I paddle out to an old favourite yesterday...triple overhead sets...and one very tough wave to surf! It may be the most difficult big wave spot that I've ever surfed. It's psychologically and physically challenging. There's always lots of water moving around, the waves are super hard to catch at times, random bomb sets will break way outside, and then when you do get one it takes off like a rocket and you never know if it's going to open up or pinch and slap you, and attempting to straighten out is a great way to get vaporised.

Which keeps the crowds down...usually.

But yesterday morning I paddle out and there are twenty people in the lineup. Which by modern standards is a not such a crowded lineup, but I'm used to surfing here by myself or with just a couple of other local friends, so it's a bit of shock.

Photo Harley Banks

So anyway, I paddle over into the middle of the pack and a set comes in pretty much straight away. There are people paddling everywhere, scrambling to get over it, some trying to catch it, some paddling around in circles looking for their dog. But the guys paddling over it don't realise that they should actually be paddling for it and the guys on the shoulder don't know that they have no chance at all of catching it over there. That's the thing with this place, if it looks like it's about to break on your head, then that's when you turn around and start paddling like crazy to catch it! 

I get lucky and just happen to be right in the perfect spot. So I swing around, glide in with two strokes on my 7'3" and ride it all the way down the line. A good start to the surf!

I paddle back out and figure I'll sit wide, thinking that maybe I'll get lucky again and pick off a wide set. But if not, just let the current slowly drag me back into the peak. Pretty much straight away, it looks like a big set outside but I second guess that it's just a shift in the wind. Wrong! It's a triple overhead bomb set! I get over it, no problem, but I'm too deep to pick one off.

A couple of other guys sitting way outside get over it too, but everybody else wears it. I turn around to see heads bobbing in the water, at least three or four broken leashes, and at least half the crew heading towards the beach, making no attempt to get back out. But there's about half a dozen guys still digging deep to get back out. Unfortunately for them there's another bomb set iapproaching even bigger than the last, which myself and the other two guys just scratch over again. I turn around to scan the whitewater behind me and now there's no sign of anybody except for a couple of heads bobbing way off in the distance. It's just me and two other guys left in the lineup.

I was lucky today. I've lost count of how many time I've been picked off out here and I can't help having a little chuckle to myself. //JIM BANKS

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