Around The World In 80 Waves

Having driven three hours south of Perth I am loathe to just drive all the way back there after my session at Smiths Beach, so I try to see if there is anywhere local that I can stay cheaply which would allow a few more sessions in the area before returning.

Almost everything is way beyond what I wanted to spend especially because I have already paid for a bed at the Billabong Backpacker Resort back in the city, and it means I will be doubling up which is extravagant even by this trip’s standard.

Finally I decide that there is no choice but investigate sleeping in caves.

Before you think I have regressed further towards my Neanderthal genes I should explain that Caves House is about as far removed from a drafty hole in the rocks as you might imagine, and the service there is rather better than that too.

It is a magnificent building in Yallingup set in manicured grounds at the top of the hill above the famous break in the town.

I arrive late in the day and manage to haggle the room rate down to something I can live with, and after discovering I would have a proper double bed to myself (with an electric blanket), my own TV and a wholesome breakfast in the morning I shake hands on the deal and settle in for the night.

I spend most of the evening in the Long Bar enjoying a Sunday Roast, followed by cheese and biscuits with a couple of pints of James Squire’s One Fifty Lashes, which I have been enjoying all over Oz.

There is surf memorabilia all over the bar and I have a good chat with the barman James who surfs the local breaks. The conversation inevitably turns to the angry fish in the neighbourhood and comments like, “we’ve had a bad run recently” and “some of the local ones can be as big as 6 metres in length” don’t do much to ensure a good nights sleep!

I wake up early though and walk through the grounds which have a number of these beautiful Flame trees along the path down to the beach.

It has dropped a bit since the day before but is still massive so after ambling back I decide to enjoy a hearty breakfast before checking out and driving down to the break.

I drove three hours south of Perth and after checking out a couple of breaks opted to get in the water at Smiths Beach where there are a good number of others are already in the water.

Whilst being no guarantee of not being attacked being part of a crowd obviously improves your chances of not being the chosen meal! You would have to be staggeringly unlucky to get attacked but this article should give you some idea about why I am concerned so much in this part of the world.

All the people in the water are really friendly and the sea is so clear you could see all the way to the sandy bottom, which settles me down because you would at least see anything coming you way.

This is a great picture of me having second thoughts about taking the drop on one of the head high waves because it it about to thump down right across the bay.

I did manage to make a few drops though and even a handful of turns on one wave before the broken section would catch up with me.

It is hard to tell whether I am surfing the wave or it was surfing me in this shot, but I managed to stay upright a while longer. It was quite a heavy wave breaking over the sand here and more than once I surfaced after wiping out wondering if my board would be in two pieces.

It was late in the afternoon when I arrived and there really wasn’t much daylight left by the time I caught this ride in at the end of my session.

The number of surfers in the water was thinning out and I didn’t want to be the only thing on the menu!

Ten years ago myself and some other surfers from London raised loads of money for MIND, the mental health charity, by swimming across the English Channel from the UK to France. It was done as a relay with each swimmer getting in and swimming as hard as they could in rotation.

We all did a stint in the dark or half light, in the middle of the shipping lanes and as we approached the French coast until the distance was covered taking 12 hours to get there. Wes, who you see here about to do a dance to Queens of The Stone Age that was immediately followed by a comedy fall off the back of the boat, has since returned back to his native Australia and I arranged to meet up with him for a surf whilst I am in the area.

He lives on the coast near Freemantle which is only half an hour from where I am staying so we arrange to meet up at first light because the wind was predicted to drop for a few hours.

Checking out a few breaks we were both particular pleased about our early start because whilst at Cottesloe Beach a particularly attractive young woman ran past us laughing and throwing her clothes off before running naked into the water. This meant we got to see a full moon as well as enjoying this sunrise at the same time.

Rottnest Island located just off the coast here gets in the way of most of the swell, so even though there should be good waves on offer here it was all a bit disappointing apart from the streaker. However it seems the whole of Western Australia is aware that the wind has dropped and it is packed in the water anyway at the break called Isolators where we decide to paddle out.

This takes us through a huge patch of seaweed which I get completely tangled up in, and knowing how I feel about what else is in the water you can imagine how it brushing up my legs does to my nervous system.

Wes and I find a little peak to enjoy surfing over the rock reef off the side of the main crowd, but in all honesty spend most of our time in the water catching up rather than bagging loads of waves.

Wes, who I discover has entered the dirty business of politics since I last saw him, is giving you a wave from behind me in this shot.

We do catch a few little rides though of which this was the best picture.

After a fun session with an old friend, we decide to go into Freemantle for breakfast and continue our catch up. Whilst there Wes convinces me that I must drive south to where the waves aren’t sheltered by the Island.

The last time I surfed the waves off Scarborough Beach it was in Yorkshire back in the UK. I was surfing in the North Sea on a swell generated in the Arctic, and there was half a foot of snow on the ground!

