Surfing Newquay
Although I’m on my bi-annual jaunt to Cornwall for a week of fun, frolicking and swimming in the surf, I thought I’d catch some real waves in THE best surf town of the UK. That would be Newquay.
With Lija only just back from Oz on Tuesday, we met up on Wednesday night at a free concert for one of my favourite solo artists Ben Lee, which was good fun, and then I left for Cornwall on Thursday morning. I had my book packed for the 5 hour journey to Newquay, but it was never opened as I bumped into Sascha and Caedie at Paddington station. They were on the same train heading down to Penzance early, so we spent the day chatting and catching up – what’s been happening, what’s expected, what’s coming next.
I said goodbye to the boys at Par, where I had to wait for the one carriage train that passes through a few small towns on the way to Newquay. It was raining and it took me forever to navigate my hostel, after finding out the tourist centre was closed and the bus station staff sent me in the wrong direction. Then of course my hostel had to be up the hill, which I climbed up and down for two days. It’s a real surfie hostel. Reception was closed between 1 and 5pm, so one of the guests let me in and I sat drinking coffees for two hours, by which time after I checked in I found out everything in town was closed after 5.
I walked around a ghost town before grabbing a quick bite to eat and heading back to the hostel to hang out with some of the folks there. There were a couple of guys from Australia who were just working their summer in Newquay, a Kiwi couple who used to live there and have now moved back, Andy, a German guy from Bonn who was really nice and I got on with well, and the hostel staff themselves, British hippie chicks. Despite the crappy shower and the freezing draft that came through my room’s window, it was a really homely place that I felt comfortable in.
The next morning it was still raining, but I headed out to find a surf school. I had a great sleep in without an alarm, a first in a while, and walked the length of town, noticing shops that I would want to stop and have a look at later. Later came sooner than I realised as the schools were unattainable. I stopped for a healthy but delicious lunch of cod, chips and mushy peas (cheaper and nicer than London) and decided to call the numbers I found on the brochures I picked up. I had luck with the Escape surf school, they are actually really good – with the Top UK junior pro champion one of their teachers, and I heard they are also training those for the Olympics.
They were back on my side of town so I wandered slowly through the surf shops and Cornish specialty shops, stopping for a hokey pokey ice cream, some Cornish fudge and a nice jumper I saw on special in one of the surf shops. I put off the surfing thing for as long as the time counted down until my lesson, then made my way over to the Escape school.
It was me and 11 guys, who seemed to have mixed feelings about a random girl joining the group. They were soon put out of their misery as I was suited up, despite how difficult it can be getting into a wetsuit, gloved and booted before most of them left the change room. We carried the surf boards down to the beach in twos, one person holding the front of the boards and the other holding the backs under each arm.
We split into two groups where we were taught the basics on dry land about positioning, did some stretching to warm up, and how to stand correctly. All my squat exercises at the gym have served me well! They wanted to get us out in the water as soon as possible because the tide was perfect, just starting to come in, and the waves were a good size.
I found it difficult to carry my board down to the water under one arm, something I’m sure means I’ll never be a true surfy, unless I get a better board – these were just practice ones of course. There was also no glamorous Baywatch running into the surf for me, very sub-standard. The next two hours is a bit of a blur, as each time I jumped on my board and either missed the wave, got dumped by the wave or managed some form of raising up on my board before crashing back down, I was even more determined to jump up, wade in deeper and do it again.
The need to get it right consumed me for a while, and in the end I was throwing my leg onto the board, balancing my body across the length and then arching up as I flowed over the wave, bringing my knees forward and one leg back into a squat with my body facing the right side of my board and my head and arms giving me direction.
After a while I could tell where I was making mistakes, but in the heat, or flow of the moment there’s not a lot that can fix mistakes, so I’d just jump off and try again. Sometimes one of the teachers would come over and give the board a push so I could concentrate on the right moment to kneel. In the end I was standing up quite a bit, even for as long as five seconds or so – a long time when flying through the wind, and no longer because we were still quite close to the beach.
In the guys’ words, I ‘put them to shame’. Half of them gave up after a while, and most of them never even stood up on the board. After heaving the boards up the hill and having a hot shower we all went next door to the pub, where the cameraman was showing a slideshow of all the photos he took. The guys were all impressed and bought me a drink to celebrate a great day.
Tags: Travel
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