"The swell's too west" "The swell's too small" "The swell's too inconsistent."

"The boat's empty" "The boat's full" "The boat's not going."

They say time and tide waits for no man, and a Shippies swell certainly doesn't wait for photographers to get all their ducks lined up in a row. With a day's notice, Tim Bonython had to make a tight call, clear the diary, arrange flights and transfers, and lastly organise a boat.

The final part - organising the boat - proved the most difficult, and in the end the most comical part of the exercise. While Tim was in the air and out of mobile range his mate, Zeb Critchlow, organised a boat for him. This is the conversation when Tim greeted the captain early the next morning:

"So where we off to?"

"Shipsterns Bluff."

"Where's that?"

And thus did Tim and the cap'n motor around Storm Bay taking lovely photographs of hills and headlands. At about the same time the crew at Shippies saw a boat sail past the renowned Bluff about three kilometres out to sea. Youd think it'd be impossible to miss that big, imposing headland, and yet...

Tim filled his memory card with picture perfect shots of dolerite cliffs before realising the mistake and doubling back to Shippies. He missed Danny Griffiths blowing a drop and blowing his eardrum, but the real action was yet to begin: Tyler HX, Mikey Brennan and the Tassie lads put on a show, Mark Mathews swooped into a few bombs and south coast grom, Russell Bierke, had his first session at Shippes. 

And of course there was Benn Richardson's amazing over-the-step-and-into-the-pit wave. Check the video and also today's Wave of the Day. Said Tim after eight hours of shooting and bouncing around on the high seas: "I love my job!"

Check Tim Bonython Swell Chaser's on Facebook to keep up to date on Tim's missions.