our wave newspaper issue #8 march and april 2006

OurWave Vol.3- Issue# �- Mar/2006-Apr/2006Go to 5 for advertising Info.

V O L . 3 - I S S U E # 1 - M A R C H / 2 0 0 6 - A P R I L / 2 0 0 6

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Dear Our Wave - Here’s a pic of my son, Daniel (aka Danny Boy) at age six at Huntington riding his first wave! He’s now a surf addict like his dad and older sister, Danique. He’s now is riding a much shorter board at age 9. Danique is 11 and can charge those waves with the best of them. I thought I would share these with you and maybe even post on the next issue of our wave. ALOHA! Danny Garcia

STOKEDFirst I’d like to say how stoked I am on your newspaper. Now that I have found my picture in it, I love it even more. It is refreshing to see local surf spots and local surfers, as opposed to looking at the same old shots of Slater or Irons getting tubed at Pipeline.Anyway back to my pic, this is at south side Seal about 25 feet from the pier. The session was on March 10th. This was one of the biggest NW swells of the year. I was surfing North side with Cliff Kjoss, an old lifeguard friend, and the tide just started drop-ping (it had been high all morning). We decided to paddle over to South side knowing that it was just a

matter of time before those heavy South side Seal barrels started showing up. At that time there was only one other guy out on south side and he was on a sponge. Within 10 minutes we each had 2 or 3 great waves and at least 1 near broken board.By the end of the session there was a hundred guys out, but everyone was getting plenty of waves hoot-ing and hollering for each other. The vibe was great and everybody was stoked.Aloha- Nathan Irby

photo by Eddy Raposa originally run in Our Wave’s last issue

LOCAL

SURFERSREWARDED WITH EPIC SURF FOR TWO SOLID MONTHS!

photo by Eddy Raposa

Cliff Kjoss fishing on Southside.

By Jody LemmonThe Oceanographic Research Vessel Alguita hails from the homeport of Alamitos Bay CA. Captain Charles Moore is the ship’s owner operator and is a native of Long Beach. The Alguita plays an integral role as an oceanic research vessel for the Algalita Marine Research Foundation. Captain Moore has gathered an impressive reputation as a marine con-servationist, while traveling the world’s oceans. The Alguita was originally constructed in Tasmania and was designed specifically as a world cruising re-search vessel. She is a fifty-foot aluminum catama-ran carrying an impressive array of technology.More than five years ago Captain Moore traveled across an area in the middle of the Pacific Ocean called the North Pacific Gyre. This high-pressure weather system, which is roughly the size of Africa,

covers a majority of the off shore blue water in the Pacific Ocean. A series of rotating water currents have been accumulating man made debris in the region, for decades. This little explored area of the ocean soon became a fixation for Captain Moore, spawning many return voyages.Throughout history trans Pacific sailors have avoid-ed sailing deep inside high-pressure systems, like the North Pacific Gyre. These weather systems range in size from ocean to ocean, but they all share a com-mon characteristic of having very light winds, near their centers. In the year 2000, on a return voyage from Hawaii, Captain Moore utilized the fuel capac-ity of the Alguita and motored across the North Pa-cific high-pressure system, in order to make up some lost time. What he discovered was the presence

Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle.

Continued on page 7

A local surfer’s acount of life on a research vessle

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OurWave Vol.3- Issue# �- Mar/2006-Apr/2006Go to Page 15 for advertising Info.

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Se al Be ac h

The guy on the platform had the best seat in the house as a crew of tow-in surfers had their way with this rare big wave spot during the “Big Wednesday” swell.


