Get In The Pool

The water’s delightful

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After ten days without showering, the chance to surf in chlorine is appealing for hygiene reasons alone. We’ve rolled into the Wavehouse in San Diego after a coupla hours in the car, it’s baking hot, there are girls rollerblading, douchebags rocking sick tatts, and all sorts of freaks on display. For a group who’ve been in the Central Cal wilderness for a while, this is a sensory overload. Urban beaches in the US are a spin-out. In Oz the sand is mainly an anglo domain, Stateside you see black folk bodysurfing amongst latino sunbakers, while Asiatic folk play volleyball next to the lifeguard tower. Which is straight off the set of Baywatch, with red trunked rigs swinging their rescue cans in the breeze. Fake boobs are bouncing by on bikes and the groms are rubbernecking every which way, eating ice cream.

We slink into the Wavehouse and are greeted by the oh-so-friendly girl next door who’s sorted our booking. The flowrider is pumping and the resident gnarly bros are taking it apart with all sorts of strapped in flips and trickery. The boys laugh, This isn’t a sport, it’s a hobby. We’ve booked a private session, and after we’ve signed our lives away – literally, you can’t sue if you die on the flowrider, unlike in Oz, which is why we don’t have one – the boys trunk up and get in the tank. We’re set in first gear for 15 compulsory minutes and the boys fiddle around doing little threes and baby carves, feeling the water out and getting used to the beating that every wave ends in. Flowriders are more wakeboarding/skating/snowboarding than surfing, and way more painful. Come session end our crew will register sore heads, crook elbows and banged up knees, but shit she’s fun at the time.

Owen’s done one before, in South Africa, and naturally he’s the man. Dean can’t crack the code, and spends most of the time riding straight into the barrel, getting swallowed. He eventually realizes he can ride the sucker better as a natural footer, which the boys find hilarious. Stu is a natural and spends the session goofing around, while Garrett, Noah and Mitch log minute long barrels over and over again. At session’s close the boys are giggling with glee, sunburned as hell, and sore all over.

We chill next to the tank and watch the local bros again. They don’t surf, they flip, ride switch, occasionally toy with the barrel, and sport bad haircuts, worse ink, and all sorts of piercings and frosted tips. They are definitely dude man gnarly bros, and the gang chuckle to themselves, “Pfft, they’re strapped in, all they’re doing is bogging and recovering and they think they’re killing it. And they probably think we suck.”

We giggle, slip back out onto the sand, stare longingly at our real flowrider, the Pacific.