It always takes me a few weeks to get my head around reef sessions like we featured here in these past two editions. There's something about the adrenaline of the moment and your brain normalising it so your senses are available to react to the scene in front of you. It's an acute crispness of mind, but in the process you don't really get to contemplate what is happening. It's not until a few weeks later that you revisit the images and realise how completely insane the surfers are. But for them there is nothing insane about it. That sharpening of the mind is for them 100-fold what I experience from the shooting gallery. They tune into a zone that is completely focused on a few things that need to happen to ensure they get through a wave safely. Time slows, the wave becomes a road map with every little ripple a signpost of what the next few milliseconds will bring. It's intense, but ridiculously addictive. While it takes me weeks and sometimes months to get my head around it, they'll have it etched into their brains forever.
This week the waves were small and fun and perfect for the kids to welcome the surf season in. It's a far cry from the reefbreaks on a macking swell, but for the grommets, maybe it isn't too different when every wave is well overhead. For me it is about recalibrating from the very leading edge of wave of consequence surfing to the cultural buzz of sliding a log along a glassy wall or reading the wave so well that the lines you take are primal and perfect.
See you at the beach ... Derek
PS We're offering our Box of Light readers a sneak peek into New Zealand Surf Journal. We're due to launch officially in November, but for now have a look around and let us know your thoughts. Have fun ...
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