Endless Session, Day 138: Sunday funday
Wipeout, Day 133. Photo by BumpSetSurf.com
Crowds can get frustrating. You should always share the occasional wave, especially if the surf is inconsistent, but sometimes there are just far too many people at a spot, which causes things to get dangerous. Today, on day 138 of an attempt to surf for a year consecutively, I witnessed surfboards flying everywhere, kids an inch from getting impaled, and all around pandemonium when five people proceeded to take off on the same wave, all seeming to go different directions (right, left, up, down, and straight).
Sunrise on day 138. Photo
The bright side of the day — driving down the coast and watching a sunrise that gave the sky a deep fiery hue, witnessing a seal (the real local in the ocean) cut a guy off and literally surf in a wave almost all the way to the beach, and paddling over to a less populated section of the peaks and getting a few small waves all to myself.
And on a much brighter side, the bigger the crowd, the more ear-to-ear grins because of the ocean. The Sunday Funday crowds, full of weekend warriors who struggle to get to the ocean during the week because of their schedule and kids who wait tirelessly for the Friday school bell to ring so they can hit the waves the next day, can get messy, but the mess is usually accompanied by belly laughs and lots of funny wipeouts.
All in all was difficult to have fun and lose myself in the masses, but the occasional long ride all the way to the beach made up for it. Saltwater — crowded or not — cures all.