Costa Rica 12/4-12/12/09

The best surf trip so far!!!


Me, Pat, Francis, Dan, Dave, Jeremy, JC, Josh, Derek. As far as I could tell, everyone got along great. Stayed at The Flying Scorpion. 2 HILUX's. Waves were chest to overhead every day. When it got too big in front of our cabina, we took a short ride to an empty left point break. Rooms were sparse and hot, but ceiling fans kept it liveable. Bugs got me a few nights. Food was fantastic. Broke my yellow Jed Noll on Wednesday. Dave was nice enough to let me use his longboard frequently for the remaining 3 days. The pictures tell the story.

Me, Pat, Francis, Josh shared this room.

This was taken on the hike to the waterfall.

Sucked.

Plastic moved faster than I have ever seen him on this trip.

This was a perfect "A" frame about head high. I went right, Dan went left. Perfection.

Sweet right in front of our hotel.

Pat on another sweet right.

These 2 pictures were taken at Punta Coyote, a left point break that only works at head high and bigger.

11/22/09 Aydlett

6.0/101. NE. Gusty, coldish, first session with booties. Also rode the Kode 94. Very nice. Thin, skatey, loose, fast as shit. Contos, Jack, Billy, Bob, George Lam. Hoping for window installation today.

11/1/09 Old Lighthouse

NE 25 5.3/Acid. Raav, Andy M. Fun medium waves with big swells on the outside. Raav got worked a few times but it happens. Raav also was demoing the Tabou Pocket wave 85. He liked it. Margaret then lent us an 82L fast wave for a week or so. Maybe ride it tomorrow.

10/25/09 Chicks

20-25 N. 101/6.2. Raav, Contos. FUN waves and lots of port ramps. Really just a playground. Great session, AM only but still great.

10/18/09 Chicks

Photo by Raav on the way.

NW wind blowing 30-35. Contos insisting it's 18-24. Britt complaining that his wave board is too turny (huh?), Jack rigging his skate sailing gear (ballsy), and Rob "Raav" Spurgeon asking not to be made fun of for wearing a 5/3 full suit (it's a Pro Limit-WOW-with rubber skin so the wind can't cut through it and it's soooooooo comfortable). Tide going out. Waist high breaking swells to the West, Chest high breaking and non breaking swells on the bar and head to logo high waves up by Lynnhaven Pier. The sailing was as follows: Launch on starboard and pinch across the channel. It was fluky inside. Jibe just before the opposite shore and blast out towards the pier while looking for Raav who went out first and is wound up on his 4.2/85l FSW. Completely jacked on 4.4/74l. (with an 8.25" fin Mr. Contos). All the port tack jumps you wanted on the way across to the pier. Most over 10', some over mast high. Say like about 4-5 per run. Then you get to the waves at the pier. Find a nice one just about to break and jibe on its face and ride it backside on starboard as longs as possible while attempting to smack the lip backside a-la-Karl Quist. Blast back across the bar hitting lips, and generally backside riding as much as you can. When you cross the bar the swells spread out and create perfectly smooth jibe-a-toriums. Insert jibe of choice here. At this point you have probably worked you way upwind too much so you attempt to head back on a broad reach towards the pier without scaring the shit out of yourself. You then proceed to hit the port ramps again going way too fast but what the hell? Find Raav and flag him over and advise him to get off the 85l FSW which must be like sailing a formula board, and onto the 72l Maui Project. Sail out from the breakers on the inside of the pier. Avoid that big plastic thing floating near the bar. Prepare to Jibe. Wonder where everyone else is. Repeat.

Also Rob from DC/England. Great sailor, hit a few starboard fwds.

10/17/09 Chicks

Decent 6.2/101. NW. Contos, Jack. Some air, some riding. Full suit, first cold day.

10/7/09 Factory Point

Very gusty 5.0/Acid. Billy, Bob, George Lam, Glenn, Pete Toth, a few others. Some air early on then it flattened out. 24" harness lines seem to be OK. Jibes were working nicely.

9/26/09 Corolla

E. 20-25. 6.2/101FSW. Photography and Mojitos by Robert "Raav" Spurgeon.

9/25/09 Aydlett

Billy, Bob, 5.0/Acid, NE. Gusty, sailed for about an hour, then wind died. Drank beer and waited for LJM to go to Corolla.

9/13/09 Chicks

7.2/102. Marginal but fun. NW. Contos, Jack. Sailed 2 hours and wind died. Decent session.

