Well, we're at the arse end of 2017 and it's time to reflect on the surfing year that was.

I don't know about you guys, but it seemed like the surfing world had a quiet year. When I look back I see no milestone swells, no #Muzzaswell, black nor-easter, or cyclone carnage, and nor were there any celebrity deaths or drug scandals to sate the salacious side of our psyche, while the only 'new' wave that was discovered may as well be a CGI apparition because even ten months later we're still none the wiser on its location.

As usual the pro surfers were out there doing their thing, you probably saw it on the webcasts which is why you read very little of it on Swellnet. Why indeed when the rest of the surfing spectrum, the full gamut of colour and form, happens away from the webcasts.

These were the top ten stories on Swellnet this year, some of them ranked because of the traffic, but mostly because they gave us a laugh or they were stories we enjoyed telling:

Mystery revealed: Why that Japanese surfer was six kms out to sea

A week after a Japanese surfer is recued six kilometres off Wollongong he's found camping under an overhang at a local pointbreak. Toru comes clean on his ordeal, which was more a self-imposed commune with nature than misadventure.

"I paddled out late. It was going to be a full moon that night. I stayed out to watch the moon rise and then the wind died off and it was still. Very, very nice...”

Even with a hefty dose of plagiarism (hello Pedestrian, Junkee, and the ABC) it was Swellnet's most visited story for the year.

Tuesday with Richo

Evergreen Terry Richardson turns up at Swellnet's South Coast office for strong coffee and a rolling conversation.

Richo is now 62, he's still competing and still wearing the same webbed gloves he wore to victory at the World Masters in 1997. He's getting back into shaping and splitting his energy between modern shortboards and the old classics: twins, bonzers, and various channel bottoms.

Dad takes photo of ten-year-old son surfing over Great White shark

A shark story down at number 3? Clearly the hysteria was dying down in 2017.

If Trump didn't become president in January we might never have heard the term 'fake news' and we might be more willing to believe what we see. But Don is Prez and everything is up for scrutiny, including this photo of Eden Hasson surfing over the top of a shark. Admittedly it's ambiguous but Eden's Dad Chris, who also took the photo, jumped on board and weighed into the comments. He also had other guys vouching for it.

Three fins before the Thruster

Did you know Simon Anderson wasn't the only person riding a three-finned board at the '81 Bells? Did you know the first three-finned board was made in 1965? Brewer, Abellira, Aipa, McTavish, Hyman, Townend all had a crack at three fin boards.

For fifteen years they all swam in the same waters but it was Big Simon who cracked the code: three fins of equal size shaped in a triangle.

Swellnet explores those pre-Thruster designs.
 

Ain't no wave pool

On Valentines Day this year Mick Fanning dropped the most outrageous surf clip of 2017. Filmed 'somewhere' it set off the biggest online hunt since Pokemon Go and the location was expected to be blown wide open within days, hours even.

"I'll see you there in a couple of years Mick. Me and 8000 other fuckwits," was a typical refrain.

Ten months later the surfing world is still none the wiser.

Soaring and exploring with Steve Cohen

By the time he was 16, Steve Cohen had discovered Cape Solander and Aussie Pipe, and by the time he turned 20 he'd quit surfing altogether.

Steve then took to the sky virtually pioneering the sport of hang gliding. As he put it, “I put the board away and I went surfing in three dimensions”.

Enjoy this long form read with one of surfing's unsung pioneers.

Flying too close to the sun: The ascent

Josh Dowling was a high functioning craftsman when he needed to scratch that itch - literally.

Josh mainly worked with epoxy resins - he was Firewire's first shaper before striking out on his own - and the extended exposure to epoxy began playing havoc with his body.

This story was published in two parts, following it was 'The Descent'.

The good news is that Josh is again shaping.

Western and South Australia's stellar run of swell

Waves, hey? No coasts recorded any almighty swells in 2017 but West Oz and South Oz had an autumn season for the ages.

From the Margs Pro in March until June each state - in fact each coast in each state - pumped like a silly bugger.

There was, as always, a reason for this anomaly and the Swellnet brains put on their nerd shirts and deduced why. In short, it was all due to SAM, but you'll have to click to find out who or what SAM is.
 

The rebirth of pro surfing

It was this day two years ago that Kelly Slater unveiled his wave pool to the world. Do you remember? One day after Adriano De Souza claims an improbable world title, Slater receives all the attention.

In recent years he's had little competitive success but Kelly Slater is still shaping pro surfing in his image, and this will go on for many years yet given the success of the Future Classic wave pool contest in September.

It was a story that had everything: surfers playing God; the promise of industry revival; renewed interest in the sport (or the death of it); profound questions of philosophy all around, and it hasn't ended yet. Not even close.

Steve Cooney: "I remember it very clearly!"

Of all the surf world's discoveries, Uluwatu is the most storied simply by virtue of having Albe Falzon on hand to capture it as centrepiece for Morning Of The Earth.

However, what hasn't been told before is that Rusty Miller wasn't there for the first session and that 14-year-old Steve Cooney rode it alone.

In this interview with blindboy, Steve recalls not just the first session but the very first wave.