Surfing at Bondi Beach

I don’t know what it is with the Australian weather just not wanting to cooperate with me when I do cool stuff in the water, but today when I had my first surfing lesson at Bondi Beach, it was just like when I went scuba diving…rainy, windy and chilly. I actually was quite cold on my way to the surf shop, wearing just a t-shirt and my swimmers. I thought that might make the whole experience pretty miserable, but luckily I was wrong.

When I got to the surf shop they had a nice big long list of all the things that can go wrong while surfing and that I could die from something bad happening so there definitely wasn’t any sugar-coating going on about what I was going to do. Then they had me sign it saying that it was still ok and they weren’t responsible for it. After that, it was time to get the wetty (wetsuit) on and head down to the beach.

The total number of people in the group was around 12, but after introducing ourselves to the group and telling about our surfing experience, we were split up into smaller groups based on how much we’d surfed before. So, naturally, this being my first time, I was with the beginner’s group, just there to learn the basics. My instructor was Ryan and he was a real fun guy who did a great job handling us rookies. We first sat on the beach and talked about the basics of handling the board in the water, how to get on and off the board, where to position ourselves on the board and how to catch a good wave. Then we got in right in the water and went for a try. The water, as usual, was pretty cold, but I actually got pretty hot sitting on the beach in the wetty so it felt quite nice. Ryan really helped us for the first few tries and we were just trying to ride the wave all the way in to the beach and basically do every step except stand up on the board. This was pretty easy when Ryan was there and told us when to do what, but once I was on my own for a few tries, it was sort of tough to read the waves and decide which ones were good to try to catch.

After a bit of that, it was time to head back to the beach for another small lesson about how to stand up on the board. Then we went right back into the water and gave it a shot. And on my first try to stand up what do you know, I did it perfectly and rode the wave all the way in to the shore! Now, that must have just been luck because it wasn’t so easy every other time, but I was able to get up on the board quite a few times and that’s pretty good according to a sign I saw in the surf shop that said on the first lesson you should expect to maybe stand up on the board once or twice. So I was happy about that. But again, my big problem was being able to read the waves correctly and be able to choose the good ones. Like a lot of things, getting good and comfortable with surfing comes from just practicing and repetition.

Throughout the afternoon the water was quite rough and I got knocked around pretty good a few times. There was even one time where I just got demolished from all sides by a few huge waves. My legs got taken out from under me and I was flying all over the place. I don’t think I’ve ever swallowed so much salt water in all my life than what I did today! As expected, when the day was over I was very exhausted. As fun as surfing is, it is very taxing on the body, and although it’s a great workout, it is very tiring. So when I got back to Coogee, I decided to treat myself to a nice big pasta bolognaise lunch and a whole pitcher of water to replenish my body!