8/31/09 Chicks

6.0/101. Raav, Carl. NE. Very choppy but fun. Good, not great. Sailed for 2 hours. Endurance was way up. The 101 shines at Chicks. It really turns better than the 102. Also the 6.2 really does perform better when I rig it the way Olaf says. Wierd.

8/2/09 Ego Beach

SW 20-25. Pete, Kim, Chad, Lisa, Uvee. Rigged and sailed at the Hole and sailed on the sound for about 30 minutes as the wind increased. When I was slightly overpowered on 6.2 I hit Ego. Underpowered for the first 2 runs, then it filled in nicely. Overpowered at times but 6.2/102 was the correct choice. It was 5.0 on the sound. The ocean was flat on the inside with some 3'-4' swells on the outside. Sailed with Pete and 2 others. Water was noticeably cooler than the sound which was refreshing. A nice ocean sesh which could have had more waves.

7/31/09 Kiptopeke

Had a fun little session at Kiptopeke. 6.2/101. Had my gear with me from the Cape and it was blowing up and down the east coast. Kiptopeke was wound 6.0 almost straight onshore. I rigged and went out. Spent five minutes or so slogging in a lull then it ramped up to like about marginal 4.5. Instead of rigging down to 5.3 or 4.4/Acid, I flattened the 6.2 to within an inch of its life and had an excellent session. All port tack jumps with some 4' rollers breaking on sandbars. Good air, lots of fun. The session was a nice reminder that Kiptopeke is an underutilized launch. The fact that there is a great little bar literally at the launch should be an incentive to get more people to sail there. But at the end of the day nobody will.

7/24/09 Chapin

NNW 25-30. 5.3/Acid. Overpowered, too lazy to re-rig to 4.4. Ahhhh Cape Cod, never seems to disappoint. IWindsurf was screwing up foreskins, I mean forecasts all week, but CC came through BIG time on Friday with awesome conditions on the CC Bay. Very similar to Chicks on a N/NNW. Waist to head high swells breaking on an outside bar with so many BIG port tack jumps that I almost wasted myself in the first 30 minutes. The shallow water was warm but the outside was COLD. I was wearing shorts and neoprene top and was chilly on the outside. I ate it on one jump and smacked my nuts so hard that I thought I would pass out. After I finally got back in and rested for 15 minutes, I was good for another 2 hours. There was about 15 other sailors there including that dude Peter from last year. Great session, had to hurry back to the house to catch dinner by 4:15.

7/11/09 Sandy Hook

Well the first real session at Sandy Hook had its good points and bad. After a 4 mile run on the tracks, I headed down 287 to the GSP. Shore traffic was heavy but moving. When I got to Sandy Hook it was blowing 5.0. I rigged up the 5.3/Acid and headed out on the flat water side, while waiting to meet Pete Asheman to sail on the much-more-enticing-but-strangely-empty-of-windsurfers-ocean. Well, sailing on the inside of Sandy Hook sucks. Kind of reminded me of sailing at St. Mary's College. Pete and I hit the ocean after a few hours of dicking around on the bay, and had a great short-but-sweet session, I had switched to the 101. Obviously the deal with Sandy Hook is that, other than NW, the ocean is the place to be. SW would probably suck on the bay or the ocean. We had S/SSE wind so there was a clean side shore fetch on the ocean side. I think Sandy Hook would rock on a N/NE. The traffic leaving Sandy Hook was absolutely staggering from about 2PM to 9 PM, with lots of northern NJ types lurking around all over the place. It's so funny to see a bunch if dudes from, say Newark, trudging down the beach in oversized shorts, wife beaters, basketball shoes, and Met hats turned sideways, their girfriends screaming at them about one thing or another. We had a bite to eat at the restaurant on Sandy Hook while waiting for the traffic to ease up. Great meeting Pete and his wife, I look fwd to hanging out with them again, possibly with LJM tagging along. Cape Cod coming up.

7/3-7/5/09 Corolla

Some knee to waist mushy waves, better than nothing. Beautiful couple of beach days in Corolla, great fireworks, dog drama on the beach, 5' Black snake in the driveway.

6/20-6/21/09 Corolla

Well as strange as it sounds, Corolla delivers for the second week in a row. We had waist to chest waves with a light offshore breeze, some flies. The waves were perfect. Surfed with Bracken, Pat, Kevin, Patrick (Earl's grandson.) while Lauren and Amy hung out on the beach with Hooper, Brody, and Indy.
The next day it blew NNE 25-30. Smallest gear I had was the 101 FSW and 6.2 Icon. It worked though. Awesome, awesome session, right at the end of Bismark, used the golf cart to get the gear to and from the beach. Nice airtime, nice swell riding, with the occasional wave to get a turn on.

