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Cool
surf vehicle
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Too Deep : A Couple of Warnings :
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I'd gotten in too deep. Again. For the second time in six months, I'd watched the swell, checked the break, seen that it was serious, and gotten out of the boat anyway. For the second time, I was in trouble out at sea, about a 40 minute boat ride away from town. This time, "town" was a 500 person village roughly four hours by plane from Hawaii. Which wouldn't have been too bad, but the flight only goes once a week.
Both times, I was seduced by the sheer sexiness of big, clean, glassy tropical waves. Waves like these are just different from the ones we surf most of our lives - it's like seeing a movie star or a model close up - they are different, waaay more physical, gorgeous, other-worldly. It's all right there, ready to go - a fantasy just sitting in front of you. You get greedy when that happens. At least, I do.
So I got out of the boat.
The first time, I spent about half an hour edging into the peak, and then twenty minutes peering over a few enormous ledges, and backing off while nervously looking over my shoulder. Sure enough, eventually, I looked around and saw the Wave I Wasn't Going to Get Under. A few seconds of something like fear, and it was on top of me. I dived as deep as I could, felt the impact, counted to 25 before I came up, took another breath, went down, felt the impact, counted to 15, promised my wife I wouldn't do this again, came up, took a couple of breaths, got whacked by a normal size wave, and then washed into the reef. Ten minutes of white-water paddling got me back to the boat, where the boatman was asleep.
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This was the second time, and as I saw the Wave I Wasn't Going to Get Under coming, I really promised, seriously, that I wasn't going to do this again. Deep dive, BAM, total mayhem - black, dark blue, light blue, white - count, up, breath, dive, BAM, count, up, breath, breath, paddle hard, duck-dive, breath, we're in the channel, coughing, gasping, sucking air, and here's the boat! Great. My buddy Brian is sticking his hand out and they are going to pick me up. For extra adventure-story credit, the boat is an outrigger with a tiny outboard motor - highly photogenic, but not very fast.
And. Oh no. I'm still in the water, and the boat is turning away and gunning it through the channel to the backside of the island protected from the open ocean. Yes, a monster set has shown on the horizon, and the boatman doesn't want to lose the boat - I'll be gone next week one way or another, but the boat is his livelihood, so he makes the choice quickly.
I start paddling out towards the open sea, but fast. I crawl up each wave as it comes, waiting to see what's behind it. As the set builds, I end up with a space of about 20 yards in the middle of the channel which is not breaking. If the waves get a couple of feet bigger, the channel is going to close, and I will be trapped inside as the set works itself out. I'm officially getting quite worried. The next wave is huge, it feathers, feathers, I paddle, paddle, feeling the thing beginning to pull me back over, ah, God there's a lot of water moving, and ….
It doesn't break all the way across - I'm outside, slowly drifting up and down as the swell blows through. I can see the set just blasting the reef on the side of the island, spray hurling off the top.
Now I have to wonder if I'm going to be outside all day. If the channel stays like this, the boat isn't going to make it out, so I could be here until the swell drops. No drinking water. Air temperature in the 90's... Hold that thought. For a minute or two, let's just be happy we're out here.
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Sure enough - there's the boat! The little outboard is whining, I am waving my arms to get attention, there's Brian, and I'm in the boat! Go go go go. We gun it for the channel, surf the boat down the face of the waves as the set comes in, make it to the lee and then back to town.
After three quick beers and about thirty cheese sandwiches I make a quick note to the Prevailing Deity: "OK, I got it. If I get out of the boat next time, I'll get hurt. I appreciate the warning. Love and Peace. Thanks for everything". Then I go to sleep for four hours.
