Talking to a Springbok in the surf (in relation to wave quality and overcrowding)
Yeah crowded surf is scary bear stuff, coming from S.A we are very lucky because of the amount of sharks, a lot of spots are empty because of shark attacks and seals and stuff. I feel much safer in shark infested waters then I do when there are 40 fibreglass swords waiting to stab me.
snapper looks stupid crowded on the cam on a shit day.
Coming from Barwon Heads, I surfed snapper and was amazed at the aggressive large group of grommets paddling themselves in a pack to the take-off zone and everyone else picking the scraps. Not a nice vibe at all and don't have any need to get back there in a hurry. I surfed the rock wall on the opposite side of the channel to d-bar. Bit of a drive but away from the crowd. I'll take Vicco any day
jason you should have just paddled saves the petty! haha
When you hit Snapper, with the crowd and hype and grommets its not going to be a fun surf.
The aim is to jag a screaming barrel and get the hell out of there. All QLD points get the same treatment from mega crowds.
There are solutions like timmed surf sessions to give everyone a reasonable chance of a wave and not being smoked by someone but the proposition of having life guards or clubbies police it is unfathomable.
gotta love the south africans they dont waste time or money on enviromentle impact studies they just get on with it, at nahoon reef in east london it was a bit hard walking/wading out across the rocks so they put a concrete foot path out across the point
they should give the concrete path a go at winki or lennox but the locals wouldn't like it I shouldn't think
they should give the concrete path a go at winki or lennox but the locals wouldn't like it I shouldn't think
By: "dougshapes"
Actually in the old days (like 30 years ago when I first surfed it!) Lennox used to have a sort of ramp! You could drive right down to the end and we used to camp there in old Kombis and Panel vans. It looked like some sort of of boat launching ramp. National Parks probably pulled it apart when they took over but it made getting in easy, getting out was still life scarring experience on a big day!
i still can't figure out what this thread is about
i think its about crowds patty, and what can be done. does making spots more accessible make them more crowded? i don't think so, bears down yallingup way is a good off-the-beaten-track example and there were 30 guys on one peak around xmas. it wasn't fun trying to avoid 3 or 4 guys comin at me on the one wave. got run over and tangled up with some old frother with water sunnies and a mullet. i think if every coastal engineer was a surfer it'd improve, but eventually that'd still get crowded. maybe it should be like tennis where you have to book the court, but then whos to know when it'll be on? i'd rather go to my local beachie here at gero, or find a wave without the consistent quality and hunt around for the wedgy ones. for me, nothing beats pulling off a good turn and claiming it to absolutely nobody. or hooting 2 or 3 other guys into dredgy closeouts that occasionally hold up. the popularity of surfing is eating itself. the grass-roots vibe probably can't be found at snapper.
should put a few ramps at snapper for the skaters to use in between surfs so don't av to charge cross town or through cars on skatey fuck the other stuff only surfers go there any way be they 2 or 2oo yrs old
"gotta love the south africans they dont waste time or money on enviromentle impact studies they just get on with it"
HAH
"does making spots more accessible make them more crowded? i don't think so"
Iconic set up, the Farm. Just a few years back, even with ALL the development behind it, when the beach was over 4ft there was only a hardy crowd of both locals and non.
Since allowing the SURF SCHOOLS to drive down and the reopening of the bottom car park, 1ft or 10ft there are a 100 people in the water. 200 on weekends...
Locals need to get violent at kooks .Kooks need to get bashed by locals its the only way to control crowds .When there is a local crew out there they can share the waves but when kooks are out there they cause a lot of trouble and are not accountable for there behaviour .Kooks turn up to places with there rubbish and ruin every thing a surfer is meant to be .Locals have to put up with these type of kooks every day and and we are sick of it .Do you think a kook would like a bunch of local surfers turning up to there house or there street and start yelling and being disrespectful .I live at the beach and will continue to control kooks like in the old days but every time i teach a kook or try to tell a kook to go home they get replaced by a new kook in 5 minutes .
Blessed are the cheese-makers, LR. Although you strike me as a sort of non-dairy guy. Perhaps we can find you a job in the Assad regime if those lousy kill-joys - the rozzers - arrest and deport you for breakin' one too many noses of those damn kikes. Sorry, I meant wogs. oops, chinks. Or was that Wasps? Jeez, they all look the same.
PS. It's okay to be a local kook, right? It's just those damn non-local ones we've gotta deal wiv, eh? Just checkin....
dan-burke hit the nail on the head surfing will eat itself but not before the people on this thread including me grown old and missed our prime time to surf. The only answer is creating waves. But dont build them in populated areas. Build them in places where you have to travel to get to them. Lots of national parks have great setups that could be improved by some smart coastal engineering and that way you are returning part of the true stoke of surfing. Escape, travel and great waves and not feeding the worst, localism overcrowding and showboating.
If a guy scores a sick wave in a remote location and no-one saw him ride it did it really count?
For all you people who say no to improving coastlines for surfing. Think how your gunna feel 10-20 years down the track when it happens anyway and your prime surfing years are behind you.
In Durban there were quality waves off their groynes or piers.
Anyway they rebuilt them and their waves lost quality.
Now they rebuilt them again with sand pumping pipes in the middle of the groynes so they can pump sand where and when they need it.
Gold Caost and other councils spend money like water on inland parks - they need to divert some of it to innovative solutions to the surf overcrowding problem.
They ruined Kirra, paid Neil Lazarow to come up with a solution, then totally ignored his findings.
Then the save kirra protest had 5000 people turn up.
So the Council, in particular Chris Robbins are sitting on the fence and passing the buck.
We need both Snapper and Kirra working coz it is no fun out there, it is just too dangerous.
I've been surfing 30 years, 10 as a shaper and I would like my son to learn and enjoy surfing and see the iconic waves we had up here.