Well, 2020 has been laced with change and upheaval. Let's hope the back nine improves a bit. Last week was some kind of emotional rollercoaster that pretty much fried my brain by Saturday. Amid the incredible sadness of saying goodbye to Danny Carse there were some laughs and community bonding that Danny would have been stoked to watch over.
The day before his funeral Dunedin's waves lit up and as friends and family converged the lineups began to swell with an energy of mates catching up and sharing a beautiful sunny winter's day in the south.
The North Coast and then the South Coast turned on and the stories of barrels and long racy walls helped to fill in the gaps left by despair. Stories of Danny flowed and myself and several others learnt our first ever haka, Tika Tonu – a special tribute to Danny. He certainly would have been laughing at a few of us when we mistimed the odd thigh slap. Led by some of his Mahia whanau and our very own Matt Nathan, the haka was a fitting send off and super emotional to be a part of.
This haka is a special one from the Mahia region and in honour of Danny it has been adopted by the South Coast Boardriders Association as the club's haka. That's pretty cool.
The day after the funeral people slowly started to drift back to their new realities in a world without Danny. That was pretty hard to accept. On Saturday I found myself down the coast at a spot Danny had been surfing a lot recently. It was firing and crowded ... mostly with friends of Danny's trying to reconcile the events of the past week in a place that meant something.
There's a hole in the Dunedin surf community right now. A missing piece.
See you at the beach ... Derek
PS There was a big high for us as well last week when Toyota and Mediaworks handed over the keys to a new Toyota Highlander. NZ Surf Journal won one of them through the Toyota and Mediaworks Small Business Driver competition. The Highlander is the dream surf wagon and we're planning some pretty epic roadies already. Stay tuned ...
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