My days were made much better this week thanks to the return of an old friend. A dependable, ultra-reliable friend who delivers quality in spades and on his day puts smiles on the faces of everyone in the lineup. At once calm and charming, and in the next breath testing and challenging, the banks at Blackhead have been sorely missed.
I'm not entirely sure what led to their demise, but day after day over the past months nothing but gutters and gutless waves rolling crooked and broken to shore. I had almost given up hope. Most of Dunedin's surfers already had. And then, bang! Out of the blue last week and the banks returned full of the fervour we'd once grown to admire and depend on. The sand sculptured in just the right way to turn a scrap of swell into a focused peak of energy – the kind that harbours hollow waves and winding walls. This is the friend we've all missed and we're glad to have him back.
But this week you'll want to be casting your surf net further north if the forecast charts come to fruition. That's where I'll be ...
See you at the beach ... Derek
PS A busy day for me yesterday shooting a summer campaign for Hello Friday in 1°C early morning sunshine. The idea was to make it look and feel like summer. That was made easy thanks to my talented model Kristin, who gripped the icy sand with her toes and put on a brave sun-drenched summer smile. That was soon followed by a session with New Zealand surfing royalty Maz Quinn, who is fresh back from the Mentawais and loving the cooler water temperatures (possibly not true). But the highlight of that session would have to be watching local surfboard shaper Graham Carse stroke into the wave of the day and tuck into a decent barrel. A fitting way to welcome back an old friend.
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