Okay, so…it took a few years

The ’78 VW camper van that started a lot of dreaming. Fall 1991 at Christmas Meadows, Utah, with Tom McLaughlin.

In the summer of 1991 I purchased a Volkswagen camper van. I found it parked on a street in my hometown with a “for sale” sign in the window. It was a green, 1978 full-camper version by Westfalia, and it was the exact model I’d looked for in previous years while living in two places — Germany and California — where you’d expect to find such a vehicle. Instead, I found mine in coastal northern Massachusetts upon my return there after a winter in Utah.

I went back to Utah a month or so later and started plotting where I was going to go the following summer. I had some money saved up and I wanted to go on an adventure in my new camper. There were two potential destinations.

The first was Alaska, a land I had often dreamed about thanks to the tales of Jack London and National Geographic specials on TV. In fact, living in a cabin in the wilds of Alaska was, along with sailing around the world, one of two dreams I’ve had since I was young. And my brief (to that point) explorations of the mountains of the western U.S. only added to the allure of the Last Frontier: bigger mountains, wilder places!

The second option was a small town in Mexico called Puerto Escondido. It was a newcomer to my awareness, only registering in my late teens and early 20s as I got more into surfing. Puerto Escondido was home to a break known as “The Mexican Pipeline,” a hollow, tubing wave the likes of which I had never seen in person, and unlike the famous break in Hawaii for which it was named, Puerto Escondido broke to the right, meaning I would ride facing the wave.

As summer turned to fall in 1991, my research picked up. And the universe sent me what seemed to be a few signs. In October, I got my dog, Spooner, who was an Alaskan Malamute. Later that winter, I started dating a woman from Anchorage, Alaska. And through it all there was the fact that I didn’t speak Spanish.

In May 1992, I drove to Alaska and fell in love. No, not with the woman — she dumped me before I even got on the road — but with Alaska. And I spent the next 12 years looking for jobs there that wouldn’t put a crimp in the career I was building. It took until 2004 and though Anchorage was hardly a cabin in the woods, I loved my time in the Great Land and have missed it dearly since leaving.

I never did make it to Puerto Escondido. Until now.

It took me 25 years but on Feb. 27, 2017, I stepped off a plane in Puerto Escondido. The heat and humidity were in stark contrast to the cold, dry winter I’d left in New England. And the waves were WAY more intimidating than the waist-high longboard waves I’d ridden in Massachusetts two days earlier. (The water was also twice the number of degrees in temperature.)

So now I’m here in Puerto for 10 days. I spent a couple of hours yesterday just watching the main surf break, awed by the power and size of the Mexican Pipeline. Twenty-five years ago, I’d have charged out there and probably gotten my ass kicked. I’d have survived — my conditioning and fitness then would have seen me through it — but I would not have performed well, if at all. Yesterday, even though I’m a better surfer now than I was then, I opted to just watch and learn…and then went to a smaller, more manageable break nearby. The water was just as warm, the waves were a lot smaller and more gentle, and I still had a bunch of fun.

I looked this morning and the swell looks to have dropped enough to make it manageable, but there are occasional sets of waves that appear that induce a bit of sphincter-clenching. I hope that means that I’m older and wiser, and not that I’ve become a chicken as I’ve aged. But I will give the break a try today. Better late than never, right?

Or I won’t, and I’ll go back to the mellow break. Damn! Older AND wiser…who’da thunk it?!

7 CommentsOcean Fun, Travel

Bookends

The guy from state parks didn’t show up until around 6:10. I was the only one waiting at the entrance. There were two guys already in the water. Their cars were parked on the 101 up at the top of the hill where the parking spots started. If you wanted to be in the water before six, you had to park up there. At this time of year, you could be in as early as five or quarter-past.

I was in no hurry but I was glad to be there at that hour and with only those two others out. I stripped out of my shirt and flip flops, locked up the car and launched into the water in my shorts. It wasn’t great: stomach-high, maybe, chest-high on the sets. But it was clean. And it was just us three and the peaks were spread out enough that we each had all the waves we wanted. I sat outside a bit hoping for the bigger waves and was rewarded with a couple of decent rides. And just before it was time to go, those two guys bailed. I was alone in the early morning surf — and two gorgeous sets rolled through. I caught a wave in each set. My board sliced through the obsidian surface, white foam spraying from beneath the rails. I carved a couple of broad, looping turns, the spray now arcing out over the back of the wave in a great curve. At the end of the second ride, I flopped to my belly and rode prone to the beach, where three guys were putting on wetsuits to head out.

And then I went to work.

Eleven hours later I was back: same parking lot, same shorts, sunnier skies and a lot more people. But they were mostly bunched up near the shorebreak, where they could launch their skateboard moves and hurry back to try them again on the next little ramp. A couple of people were out on the reef, where occasional peaks would rear up out of the slate sea and offer up short speed runs. Every so often, though, a set would roll through that sent people scurrying for the shoulders. I paddled out there.

And I waited. But because there were so few people out there, when those sets rolled in, I was free to choose. And with the tide dropping ever so slightly, I was able to make it all the way through to the shorebreak, where the skateboarders had to watch as I rode past. No, I wasn’t as good as they were, but I still managed to throw some spray and carve some turns. And on that inside section there would be one, final move, an ecstatic toss off the very top of the breaking wave.

It was the perfect way to frame a workday.