During the swell in late December, Seal Beach garnered quite a bit of attention. The local news sent out reporters, the national media took notice, helicopters

captured the action from above and the coconut underground, that vast network of word of mouth communication, has seldom been so abuzz. Dozens of cell phone wielding surfers paced the sand, eat-ing through their peak minutes with reports of the escalating swell conditions. No doubt that the north side of Seal Beach Pier was sizeable that early morning on Dec.21, the day the swell peaked. Easily double overhead and pitch-ing wildly, it provided ample challenge for those willing to paddle out. But Southside is where the real action was taking place. With waves break-ing from the oil derrick to Cloudbreak, with rogue waves breaking on their own impetus everywhere in between, and giant reforms pounding the shore-line, the conditions were wild, shifty, and unpre-dictable.Spectators lined the shore, easily outnumbering the bodies actually in the water 20 to 1. The bravado on the beach was flagrant. A few “Man, I could’ve made that,” and “If it weren’t for my knee/back/shoulder/pinkie finger/whatever injury, I’d totally be out there,” comments were being thrown about. But the truth is, it was disconcertedly big and there were few takers.Of the few brave enough, talented enough, adrena-line driven enough to paddle out during a big South-side swell, one surfer who consistently stands out is Taylor Evans. Taylor, 24, a progressive and tal-ented surfer, has honed his skills surfing breaks all over the world, but insists that Southside remains one of his favorite places to surf.Not being able to successfully master the waves of Southside myself and generally spending too much time lamenting my late drops and subsequent rinse through the inside, I was hoping to glean some tips from Evans. He agreed to meet me and talk surfing.

I also knew that, during that same swell, Evans had tow in surfed the break I’ve heard referred to as Esters, a wave that breaks about 3/4 of a mile out from Seal Beach pier, word of it circulating about in the way that newly explored and rarely ridden spots in more exotic locales elicit. When I bring it up with Evans, he corrects me; the offshore island is called Esters, the break itself doesn’t have a name. He does, however, confirm my suspicion that it breaks rarely and needs a spe-cific swell. “It needs to be west and it needs to be huge.” Both conditions were optimal that Wednes-day before Christmas and Evans recounts the day for me:I knew waves were coming. I’d checked the re-ports, the weather, the buoys… I knew it would be closing out in a lot of places, but the big wave spots had potential, Lunada, Todos, the offshore islands, maybe here…. I’d seen it break before, (a few years ago), it was this weird winter day while I was living at my dad’s (on Ocean Ave.) it wasn’t that big in the morning, probably waist high, and by the evening it was huge, it was Cloudbreaking out in front of the house. I remember going out and catching a couple of waves and then I came in and I was standing on the patio and watching the waves break out there; it broke on the other side of the oil rig and scraped the bottom of it, and then broke through the reef that’s there and crumbled into the channel, so ever since then, I’ve kind of had a fas-cination about trying to get it. With this swell, Wednesday December 21, 2005, to be exact, Evan’s fascination turned into reality. Everything just worked out, I had the ski, my bud-dy Brett (Schwartz) and I had used a ski a couple times prior. My buddy Travis (Potter) also went out with us, he’d done it (tow in) in Indo a couple times. We used regular boards. It was all kind of experimental, you know. (Laughing)As for the secret of surfing Southside, familiarity may be the key. Evans grew up surfing Southside,

first picking up a board around the age of 8 and log-ging many Southside hours since. When I mention my inability to master Southside and my frequent ill-timed take offs resulting in some spectacular wipeouts, Evans doesn’t laugh, he responds with the same self-depreciating manner he’s displayed throughout our interview, “You surf enough, you get to a certain place where you’re just comfort-able with it.”

I’m feeling encouraged. I may even try surfing Southside again.

Interview by Nina Vafaie Photographs by Eddy Raposa

Taylor Evans

Evans, a firefighter for the City of Santa Ana, performing heroics at sea.

