Around The World In 80 Waves

It has been a few days since I got wet and I am tempted into the water at a small town called Cayucos, because of the chest high waves I see breaking off the pier. There are two people out at this classic point break so I get suited up and paddle out to join them, keen to bag my first pier surf of the trip.

Looks can be deceiving though and I have to use all of my North Wales small wave experience to wring two rides out of this break. The strong wind is cross off shore and it is making paddling to build up speed a nightmare. The waves are also breaking over only a few feet of sand, mostly closing out when they do tumble over.

Also as soon as I get into the sea the other two paddle in, which leaves me in the water on my own and somewhat preoccupied once more by the angry fish. I am just about getting comfortable when a grey seal pops up next to me and is the latest member of the animal kingdom to nearly put me in the Cardiac ward. I swear the word is being passed down the coast to have some fun at the expense of the big bloke with a red board. It is not a joke I am very amused by any more. I wish they would pack it in.

Anyway I didn’t blank and happily drive on towards Santa Barbara having bagged Wave 15. I stop to use some toilets at the side of the freeway and run into a young skunk as I leave the building. He legs it and I wonder if rather ironically I have scared him off by the smell I made. The adventures of Dr Doolittle continue.

I spend the night in a shady spot I find in the car park for the Elephant Seal sanctuary near San Simeon. It is truly pitch black and I can see loads of shooting stars in the night sky. My sleep is only accompanied by the crash of the surf on the beach and the calls of these two tonne monsters.

Sleeping in your car is not really allowed everywhere and there can be a fine of $1,000 but the California Highway Patrol drive past several times in the night shining their spotlight on me to let me know that they know I am there, but do not actually bother me. However I don’t hang about in the morning because even if I am looking more and more like Officer Poncherello from CHiPs with every passing day I don’t think it will be enough to get me out of trouble if caught red handed.

A little further south is Hearst Castle which is actually the nickname give to the epic house built by William Randolph Hearst, who actually called it his little ranch. (All things being relative this ranch was only250,000 acres, as opposed to the 1,000,000 acre one he owned in Mexico.) I spend the morning going around the Castle and grounds, which used to include its own zoo and wildlife park.  Even today there is a herd of Zebra mingling in with the cattle that are still managed on the land. (http://www.hearstcastle.org/)

Orson Welles based Citizen Kane’s Xanadu on Hearst Castle, and arguably Kane on Hearst himself because of the power he wielded. Owning a massive media empire he manipulated US politics with dubious and inaccurate stories in his papers in the pursuit of his own ends. (Remind you of anybody?) For instance he is widely believed to be responsible for getting the USA into a war with Spain. He ran for the offices of State Governor and the Mayor of New York and also successfully served as a Member of Congress more than once but never quite achieved the Presidency which he craved.

However getting away from his politics Hearst went on spending sprees across Europe buying little things like St. Donat’s Castle near Llantwit Major back home in Wales, but also the contents of great houses and buildings to have them dismantled piece by piece to then be shipped and reassembled at his holiday home here in California. It is opulence on a scale that premiership footballer’s wives can only dream of.

For a pyromaniac like myself I was particulaly impressed by this 500 year old fireplace which was bigger than the kitchen of my flat in London! The place is overflowing with items like this which he had transported to his palace at the top of the majestic countryside.

The Neptune and Roman pools you see here give you some idea of the luxury in which his regular guests such as Charlie Chaplin, Howard Hughes, Winston Churchill, Harold Lloyd, Harpo Marx and Louis B. Mayer enjoyed themselves. I think I could live in a place like this if pushed.

Thankfully the engine management light goes out as the engine and/or the day warm up and the car is running well so I drive on, passing the Laguna Seca racetrack where I decide it is probably not the best opportunity to see what the Little Green Surf Machine is capable of.

I stop at Monterey which used to be the state capital and is the location of John Steinbeck’s Cannery Row for all you literary types. However I am more interested in the aquarium there, where I couldn’t agree more with Jacques-Yves.

I get up close to a load more sharks like the Hammerhead you see above and can sit and watch the jellyfish moving about in their tank for ages, which is like a huge living lava lamp. I chat with some of the experts and am delighted to hear that there are roughly 250 adult Great Whites Sharks in the triangle between Baja, Seattle and Hawaii. I would have expected a huge amount more than that, but they are actually an endangered species and it is a shame they have been depleted so but it makes me feel a little bit more comfortable getting into their environment knowing how few of them there might be knocking about. It only takes one getting angry though…

I drive onwards past the Pebble Beach golf course which the guy at the tourist information centre described as the World’s Capital of Golf. He is obviously unaware of Augusta, St Andrew’s, Gleneagles, etc.

