim of the lefts, both Trina and I were picking off waves surfers couldn’t quite catch, or couldn’t make the section. “If no one else wants this one,” Trina said, possibly a veiled message of ‘back off, old guy’ inherit in the phrasing (and the determined ‘going-for-it’ look), “I’ll take it.” And, of course, she did. Several times.

A year or so later, in the same parking lot, Tim Nolan (still older than i am) and I discussing why the waves could have been here, should have been here, but weren’t, after I’d recited Trina’s quote back to her and Tim, and, because we must all apologize, sort of, for sessions in which we’re a bit more aggressive than average, Trina explained that she’d just returned from Australia and was pumped up. At this time she had been working in graphics and web design in the Port Angeles area, but said she might have to move to the Seattle area (area).

“Oh, too bad,” Tim and I, no doubt said, thinking of all the surfers we run into, most of whom disappear to somewhere, possibly even worse than the big city across the Sound. “I’ll still be surfing,” she said. “Of course,” we said.

I ran into Trina two different times at the Surfrider Cleanwater Surf Contest in Westport (with a year in between in which I didn’t volunteer to ‘help’ and assist the judges- great fun for me). This is really like me running to the bathroom, her ready to go into a heat. “Good luck,” or “How’d you do?”

So, it wasn’t really too surprising, a few weeks ago, on a day when the coast was out of control and the Straits over-crowded; while I, already surfed-out, was taking the ever-longer walk out to check out what the dam removal had done to the surfing spot at the Elwha River, I passed Trina and a friend headed back to the parking lot. She has moved to Westport, she said. She did well at this year’s Cleanwater (second, as I recall, in Women’s Longboard). There had, evidently, been some discussion that some volunteers had hogged the judging assistant spots, and I missed this year’s contest. Maybe next year.

So (again with the ‘so’), here’s why I care: I also have a background in art. I appreciate anyone who can be good enough, persistent enough, gutsy enough to make a living at it. It’s hard. Like another surfer-turned-actually-professional artist, Todd Fischer, who I first met when he was a plumbing contractor working on some of the same projects I was doing the painting on, Trina seems to have figured some way to make a living from art AND live close to the beach

And, again; good luck.

“Hey, So… WHAT’S YOUR DEAL?” Called Out In the Parking Lot

Posted on October 24, 2014 by Erwin A. Dence Jr. under surf adventures, surf sessions, surf stories, surfing tales

Yeah, running around from side to side of my car, unhooking straps, grabbing wetsuit pieces, turning to comment (positively) on the glassy waves, and on the six surfers already out on the lefts (mostly negatively), I was called out by the young Port Angeles (I asked, he told me) in the driver’s seat of the little (as in not full or over-sized) white pickup that just pulled in beside me; called out for being over-enthusiastic, over-amped, over-coffee-ed, grumpy, and (I’m trying to imagine what I looked like), but, somewhere after I said I didn’t want to be one of those guys who gets all aggro over small waves… “but these waves are… (I may have hooted at this point)… I’m going to go after some rights, before…”

“Hey,” he said, with the emphasis, somehow, on each of the three words, “What’s YOUR Deal?” So, maybe the emphasis was mostly on the ‘your.’ My response was something like, “I’m old, I’m excited, I’m…” I guess he didn’t want to listen, or maybe the waves weren’t good enough, maybe he was heading to one of those fabled (or even, ‘secret’) Straits of Juan de Fuca spots farther west, and maybe six surfers already out this early on the lefts and me on the rights just didn’t seem too enticing; he backed out with me still ranting and running around the car, and pointing, and hooting, and…

“I’m old, and I’m… I’m just excited… just…”

Yes, it was what I was thinking about while (mostly clumsily) surfing the rights, the tide already a bit high, alone. Oh, I do long to be mellow, but I had wanted, somewhat desperately, to go the day before. Rumors of waves two feet bigger, glassy, maybe without that ‘wonk’ from overnight winds; phone calls of surfers hitting it three days in a row; the forecast showing a dropping swell on this day, the buoys showing a swell in that ‘iffy’ range, angle-wise, the ‘race’ (in my mind) with the SUV with two boards on top through Port Angeles, me in front, then “nooooo….” he was ahead of me on Surf Route 101, then behind him all the way out on 112, until… “Oh!” He had to pull off, “Probably to whizz.” Ha! “Oh!” Yeah, now I had to pee. Desperately.

I barely made it, the SUV pulling in a few moments later. I had wanted to ask the driver why he had a “PB” decal on his back bumper, but now knew it was Dave, “Big Dave,” a grom in Pacific Beach when I moved there in 1971. Big Dave who rides an SUP as a regular board. And he was going to the lefts. I knew, when the tide got higher, the rights would go away and I’d be moving over to join the group on the lefts.

Knowing I, my promise to myself that I would surf until I was exhausted (or the waves were) and I would possibly add to the frustration of surfers who were not catching enough waves, I did paddle over after twenty or so unshared waves. I was actually kind of surprised when, paddling for my second wave (first being an insider everyone else missed), a long line outsider, no one challenged me, starting paddling for in down the line.

