3 | Surf Camp

Surf Camp Australia was well worth the $500... Eat, surf, sleep & repeat! I managed to stand up after a couple of lessons and even ride a few green waves at the end of the week, they were scary! Image falling off a 3 metre wall head first and that's what it feels like to fall off, then be under the water for what feels like a minute, great fun!

The week did not get off to a bad start when I dropped a crate of Corona I was carrying back to the trailer park. I slipped going downhill and lost it over my shoulder... DEVASTATED does not cover it. $75 for a crate of 24 bottles, for me that is an expensive loss as I lost around 8 of them. It could only get better from here.

The days started with a buffet style breakfast, the first challenge of the day... how much could I eat? I think my record stood at 4 slices of toast, a bowl of cereal, a banana and a cup of coffee; not bad! The group was split into two groups which rotated around starting at 8:00 or 10:30 doing two, two hour lessons a day.

After collecting the boards and hitting the beach, we would draw invisible boards in the sand and learn the routine of how to get on the board. Then we were left to try it out in the surf with a trial and error approach. For the first few days were error filled although I did manage to stand up a few times. Once we had finished our final lesson of the day it was time to beat the line of people queuing up for the showers. For some reason I always managed to find myself at the back, perhaps i was talking too much to others about the waves and others took a welcome opportunity to jump ahead.

In the evening we played Jenga, danced on the tables playing drinking games such as Roxane (dangerous) which is basically drinking every time her name is mentioned in the song, which is a lot!

By day 5 I was ambitious enough to go further out in the surf to catch green waves. I got roughly 100m out at times battling the waves to make it pass the break and take a rest before trying to catch the larger waves. The advice I received from the instructor Felix was to paddle hard before the wave broke and attempt to stand up as the wave is breaking; easier said than done!

The week flew by so quickly and will no doubt be one of the best weeks I will spend in Australia.

#Beach #Sport