Rhosneiger surfing Tuesday, December 11, 2007

Last weekend was another windy one which kept us away from the tidal races again :-(. On Sunday I went with Barry to Rhos Neiger beach with our seakayaks and my surf kayak. We figured it would be a good idea to get stuck into some surf in the seakayaks since we're expecting quite a bit of the frothy white stuff in New Zealand. It started off around 3-5 foot and reasonably powerful then dropped off a bit as the tide went out. It was fun, and not often scary with the weather alternating from sunny to rain that hurts. It was really good to practice in the surf although I'm still not sure what the appropriate stroke is when a wave breaks on top of you! I saw the water rearing up right behind me on one wave and turned side on to it, I raised my paddle into a high brace, but the wave broke on top of the blade and pushed it down into the water, which didn't really help me in staying upright! I somehow managed to extract the paddle and get it on top of the sea again and with a bit of a weight shift (I think I just threw all my weight into the wave) I stayed where I could breathe air. Still, I was left with the feeling that that tactic probably won't work in bigger more powerful surf in NZ! Besides just avoiding being in that nasty place where waves land on top of you, I'm not sure what I could do differently!

Thanks to Barry for being brave enough to get into the water in December to take some photos!