The next stop is Carmel-by-the-Sea where I check out the local break, but the sea is flat. The town is home to Clint Eastward and he was even it’s mayor at one point. In an effort to bump into the big man himself, I call in on the bar he owns called the Hog’s Breath only to find it is closed for two days. I am more than a bit disappointed not to have been able to enjoy a Dirty Harry burger there before moving on again.

 However the real star around here is the road and the scenery. There is a 90 mile stretch of road which is simply stunning. 

The car is running well despite the warning light coming back on periodically, and I am having loads of fun chucking it around the corners. 

The area is known as Big Sur and it is staggeringly pretty.

There is barely another soul about and the waves breaking at the bottom of the cliffs to my right are too messy for me to chance going out around here on my own. I push on until its gets dark and then crash out for the night.

Once I collect the car from the garage I decide to drive into the Sierra Nevada mountains to give it a proper test run. This shot was actually taken an hour and a half before the sun went down in amongst some of the Giant Redwood trees. The trees are so massive they block almost all the sunlight. It is all a bit Blair Witch Project and bloody cold so I drive back to Santa Cruz and make my final visit to 99 bottles, where I take my tally there to 17 different beers. (Must try harder!) Have a chat with a few people at the bar in which the subject of gun control comes up. One of the blokes who seems quite normal tells me he has an AR15 assault rifle on the grounds that you never know. He and the rest of the US are still living by the ‘peace by superior firepower’ train of thought and I think they will keep having gun problems until they grow up. Shame, because almost everybody I have met is thoroughly normal.

I find a nice spot to sleep in the little green surf machine for the first time. It is next to a beach, just around the headland from Pleasure Point and everything goes well until I set off the car alarm at 5am in the morning because the bloody thing has auto armed in the night, which it did because I had the audacity to take the keys out of the ignition overnight. It is dark and I can’t find the key for ages, the alarm works very well and all the lights come on in the houses nearby. So much for surreptitiously getting a crafty kip! I start the car and hit the road as soon as I can.

Pleasure point is just around the corner so I wait for the sun to come up and check out the break which you see here. The house in the middle is owned by Jack O’Neill the inventor of the wetsuit, purely so he could stay out on his surfboard longer and catch more waves. His son is also responsible for the surfboard leash because so many boards were getting washed into the cliffs and destroyed by the powerful waves here. As you can see the tide is high again which I have realised was where I went wrong at Steamer Lane, so I dont fancy getting into another bad situation.  

 The locals tell me it will be better as the tide drops and I hang around for a bit even checking out The Hook which is the next break along. The waves are very small and clean but already massively over crowded. The only ones who appear to be having a good time are the Sea Otters (a big nod to my channel swimming buddies at this point) who hang out together like this making ‘rafts’. VERY cute. It doesnt tempt me into the water though and I break the cardinal rule of surfing, i.e to never turn your nose up at surfable waves, and head south finally leaving Santa Cruz.

This logan is on Tshirts and car bumpers everywhere. I hope they do manage to keep the eclectic mix of surf dudes and shred Bettys, recumbent bicycles, skateboards, coastal joggers, freaky tattoos, and the great atmosphere that goes with all of it.

I head south and no sooner do I get sufficiently far from town for returning to be a real pain but the engine management light comes on. #*&$!!!!!!!!!

I told them the Beetle needed to cope with everything at the garage. They may have gone a bit far. ;o)

Loved the picture Adam. It really made me laugh.

I head towards the beach but something is definitely not right with the car. The engine doesnt sound right at all. Thankfully I am only a few quid lighter after finding a Volkwagen dealership whose mechanics tell me the problem is due to one of the spark plug caps having come off.

I treat the little green surf machine to some new spark plugs, because they tell me the ones in there are way past their prime, and am glad this came up here rather than in the middle of nowhere in Central America. I thought the byline was ‘If only everything in life was a reliable as a Volkswagen?’

Knowing my luck with motors something will happen anyway in the back of beyond! I cant help wondering what automotive mehanical mishaps I have in store later on my travels. I really need a collective finger crossing effort from all of you on this. I think I must have upset some voodoo mechanic or something similar in a previous life.

I get up before dawn and return to Steamers lane hoping to get that perfect hour after the fish have stopped feeding but before the crowds turn up. The sunrise I’m greeted by is awesome.