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Bryan Van Arsdale

Hello Eddie. Thanks for the call. My comments about Bryan’s level of surfing are nothing short of purely stoked. He’s a lot better than I was when I was in my teens! It’s refreshing to see someone so young pushing himself so hard with or without knowing the true dangers of his actions. This past January on Southside I saw Bryan pulling into some sick barrels. He was charging and letting everyone know that he was willing to take the hit (he broke at least two of his boards). He has shown us what it takes to be an up-and-comer in the line up. He’s been able to watch so many of the local rippers (Charlie, Ryan and Chad to name just three). South-side will always demand your respect and your willingness to risk it all. For those who have, including myself, it’s a ride that’s hard to beat. If it wasn’t for surfing, I wouldn’t be here today. Richard Payne - surfer



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Sean Collins reveals the secrets for knowing when and where to go in his new book, Surfline’s Califor-nia Surf Guide - Secrets To Finding The Best Waves.The book covers most all of the popular spots from the Oregon to Mexican borders. These are not se-cret spots by any means even though the details of their exact locations and how to get to them are left fairly ambiguous. What Sean does do though, is show you how to use features from the premium services of Surfline’s LOLA swell models. This information, as even he has mentioned, does exist for free if you know where to look, but it is the ease of use that makes the swell model worthwhile. The book gives good descriptions of details like the bot-tom bathymetry, favorable swell directions, crowd factors, local factors, as well as pollution and other hazards to deal with. The first section of the book, “Surfology 101: What

Every Surfer Should Know About The Waves,” is a must read for understanding how the waves break the way they do at any beach. It will give you a real understanding of why a wind or ground swell breaks differently than a ground swell coming from the same direction, or how it is that places like Seal Beach can pick up a swell from an angle that would seem to be blocked/shadowed by the Palos Verdes Peninsula if you were just to look at a map without any of the knowledge eloquently written in this book. This information is well written and easily understood. This book can be a life saver for all those kooks out there that love to talk like they know what, how, and why the surf is breaking the way it does at their local beach. The illustrations of the swell models showing the swells reaction relative to the surf spots on the maps can give you a pretty good idea which spot will be the place to go when you hear a swell is coming from a certain direction. The book gives you 4 screen grabs of the same section of a map listing a number of surf spots: Two maps showing the best average angle from the North/West (one map showing a long period swell and another a short period,) plus two maps with the same corre-sponding swell periods from the best average angle

from the South. These illustrations throughout the book are real handy for finding where to go when you come across a swell that isn’t work-ing at your favorite spot. If you have the time

to travel, just find out what the swell angle/periods are and check the book for choices that correspond with what you want. With only the two angles il-lustrated for you to guess from, it may seem that the book is just a great selling point for the real-time information that LOLA can give you, but this book offers so much more.Sean’s book also does the good deed of reminding us that the ocean is there for all of us, but under the circumstances of our crowded society, we must approach any given surf spot with some respect for the locals that surf there, the safety of yourself, as well as the safety of others. In the last section, ap-propriately named, “Bill Of Rights And Lefts - Surf-ing Etiquette,” that he co-wrote with surfing icon, Nick Carroll, they give a thorough description of how a surfer should act in any given line-up. They do a great job of letting you know that these rules apply differently at different spots and they usually follow the pattern of “Aggressive wave-aggressive crowd, Mellow wave-mellow crowd.” The trick, as they note, “You need to be honest with yourself about your ability and your intentions, and to rec-ognize that some surf zones are not suited for com-petitive skills-oriented behavior.” The section goes

on to list the rules of etiquette like, “Don’t drop in or snake your fellow surfer,” and “When paddling out to or within a break, it’s your responsibility to stay out of the way of riders on waves,” etc.... Each rule gives many scenarios and solutions for any beginner (and some of those who have forgotten) a better understanding on what they should do in any of those situations that they will most definitely end up in while surfing in a crowd.Sean held a book signing at Harbour Surfshop in January in which he also answered questions. Af-ter listening to Sean talk about his dedication to understanding the ocean, I realized what a ben-efit his sharing of knowledge has given the surfing community. The tools and information that he of-fers us surfers will only help ease the pain of the ever-increasing crowd factor and has lead surfing into a new age of extreme surfing by giving hard core surfers the information they need to know when and where to go.