To top it off, after returning home this evening, I finished the book I was reading. There was the melancholy sadness that came from knowing I wouldn’t be spending any more time with engrossing characters and unpredictable plot lines, but there was also the satisfied happiness that came from knowing whether or not the protagonist would get out of yet another jam and save the day. And, spoiler alert: the lead, in both my stories, triumphed once again (as I suspected he would) and lived happily ever after.

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A Cruel Mistress

For a whole host of reasons — all of them horse shit so I won’t go into them here — I haven’t been in or on the water much lately. Every time I hear that Counting Crows (remember them?) line, “Been so long since I’ve seen the ocean…I guess I should” it hits home — until I realize I live about a quarter-mile from the waterline. At which point I feel even more pathetic. It’s a wonderfully vicious cycle.

But for that same whole host of reasons — all of them still horse shit so I still won’t go into them — I’ve been making an effort to improve several aspects of my life. And that includes prioritizing water time. That should be the priority for a Pisces, shouldn’t it?

What’s been sobering is that it hasn’t been easy. Well, the actual getting out and DOING those ocean-centric things has been; I’ve been motivating fairly well (see above re: “horse shit reasons”). No, what’s been difficult are the actual acts of sailing and surfing, usually two things that are Zen-like in their mental aspects (at least for me).

Take yesterday, for instance: I went down to San Diego to watch a regatta of schooners go by on the bay as part of a race. It was cool to see these majestic boats cruising past on the breeze that was rolling over Point Loma and down San Diego Bay. Wait, what? Wind? In San Diego?! That’s right: actual freakin’ wind! After the schooners had gone past I motored over to Mission Bay where I rented a 16-foot dinghy and went out to enjoy that same wind.

And enjoy it I did…but it took a while to get there. Tacking out of the basin where the rental boats are tied up, I unfurled the headsail only to have the jib fairlead snap. Whoops. About face…back to the dock. The guys set me up on the other 16-footer and off I went again. Several quick tacks and voila! Past the rock jetties and out into Mission Bay.

I tacked my way up toward the broader, windier part of the bay. And plenty of other people had the same idea: there were tons of sailboats of all sizes, several kiteboarders (including one guy on a foiling board who kept getting yanked clear of his foot straps), a few sailboarders (didn’t know anyone still sailboarded) and the rest of San Diego’s water aficionados: SUPers (both good and beginner), jet skiers, water skiers, booze cruisers, cops…you name it. Hell, out of sight around the one island there was a rowing regatta. It was like both directions of a busy Southern California freeway with none of the lanes drawn on the pavement. Thankfully, nothing drastic happened while I was out there. More damage to the ill-maintained dinghy (topping lift broke and several of the plastic mainsail cars slipped out of the track on the mast) but nothing major.

What was really frustrating, though, was my seeming inability to read the wind. Performance? Hell, I was just trying to keep the sails trimmed not TOO horribly. I mean: there were times it felt like I couldn’t even tell what the hell point of sail I was on.

But before my rental was up and it was time to return to the marina, there were one or two instances where I actually DID get into a groove: the sails trimmed properly, the boat heeling just SO and the hull slicing through the water with a sense of purpose. In those moments it felt like the boat was smiling just as I was.

My return to surfing this weekend was painfully similar. Friday night after work I jumped into the water for a sundown session. The waves were fine: fun, big enough for a heavy guy like me to have fun, not too many people out. Could I catch a wave? Nope. My paddling was anemic and my judgment worse. It finally got so dark that I was the only person left in the water and that still didn’t help. I managed to get worked by a couple of clean-up sets and finally said “to hell with it” and just rode in, prone on my board.

Saturday morning wasn’t much better but at least I wasn’t worried about being stuck out there after it got dark. Of course, it was the weekend so not long after I got into the water, several fat guys on SUPs and even more old guys on longboards paddled out, just to make the maneuvering that much more of a challenge. I managed a couple of rides — none remotely special — and called it a day. I figured I’d go check out the schooners in San Diego…that would be awesome right? You’ve read about that already…

And this afternoon I went to the beach figuring I’d just read a bit and soak up some more sun. As I pulled into the parking lot a bomb set broke on the reef and a rider in each direction enjoyed a great ride. The chair and towel stayed in the car and I paddled out to join the half-dozen guys (a shockingly low number for this particular break) in the lineup.

The swell was solid with occasional sweeper sets that caught everyone off-guard, but other than those the tide made for funky paddling. The waves would stand up and then ledge out in front of you so there was no way to get onto the face and ride. It was a frustrating spell but after paddling for, and missing, a few waves I found myself farther inside. I paddled off to the shoulder of the reef sets and sat for a bit.

And then, what to my wondering eyes should appear (to coin a phrase)? Another of the very infrequent wide sets, perfectly lined up for yours truly with no one else around. A quick spin, a couple of quick paddles and UP! to my feet, driving for the drop-in…just in time for the wave to suck out. The sloping wave that was there a moment ago disappeared and I wound up ass-over-teakettle at the bottom of the sea.

But I’d found my spot for today. A quick paddle back and there was another wave bearing down. I got into this one quicker than the last wave and moved down the line before the section disappeared and enjoyed a high-speed, weaving sleigh ride before the wave shut down. A few more just like that and my frustration from the previous two outings was gone.

I don’t know if the ocean was making my pay dues for having been elsewhere (mentally, emotionally, physically and any other way possible) for the past few weeks, but I do know that this happens every time I’m away from the ocean for very long without a legitimate excuse (injury, illness, living in the high country, etc.). You can draw your own conclusions.

Ocean Fun, Personal, Sports and Fitness