Surfing it up In the fourth of our series challenging our journalists to move out of their comfort zone,
we asked Áine Ryan to spend a day at the seaside … but not with her bucket and spade.STRANGE how that upbeat Beach Boys anthem, ‘Surfin’ USA’ totally eluded me as I contemplated my fate last Tuesday afternoon. Of course I was staring into the green depths of the anarchic Atlantic Ocean and not the blue, balmy, Pacific.
And despite the unseasonal sunshine on Carrowniskey beach there wasn’t a floral shirt or a pina colada to be seen.
There were plenty of grey, rubbery looking two-legged creatures – once human I was told – prancing around like slippery seals. Some of them waltzed and rumbaed across big breakers with the alacrity of Bolshoi ballerinas. Others were hurtled around in the foaming swell like bobbing buoys.
Meanwhile, I stood , stilled by fear, on the edge of this spectacular beach that offers panoramic views of Inishturk and Clare Island, as well as the vast undulating mystery of the distant horizon.
Suddenly my surf-chick daughter, Bébhinn, comes into focus. She is standing right up close and staring at me – like down the barrel of a gun.
“You can do this, Áine.”
Bébhinn is 28, so she only calls me Mam when she needs me to dog-sit her adorable Samhradh or borrow some of my treasured stash of hippy clothes.
“Áine. I said:You can do this.”
I am in a trance when we talk to SeΡn Kearney of Surf Westport. His van, filled with boards, booties and suits, happens to be parked beside us. We hire my wetsuit and booties from him. Later Bébhinn returns for a bigger beginners’s board – after I repeatedly fail to balance – and I don’t mean stand – on one she had brought.
Seeing the fear etched on my face, SeΡn tells me that Carrowniskey is an ideal beach for beginners. A qualified instructor, he worked for a number of years at Delphi Adventure Centre before setting up his own business for this season.
“I used to work at [the adjacent] Cross beach when I was with Delphi and, of course, I surf here regularly. Because Carrowniskey directly faces west, it picks up a lot of swell and it is ideal for beginners and intermediaries because it is a very safe beach,” SeΡn explains.
He might as well have been talking to the wind. (And I mean any wind from any point of the compass.)
I smile blankly before secreting myself in the back of Bébhinn’s van to wrestle with the wetsuit.
At this stage, my nemesis, photographer, Michael McLaughlin has arrived. Boy! am I delighted when – in pursuit of a humiliating photograph of me – a few rogue breakers saturate his nether regions in salt water.
But, apologies. I am getting ahead of myself here.
I have just put the rash vest on and I am now strangling myself with the wetsuit. Godammit.
Booties on, me and my board are now wobbling over the moving mosaic of rounded beach stones towards the vast strand. Even though it is a lovely sun-filled day, a playful breeze careers me across the beach when the board becomes a mainsail.
Bébhinn is laughing as I attempt to recover some semblance of surfer dignity.
When we reach the edge of the water – which is at half-tide and spitting and fuming venomously – she ties my ankle to a chord that is attached to the board.
I suddenly remember that it is 16 years since I dipped my toe in the ocean. It was the sunny Summer of ’95. So what if I wasn’t exactly a surfing dudette back then either. I did do the doggy paddle in about two foot of water though.
Now in a newish millennium and having reached another decade in my life, I am about to challenge my many fears: ‘catch a few rad (radical) waves’ and maybe even ‘turn down the line’. Savage!
Okay, in my dreams.
We are about waist depth and I am asking Bébhinn if anyone has ever been swept out to sea and never heard of again while surfing on Carrowniskey. I warn her not to dare let the board go as I hoist myself up.
I am afraid I have surfers’s amnesia about the next hour. I do recall falling off the board. A lot. I also remember seeing – through a miasma of salty water – Michael McLaughlin laughing a lot. (He has such a wicked laugh.)
Oh! and I ultimately discovered that my daughter was not holding on to the back of my board when I landed, miles away, on the other end of the beach having –inadvertently – caught an ‘awesome’ and seemingly ‘sweet’ wave.
You know I think my marine mojo has been stoked and you are now looking at a Beach Bunny. Catch ya later, dudes!
MORE www.surfwestport.com