By Mark Lugenbuehl

When and Where To Go

Tyler Collins , son of Sean Collins, showing his local knowledge.

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of an unnatural substance that had become a pre-dominant characteristic throughout the Northern Pacific’s water column.The first plastics produced are still present today. Plastic does not biodegrade. It goes through a lengthy process of photo degradation. As plastic is exposed to solar rays it becomes brittle. Ocean waves slowly break down the brittle synthetics into

smaller and smaller pieces. The tragic reality is that the North Pacific Gyre has become a “Garbage Patch” filled with tiny particles of plastic. These tiny particles appear as confetti in some regions and are believed to be present throughout the entire water column.This summer I was contacted by Captain Moore and offered the chance to accompany him and his crew into the North Pacific Gyre. The prospec-tive plan included filming a documentary, where I would fill the role as the underwater videogra-pher. Collecting, documenting and quantifying the various organisms and synthetics we encountered would be our main objective.The four-crew members I would be sharing close quarters with for three weeks included some im-pressive individuals. Marcus Eriksen Ph.D. is an expert in science education. He commonly gives consultations to schools, museums and zoos to en-hance their science programs. Dr. Eriksen filled the role aboard as a research assistant and planned on collecting plastic samples to use as a “hands on” teaching aid for Cal-ifornia school children. Austin Brown the co-captain on board has experienced previous expeditions through the North Pacific Gyre. His knowledge of the ocean is an asset worthy of mention. Austin is the boat manager for the Orange County Coast Keepers environmental organiza-tion and rarely misses a voyage aboard the Alguita. The biologist aboard was Laurie Harvey. She focuses on the study of nesting seabirds. Laurie preserved many of the samples we collected in the gyre and identified a multitude of marine birds we encountered. The documentary producer aboard was Ian Connacher. He worked camera 1 and hails from Canada. Ian is a segment producer for Discovery Canada and runs his own film company, Cryptic Month Productions. His company fo-cuses on environmental issues allow-ing Ian to travel to the far reaches of the globe.Plastic as far as the eye can see. Traveling up to seven hundred miles off of the coast of the Oregon/Cali-fornia border revealed many incred-ible finds. Catching a North Westerly we sailed for nearly a week to finally cross the wind boundary line into the gyre. Traveling through the gyre was a strange phenomenon. The process of spotting for floating or partly sub-merged debris evolved many times over the weeks of collecting. We could be found at the top of the mast scanning the horizon for large drift nets or brightly colored rope boluses. Boluses are a strange phenomenon consisting of a multitude of mono-filament fishing line and plastic rope, which is all tangled together into a nasty rats nest. Scoop nets were pri-

marily used to catch the smaller pieces and frag-ments of plastic, that floated by regularly. Fishing buoys from the far away continent of Asia were a common find. Using a boat hook or common fish-ing gaff became the tool of choice for the larger chunks of floating plastic debris.

Once a crewmember would site and direct the helmsmen close to a floating apparition, my job came into play. I would dive over the side and shoot the diversity of life inhabiting the plastic object. Tiny schools of fish, crustaceans and mol-lusks were commonly found around or on the plas-tic object. These creatures have very few predators causing them to pay little heed to my camera or myself. Diving in the open ocean evokes a bar-

rage of thoughts in ones mind. As I focused my camera on a variety of drifting plastics, ranging from hundreds of feet of netting to thumbnail sized fragments, the eerie feeling of the deep was a constant.Night diving was a thrill on many levels. Dur-ing the night deep sea creatures can be found near or on the surface feeding. The multitude of pelagic sea jellies we encountered was as-tounding. These filter feeding creatures indis-criminately swallow plastic particles along with their primary food source, zooplankton. In some areas the amount of plastic particles in the water column out weighed the zooplank-ton many times over. Pelagic Sea jellies are primarily seen at night, in the middle of the ocean. These incredible creatures are spectacu-lar for any diver to witness. During the night many of the creatures displayed colors ranging across the rainbow. Blinking, moving lights were visible through the transparent tissue of the sea jellies, appearing psychedelic against the pitch-black backdrop of the abyss.As the days turned into weeks the decks of the Alguita began to change form. Crates that were once filled with an abundance of organic produce were now being replaced with a mul-titude of synthetic debris. Boxes of sample jars