Apart from being a tad chilly there were clean lines of waves and I had a great session. However having surfed for over an hour in water which was about 3C, with snow being blown horizontally across the bay throughout, taking my leg out of my wetsuit after the session to put my bare foot down into a snow drift brought a whole new definition to the word cold!

This Scarborough however is on the Indian Ocean coast on the west of Australia and a short drive from Perth where I am staying, so I suspected it would be a great deal warmer.

Everybosy else is in full wetsuits but I have limited my travel bags for the next few weeks so only have my shorty wetsuit, which was fine because it is still warmer here than it ever gets in the UK. The wind is everything when you are in the water though and it was howling onshore, and because the sea bed drops away quite sharply it meant the waves here were largely just dumping on the shore.

I knew it wasn’t going to be a great session but paddled out in front of this fantastic amphitheatre they have built on the shore because I wanted to bag a different ocean on my travels and settle my nerves about being in the water in an area known for its angry fish.

My board was a nightmare to get past the breakers because it is so bouyant and I got hammered on the way out. I did this a few times after each of the take offs, which were immediately followed by getting oblitorated by the dumping waves that I had caught but didn’t stay in long.

Such are the level of shark attacks on the coast of Western Australia that the local fish are closer to furious than they are to angry!

In the past twelve months there were eight recorded shark attacks, seven of them from great whites. This compares with an average of more than four attacks each year over the past decade.

It isn’t surprising then that the local surfers would do anything to try and prevent themselves being next on the shark’s menu.

You may have seen in the news that so called shark proof wetsuits have been produced towards this end.

To say I am a tad nervous about surfing here is like saying the pope is a tad Catholic. Therefore I would be tempted to invest in one of the suits if I thought they were any guarantee.

However given the suit is described as a shark mitigation system I fear in truth it is probably only as effective as the Shark Repellant surf wax that used to be sold here. Guaranteed against shark attack or your money back!

I will have to make do with what I already have. Wish me luck.

I was about to post a report on how pain free flying the five and a half hours with Virgin Australia had been from Sydney to Perth. No surcharges and I was handled like a human being too. However right at the last minute they managed to screw that up by losing my surf board in the airport in Perth!

It is a couple of hours behind Sydney and after I had wasted an hour hanging around whilst they found my board it was nearly midnight there. I had been awake since dawn Sydney time and was teetering on the edge of a severe case of sense of humour failure.

Can no airline get it right?

It has been fantastic having my own space for the last few weeks but I am heading to Perth later today and it would be far too long and boring a drive to get there, so I’m returning the van and catching a plane.

It is amazing how attached you get to vehicles, and I have to say that this one hasn’t stepped out of line once as I have travelled all around the coastline of south and eastern Australia so I’m sorry to be saying goodbye to it.

The good people at All Seasons have been brilliant with me too. They sorted me out with a great price initially and were even good enough to let me off the administration charge that normally goes with passing on my details after I got nicked for speeding.

I spend the night at a camp site close to Cronulla, keen to get in the water here in the morning because it is the home break of Mark Occhilupo, a former world champion surfer, whose career I have always followed.

However the waves are a bit naff when I get there and I am bored of dribbly surf and can’t be bothered to go in here today. I have had too much of it of late, and will have another chance to surf this break later on my trip because it is so close to Sydney.

Instead I head straight back to Adam and Rossana’s place so that I can start packing my bags for the next leg of my travels.

I think I can use the opportunity to pack up some more things to send home, but am staggered at how much there is after living in the van for the last month and a half.

I don’t have time to post my parcel mountain but am dreading the bill when I get around to it after visiting Indonesia and Fiji. I can’t even lift all of it!

After surfing Thirroul there is still enough time for me to cover some of the distance between me and Sydney. The coast road I follow is known as the Grand Pacific Drive.

It takes in some beautiful scenery but the most impressive thing I see along the way is the man made Sea Cliff Bridge built out over the ocean.

Based on all the signs along it telling you that there is always hope, I suspect it is a popular spot for depressed Australians to throw themselves off once they can’t cope any more!

The last leg of the drive before the end takes me through the Royal National Park.

Like so much of Australia that I have seen it is full of gum trees. However in the last light of day I have to stop at this spot to take a few pictures of this idyllic looking watering hole in the middle of them.

To celebrate surfing a hundred different breaks already on this trip there is only one thing to do. Go surfing!

The next town I see where I am tempted into the water is Thirroul, which is a short drive northwards from Corrimal. I forgot to take a picture of the break so here is a snap of the town I have borrowed from the net.

It is my third session of the day and the surf really hasn’t improved that much, but I paddle out directly in front of the town’s surf lifesaving club where I can see a surfable wave.

There seems to be a great club in every seaside town here in Australia and they are obviously a big part of the local community. I have a little peak largely to myself but am joined by everybody getting a quick wave after work.

There isn’t all that much daylight left but I still have time to make surfing here worthwhile.

I bagged at least my share of the waves which are about thigh high and not too taxing.

Loads of pictures of me gurning my way into a ride as usual and this one of myself through the water breaking over the front of my board.