 I wait until at least one local gets in to make sure I am not the only shark bait. It is head high and maybe a bit more. I watch this guy get a couple as I get suited up.

 It all starts very well with me catching a huge one taking the drop but leaning too much into my bottom turn so arcing straight off the back of the wave. However I have been spending far too much time dwelling on the angry fish and have been forgetting that I am surfing the Pacific and Mother Nature always has the last laugh. As you can see here I have become aware that a monster set is heading my way and I’m scratching for the horizon trying to get over the top of it. Putting it bluntly I fail. The first wave of the set knocks me off my board. The second lands on me knocking the air out of me and pushes me to the bottom. 

I am aware it is the bottom because I bounce uncontrollably off several rocks that are the size of me and with no air in me I am having a hard time making it back to the surface. I keep my cool and do get there but then have to take a couple more pummelings from the next two waves before I can get my hands on my board which is when this picture was taken. You will notice that the cliffs which were some way away are now directly behind me and there are more waves on the way, so I am literally between the preverbial rcok and a hard place. A couple of sphincter clenching minutes later I have managed to get myself into a safe spot so I can catch my breath.

I have been really spooked by the experience so go in and get changed. I sit on one of the benches at the top of the cliffs trying to figure out what I did wrong and only spot what I have been sitting on when I get up. Hmmmmm!

It may be time to move on after all!

After my surf I rock up at the Post Office and am amazed that they let me access somebody else’s PO Box, but I finally get the part I need for the roof rack, which is taken straight back to the hostel to fix to the car. The Little Green Surf Machine is complete. What do you think?

Once attached I can finally sort the car for the journey which I enjoy spending the day doing including some upholstery repairs with the needle I bought from the knitting circle in San Francisco. I go down to watch Steamers Lane again but it starts raining and is quite miserable so go and buy some food in preparation for my first bit of cooking in 6 weeks! One awesome chicken and vegetable in pepper sauce on a bed of vegetable pasta later I am stocked up with vitamins, feel like a new man and head out for drinks with Dutch Hannah and some of her buddies from UCSC.

We call in on 99 Bottles where I take my scorecard tally up to 6 before going to a club called the Blue Lagoon. Top night. On the way home I walk past one of the many tramps that there seem to be in every American town. I dont give him anything as I walk by which results in me getting called a “F###ing Spic”. I burst out laughing because my plan to fit in as much as possible in Central and South America despite not speaking the lingo is to get as much colour as I can before I arrive. It is clearly working! Just wait until I grow the moustache I am planning through Mexico…

I wake up the following morning having kept half the hostel awake with world championship snoring thanks to my skinfull. Untroubled by this due to having enjoyed an excellent sleep I revel in my cub scout-esque preparation of having all the supplies ready for a Rob Special fry-up in the fridge and proceed to stink the hostel out with the aroma of sausage, bacon and eggs. I’m a happy bunny, but I’m not sure everybody else is. A bit of admin later is is time to go find some mischief. 

Steamers Lane is just about the most perfect right hand point break wave that I have ever seen. I can watch it all day long but have to get in for a slice of the fun for myself. Endless rights off the point which just go on and on and on and on. Fantastic. The waves are head high plus a bit more and there are steps down the cliff face so I can just paddle straight into the break. From here it is actually possible to surf it all the way to the beach about a 1km away, then get out and walk back along the cliff to the point and start again.

I got this picture of the back of the break from the Santa Cruz pier. You can see how it just keeps breaking off the point. Gorgeous.

As usual I am visited by nature as soon as I paddle out. I am beginning to feel like Dr Doolittle when a sea lion pops up next to me to bark at me a few times and then disappears back under the water. I notice that most of the wax I put on for my last session has rubbed off, which isn’t ideal, but it doesn’t matter because I catch a couple of waves in the quick hour I have available this morning and they are both absolute peaches.

The first place waves break is the point next to this lighthouse which is also the surfing museum. I catch two waves here carving them up into the next break called The Slot, then through Middle Peak and Indicators. The next break along is called Cowells after the street across the road and I dont quite make it through this section as the waves peter out but both rides are EPIC!!! So good in fact that I decide straight away to extend my stay here. Will definitely be hitting this wave twice, thrice or possibly more often than that, and will attach my camera next time to try and get some video footage. Awesome just awesome!

As well as stroking sharks at the marine research institute I pick up these playing cards.  

Each card gives useful advice, and I note with interest that nowhere does it say do not go in the water.