After a sweltering day with hot travellers-on-beach action, we boarded the bus (named Mr. T) headed for Raglan. The mission: Learn to surf. The poor bugger put in charge of getting Darcy on his feet: Mark from Ireland.
So off to Raglan with every second spent building up excitement for surfing!
We got in at midafternoon and had a long ass check in before finding our beds, dropping all non surf-related materials and heading down to the shed for a dry run. Mark had 8 hopefuls to contend with and was a very supportive presence for us first-timers.
After scraping up on the concrete for 45 minutes it was down to the beach for super sexy wetsuits and nerf surf boards. Hitting the waves is an extremely apt phrase for the first forray, as the majority of time was spent being jolted back on to one's bottom trying to get out deep enough to actually surf. Frustration set in after 30 or 40 minutes but finding that counter-productive, I tried to readjust my attitude and remind myself that this was supposed to happen.
1 hour and 45 minutes into the wet part of the lesson (aka the 3rd to last wave) the heavens smiled upon me. I caught a brilliant wave and in spite of myself managed to raise to a karate-style stance on the board for what I'm optimistically calling a full two seconds. It was all worth it after that, and some cold beers were in order.
Played cards with Jo from the Netherlands and others long into the night and was rested and refreshed for a full day on the bus.
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