Later, when I mentioned this to Dave, he said he had overheard surfers grumbling that it had been mellow, but was getting ‘aggro.’ “You mean when I came over?” “Pretty much.” “Hmmm. Do I just look so intense?” “Yeah; guess so.” So, I apologized to several surfers as I passed them, looking for (yet) another set wave. And, on the beach, I told Rajah (hope the spelling’s right) that, “it’s exhausting being a dick.” He seemed to agree.

There’s more to this story, but you’re probably backing away, ready to move on, still not sure what my deal is. “Yeah, I’m just excited.”

Former Edmonds, Washington (really) Surfer Bill Thomas (and a mention of Archie Endo in Thailand)

Posted on October 22, 2014 by Erwin A. Dence Jr. under surf adventures, surf sessions, surf stories, surfing art, surfing tales

I tried to insert a video of my friend, Archie Endo, surfing, quite Archie-like (stylish long and gliding ride on a longboard), in Thailand. He is (still) there, middleman for a fish company.
As I said, tried. Wrong format, evidently, and I got a big old “X,” and a scolding.
So, here is a photo I could insert, another (obviously old) friend, Bill Thomas, kayaking below his house on the Hood Canal with his new friend.
I went surfing with Bill, who will proudly tell you he has surfed the Puget Sound on one of those storm days (like yesterday) where the entire fetch of the Sound (lots of miles) was headed north, and he was on some of those windswells.
That was then, years ago, and when we went to Westport on a typical, chopped-up day, Bill in a thick wetsuit more suited to diving, and I didn’t surf very well, but did make it out a couple of times, Bill was almost angry that his skills from thirty, forty years ago hadn’t stayed with him.
He took a couple of photos of another surfer, doing well, and drove back.
Despite Bill being a retired firefighter, he was not, evidently, the guy driving the rigs to urgent fires and aid calls. He was stridently unapologetic about that. “I just thought I’d do better,” he said. “And frankly, I thought you’d do better.”
I have seen Bill since, kayaking at (I’m just going to name the spot) Salt Creek. No, one up on the Straits. He did fine. No, I don’t have a photo.

The First (Highly Forecast, Hyped, Anticipated) Swell of Fall, and…

Posted on October 14, 2014 by Erwin A. Dence Jr. under surf adventures, surf sessions, surf stories, surfing art, surfing tales

…and all that entails. This is a photo sent to me by my friend, wandering Hydrosexual (explained in an earlier post), Stephen Davis. It’s a point in Northern California, and the image may belay the size (and hide many of the rocks in the lineup).

My most recent conversation with Stephen, the day after I shared the road to and from the Straits of Juan de Fuca, and the parking area, over the weekend, with pretty much every surfer in Washington State who has a computer with the capability of picking up Surfline, Magic Seaweed, or any other surf forecasting site, or, maybe, heard about a ‘high surf warning’ on the TV weather, or maybe a friend who used to surf a lot gave people a call, and/or…

Okay, I’m not going to whine (any more than I already have) about surfers trying to surf. When I found out Saturday, with waves out of control on the coast, the swell didn’t really move far enough north to penetrate and wash the points and coves with four-to-six foot peelers, I thought, if I got up early enough, I could get a few of Sunday’s bigger, cleaner… second ‘Okay,’ I did get waves to myself while many of the surfers camping in their vehicles were still sleeping or making breakfast on grills that, magically, were pulled out of the back of SUVs, and others were watching the four longboarders floating around on the ‘I’d-be-exaggerating-if-I-said-kneehigh’ lefts. I got a lot of waves, actually, little rights, with at least one ride to add to my memory bank, one of those where the chances of making the first, then the second, then the third section were less than assured; swoop and lean harder into the wall… and make it.

So, I did fine. I’m not sure everyone did. I hung out on the beach a while, chatting with surfing power couples, a guy who remembered me from an earlier session, who said he was trying to contain himself, with visions of overhead waves, on the way to… okay (number 3) some of the waves were a bit over knee-high, and there was always the hope the swell, 16 second intervals, would move just a hair farther north, the incoming tide would bring that fabled ‘push,’ or, maybe, at some other cove or point, maybe not with the easy access, there were those (again) fabled Straits peelers.

I checked one of those spots on my way back home, still, if I didn’t doddle, in time to watch some of the much-anticipated Seahawks/Cowboys football game. There were as many surfers making the trek out to the lineup as there were in the glassy waves, and as many tired surfers making the return trip to their vehicles. And then there were the surfers, as I was, dressed in their on-land clothes, hiking out to check out a spot a friend of mine asked me not to mention, as if it is a secret.

I will return there; the waves were definitely worth it; on one of those non-weekend days when the forecast is a little bit ‘iffy,’ the hype a bit… probably no hype at all. Hopefully everyone driving up and down Surf Route 101, out on Highway 112, on the sideroads heading north from their, on the paths and beaches, hopefully everyone caught at least one memorable wave; drop, lean, rise, swoop, blown out the end, clean.

And I have to go, but I’ll get back to the Stephen Davis story… always more, always something coming. As for the Seahawks, next weekend, man.

Real Surfers

Shoulder-hoppers and name-droppers

Category Archives: surf sessions