filled with plastic confetti fragments and pelagic sea creatures lined the aft deck. My visions of a pristine ocean were being destroyed right before my eyes.I have been surfing and diving off of the Califor-nia coast, all of my life. Over the years I have, al-most, become desensitized to all of the pollution at my local beaches. Before I traveled to the Gyre I would sometimes ponder what the deep open ocean was like. I always pictured crystal clear blue water with hundreds of feet of visibility. An area so remote and pristine that it would be unspoiled by man. Plastic, an invention that has permeated ev-ery aspect of our lives, has managed to achieve the unimaginable. Plastic has become the most promi-nent characteristic present in the open ocean.Plastics share a bond with pollutants. Chemicals, which were commonly used for agriculture, have

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also made their way into the North Pacific Gyre. Synthetics have been found to effectively soak up these toxic chemicals like sponges. Plastic float-ing in the open ocean has been found to possess a much higher concentration of chemicals than that of the ambient seawater. Many of the sea jellies we encountered possessed visible plastic fragments, which were imbedded in their tissue. Sea jellies are commonly preyed upon by sea squids, which in turn are consumed by fish. The toxins coating the plastic can and do pass through the food chain multiplying and accumulating, eventually reaching game fish. The fatty flesh of many of the top preda-tors of the ocean can carry high levels of toxins in their bodies. Humans, being at the top of the food chain, are the most susceptible to bioaccumula-tion.When confronted with these facts it is easy to give into a feeling of hopelessness. We think back to all of the things we could have or should have done to at least minimize the amount of plastic being dis-carded over the years. Use once and throw away is an all too common practice that people across the world are guilty of committing. Is recycling the answer? Every piece of plastic made from recycle plastic has the same sponge like property as non-recycled plastic. A large percentage of raw plastic is still being used in the process of producing re-cycled plastic. The cycle continues and leads us to very uncomfortable questions. Captain Moore and the Algalita Foundation focus their energy on the education of the public and the preservation of the marine environment. Public awareness of the problems occurring in the marine environment is only the beginning. Humans have an average life span that parallels a century. Qual-ity of life and the preservation of our environment are issues that affect our own lives as well as the generations to come. The answer to this complex problem is not an easy one to reach. The massive expanse of the ocean is no longer impenetrable. The oceans are filling up with trash and soon we will have a synthetic sea choked with floating plas-tic debris.


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Danny Nicholes grabbing one of the biggest stand-up shacks of the year at Southside.

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Karen Helm is Living Every Surfer Girl’s Dream....

to Surf PipelineHuntington Beach, California - Local surfer Karen Helm has been busy training mentally and physically for her trip to Hawaii at the end of February. This isn’t any normal surf trip; this is Karen’s one shot to realize her dreams of becoming a pro surfer. Karen has qualified to surf in the 2nd Annual Women’s Pipeline Championship on the North Shore of O’ahu. The contest has been upgraded to a one star ASP event, and promises to be big-ger and better than last year. The contest will be held sometime between March 1st and March 14th,

depending on the wave conditions. The Pipeline contest is open only to the top female extreme surfers in the world, and Karen is definitely one of them. Karen got a late start to the world of competitive surfing, but her drive and athleticism has helped her master the sport over the last 4 years. She is no stranger to big wave riding. Karen has spent the last three years living on the North Shore of Oah’u charging big waves on a daily basis. Karen said, “My Grandfather was a Big Wave Bodysurfer who used to push me into waves at age 5. I picked up surfing later where I fell in love so much with it that I moved to Hawaii. I coached and surfed everyday for 3 years where my knowledge of the ocean and lack of fear helped me to progress quickly”. Karen hopes that this contest will allow her to “continue on and leave my amateur status behind and officially become a Pro”. Karen is currently sponsored by T & C Surfboards and Australian company Ocean & Earth. If you see Karen down at the HB Pier, please paddle over and wish her luck.

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Surfers Art featured artist: JR Johnson

JR has been a surfer for over twenty years. Starting in Half Moon

Bay, and in college, majoring in Art, he did a surf comic for the local Half Moon Bay paper. He loved doing it. JR finished his Bachelor of Fine Arts de-gree at CSULB, graduating with honors, with a degree in illustration and worked for a couple of ad agencies where he rose to the level of assistant art director.

“They were grooming me to take over for the soon to retire art director, but I realized that I was working more and more as a manager, and less and less as an artist. I knew that higher pay, and an increasingly comfortable “com-fort zone” would kill my dream of working as a true creative, so I quit and went freelance as an illustrator/designer eight years ago.”JR has been pursuing his dream of being a syndicated cartoonist on and off during that

period. Most of his work now is as an editorial illustrator, (mostly comic illustrations, visit jrillustration.com), and as a designer. He is the illustrator for RV journal, where his comics are used in every issue, and writes a column for the magazine called, “JR’s Journeys”. He has also written and illustrated his first children’s book, (with two others underway), and will be sending it out to publishers early this year.He has a beautiful and supportive wife who said,

“DO IT,” when he talked about quitting the steady job. They have a teenage daughter who is attending The Orange County School of Art as a visual art-ist and considering modeling, and they have an obedient and shiny lab mix dog that helps them remember the important stuff in life.

Page #�0 www.ourwavenewspaper.com


Richard Payne gets barreled when there are no waves to be barreled on, but you can bet that if it’s good, he’s going to be the MAN!

Micah Byrne

Like the Ground Hog, “The Shadow”, comes in and out of his holes to check how much longer the winter will last.





Ryan SimmonsLook for the low-down on “The Dog” in an up and coming issue of Our Wave newspaper.

Page #�� www.ourwavenewspaper.com


Super stoked upon my return, I called Mark, the editor for Our Wave, to see if he’d be interested in running a story about my trip to Mavericks. He obliged once again. I was lucky enough to be given the opportunity to photograph

Mavericks from a boat. As a budding surf photog-rapher, this was an experience of a life time. You might be thinking, how? How did I manage to get my foot in the door as a “nobody?” Well, a little prying and name dropping did the trick.I actually sent in a volunteer application, just to help with event setup and operations. On the appli-cation I mentioned that I had experience as a surf photographer and, on occasion, wrote for a local surf paper “Our Wave.” I was contacted shortly by some folks up at Mavericks. They asked about my photography experience, checked out some of my work, and asked if I’d rather take photos than di-rect traffic. After deliberating about this for hours, I chose to shoot. Hard choice, I know.For the next three weeks I waited, bags and camera packed, ready for the call. I had 24 hours to get up to Half Moon Bay. When I received the notice, “It’s ON!” on Feb 6th, I grabbed my bags, threw them in my rental car and headed north. At the same time, 24 of the world’s best big wave surfers and reportedly 50,000 spectators were doing the same, departing from locations around the world, all to converge on this quiet little, Nor Cal beach town, home to the world renowned big wave surf spot known as Mav’s.

Quiet no more, as I pull into the parking lot, a flood of people be-gin to arrive. After locating the charter boat, I board at 7:30. First heat starts at 8:00AM. The waves were huge, the sun was out and the winds were minimal...a photogs dream sesh! Hope you enjoy the shots, I had a blast taking them. I highly advise all to see this event live, you just don’t understand the power of a 40-50ft wave until you see, hear and feel it in person! Can’t wait for next year! A few of my shots have been published on w w w. m a v e r i c k s s u r f . c o m . I have a website in the works, where you will

be able to see more of my work, coming soon www.sunchildsurfshots.com. For now feel free to drop me a line at [email protected]

Monster : Greg Long carves a perfect line on a perfect wave.

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As I popped up and angled down its face the wave started feathering at the top. I hit the bottom and cranked a hard turn finish-

ing off the turn about 1/3 of the way up the face. I tucked and the wave throw out, sending streaks of silver over my head. I stuck my hand into its face and the wave drew me in as the silver became green with only a patch of a blue cylinder showing ahead. All of a sudden, she was there, the morning sand jogger with her hard body, and she was smil-ing at me.. Ring!! Ring!! What the hell, the phone is ringing. I look up check, the time 11:52 p.m., grab the phone and say “hey.”“Dude, its Nevik, I got some bitchin news, you are going to be sooo stoked.”Nevik it’s frigging almost midnight.!! How did you get my phone number?”“Dude you gave it to me when I was sitting up your meeting with Uncle Chick, you told me to call any-time.”Well, what can I say, it was right (probably for the first time). I had given him the phone number and even pretended like I liked him when I was work-ing on the exclusive Chick Hunter interview. Chick is a surf icon, a legend that will live on in surf films and outrageous stories long after he is gone. Nevik

is Chick’s nephew and a total moron. Nevik is eigh-teen years old and his life consists of skateboard-ing and doing his favorite surf move on any wave he catches. When you think of a surfer around his age, you would imagine his favorite surf move be-ing a slash cutback, or maybe getting air, but no, Nevik has perfected the snake. Whether you are a long boarder, short boarder, sponger, or even a butt surfer it makes no difference. If you have a nice left and Nevik is sitting inside you are soon to have a visitor. Nevik often shouts out “ party wave” as he drops down the face. I believe he does this in hopes of drowning out the assorted curses that he accumu-lates by complet-ing his move.“What’s up, Nevik?”“Uncle Chick called and he wants you to meet him down in Baja. He wants to take you to a secret spot. He called it the Lost Reef.”

“That’s cool but what is the catch? I don’t really know your Uncle. Why would he do that for me?”“Dude, he really digs your name. He says that you and him are alike in an uncommon way. He said that you both were given names to live up to.”“Hey I’m stoked, where am I supposed to meet him at?”“ We’re supposed to meet him this coming week-end. He says that there is a massive swell that is going to hit the reef and send us all to Nirvana. I

swear that’s what he said.”“ Wait a minute, Nevik. Did you say we?“ Yeah he said that you are supposed to bring me and Knat down too.”Knat was Nivek’s best friend, his mentor in every sense of the word. Going south with the likes of Nevik and Knat would not gain me membership in the Mensa society, but catching a secret spot with a surf legend, why not?

CHICK HUNTER AND THE LOST REEF

Painting by JR Johnson

Story by Ian D. Toob •••••••••••>



Did you find yourself or your buddy in this paper listed as unidentified? We’ll run it again with the name. Go to


Bolsa Chica unidentified enjoying the benefits of the Bolsa Chica Wet Land Restoration

Seal Beach unidentified gets a sweet barrel then rips a mean cutback.

Fictional



“ Listen Nivek, it’s not like I don’t believe you on anything, but why don’t you have your Uncle call me to confirm all this.”It was the next evening when my phone rang again and I instantly recognized the voice of Chick Hunt-er. He explained that he was worried about his neph-ew. He wanted to spend some time with him and his friend to see what kind of person he was and check out this kid Knat, who Nivek raved about. He did not trust Nivek to go down south without a chaperone and that was where I fit in. He explained to me that he had access to an amaz-ing secret reef break down south of the border. It was located on a private island off the coast, which was owned by his long time friend Raj (he made a point of spelling it for me) Hadmar. Raj had discovered the reef in 1987 after he had married his beautiful Mexican wife. Estrella’s family had owned the island, along with a 500,000 acre grant on the mainland, since having it granted to them by the King of Spain sometime in the 1700s. Raj was an element man as Chick explained. He was into water (surfed, doved, fished, sailed), air (pilot owner of a small plane), earth (desert rat mountain climber, not a rock climber) and had the fire (desire to experience life). Once he had heard about the island he picked a calm day to sail out to explore the island. Estrella had said that her family only used the island as a vacation spot a few times that she could remember. There was a small house on the island and a pretty good size bay on the southwest side where they could dock their boat. They had planned to stay three days, on the last day, a south swell hit the island, and smack dab in the middle of the bay was a wave bowling out in both directions.

Chick said that he and Raj had surfed the spot ev-ery time a big south pulled through. Chick said that it was the best wave he had ever ridden, better than anything, anywhere.The catch was that I could write about the island, but I would have to get Nivek and Knat down to Ensenada where Raj and Chick would meet us and fly us blindfolded to the island. No pictures were allowed (sorry Eddy) and no cell phones, no global positioning systems, no computers; in fact the only thing I would be allowed to bring was surfboards, wax, and clothes. He wanted me to leave tomor-row afternoon. I instantly agreed to these terms and started packing.I picked up Nivek at his home where he lived with his Mother (Chick’s sister-in-law). As I got out of my car, I spotted a kid about 10 years old rush-ing away from the front porch with a terrified look on his face. I knocked on the door and Nivek an-swered. I asked him about the kid and he said that the kid had knocked on the door asking for dona-tions to keep him out of gangs and off drugs. Nivek had replied that he was in a gang and used drugs. I knew then that the trip to Ensenada was going to be a challenge.We were to pick up Knat in front of the park off Lake street. Sure enough he was sitting at the curb with his board, duffel bag and a scowl on his face. Knat had numerous face piercing accented by three cone like piercings, one above each eyebrow and the third under his lip. They formed a triangle and with his large hoop earrings he looked like a dia-gram out of Phil Jackson’s play book.Knat got in the car and then went on a five-minute rage talking about how it was all b.s. and he hated society and he had wasted the day with nothing to show for it. After further questioning, I surmised

that Knat had a rare form of dyslexia where instead of getting the letters mixed up in a word, he got the words mixed up in a sen-tence. Appar-ently, he had sat underneath the Drug Free Zone sign at the park for several hours without re-ceiving what he thought the sign was saying. This prompted me to insist upon them both going through a quick search by me. Going to Mex-ico with idiots who might be carrying something was not in my life plan. Nei-ther had anything on them except shorts t-shirts wax and their boards. There was only one incident that stood out on our trip to Ensenada. That was in T.J., when on La Revolucion Blvd, right in front of the “Bambi Room”, in a precision move that would have wowed any synchronized swimming coach, both Nivek and Knat bolted from the car. Since I had searched them earlier I knew that they had a combined total of $15.73 between them, and it was only a matter of time. I was able to park in a location where I could watch the front door of the strip club, and

in about a hour they both walked out the door and

jumped in the car. There was little to say, no con-versation, after that little trick. We hit the airport just in time to watch Raj’s flame painted Cessna touch down.

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Story to continue in our next issue.


Two more unidentified Bolsa surfers enjoying the new sand bars.

Oh thank you dredging barge!



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Above- Unidentified Bolsa Chica. Below- Unidentified Seal Beach

Above- Unidentified Secret Spot

Have you noticed your-self or one of your bud-dies being listed as an “Unidentified” surfer in this or any issue of Our Wave? Give us a call or contact us over the Web. We would love to re-run the photo on the cover with the correct name and maybe a little write-up as well.



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our wave newspaper issue #8 march and april 2006

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