6/13/09 Corolla

Knee to waist at the end of Bismark. 2 sessions, late morning, late afternoon. Tons-o-dolphins. Very nice, water was beautiful. Boston Terrier central, with 6 dogs at one point. Golf cart is back in the rotation but seems like it may fold in half, literally. Dropped off O'Neill Guru 3/2 with Dave at IR. Maybe he can do something with it, if not, I will have to send it back to O'Neill. Maybe head back down next week.

6/5/09 Avon

Rented Tabou Pocket Wave 85 and sailed it on the sound w/ a 5.3 for a couple hours. Turns great, jumps nice and extremely comfortable. Slow. Too slow, and is a little hard to get upwind. Wind then went 4.0 and we sailed the reef for another couple hours. Me, Billy, Contos, Rowland. Reef was very rough and was not setting up very well. Still, lots of BIG air. Fun day, returning to a semi flooded Norfolk.

5/20-5/24/09 Avon

Rented a gigantic house with Rob, Ted, Dan, Crouching Tiger. No wind for the first 2 days. Had waist to chest waves in Frisco Thursday and Friday. Nice. Rob and Dan rented a Starboard SUP which Rob rode very well. Margaret and Olaf came over Friday night for a rigging lesson and we drank and shot pool after pizza. Saturday we had 7.0 wind at Jockey's ridge. A very unfullfilling session followed by Ted forbading us from eating peanuts in his GMC K1500 Suburban. I also did a small amount of damage to the 101 after running aground at JR. Fun few days, not nearly enough wind.

5/19/09 East Beach

ENE 20, 101/6.2. Short session w/ Jack, Billy, Bob. Much nicer than Buckroe. Dan and The Crouching Tiger arrive tomorrow.

5/18/09 Buckroe

NNE 20-25. 6.2/101. Choppy, uncomfortable, funish. Me, Billy, Glenn, Knight.

5/17/09 Chicks

5.3/Acid. Shifty, Gusty, Biggish. NNE. Fun but extremely disorganized. Sailed with Rob.

5/9/09 Corolla

WSW 25. Acid/5.4. I don't sail too often in the Currituck anymore. It is more difficult to access the sound than it was when you lived there. Also I am usually in the ocean, even if its blowing SW. This past Saturday was an exception. It was WSW 25 solid. No wind on the ocean side. I decided to sail the sound for the first time in like 3 or 4 years. I launched at the Whalehead Club which now has beautifully manicured lawns all the way out to the point. The rip rap along the shore makes for treacherous footing and there is junk on the bottom once you get in but with care you can get in safely. As I was carrying my rig across the lawn to the water I heard something at my feet. I look down and see the biggest damn cottonmouth I have ever laid eyes on slithering away from me. It was as thick as my arm and pushing 5 feet long. Ugly bastard too. It got the juices flowing. The session was fun. The Currituck sound has some decent chop when it blows, more than in Rodanthe or Avon (with the exception of the reef.) The weeds there are unreal. When you fall in, they wrap around your legs and torso like vines. Even with the snakes and weeds, I'll hit it again. Pics by Lauren.

5/3/09 The Reef

Sailed out of the turnout with Contos. RW/4.4 completely wound, perfect conditions for the little gear. Big jumps and decent waves. Hard to lay off the reef when its blowing over 30. Ocean was flat. Picked up a 5.9 Icon for Raav. His first Simmer. Nice day.

5/2/09 Sandbridge

Back Bay 101/6.2 short 2hrs with Contos and Don Watson. Flat but nice only wore neoprene top. Susan's knife party is tonight. LJM is nautious.

Windsurfing Magazine May 2009

4/11/09 Informative Message

4/11/09 Chicks

Epic 5.0 N, Acid, HUGE AIR, and so many, as good or better of a session than at West Dennis last year on that S. Me, Rob, Karl, Jack. Maybe even a 6.0 session tomorrow, we will see, after all, its Easter.

4/10/09 Avon Ramp 34

First Hatteras trip for Rob and I together in 2009. Great time. S/SSW 25 gusty. Sailed on Acid and 5.3. Up and down, knee to waist high waves if at all. Rob, Bill Bell, couple of other sailors. Drove the truck out on the beach, no prob. Got a flat on the beach and changed it using a flip flop and a fin for a base for the jack. Wind died and sailed the 101 and 6.2 for an hour or so, just a great combination. Drove into town and met the girls for dinner at Wine House. We were looking forward to the N wind at Chicks the next day.

4/4/09 Factory Point

6.2 Icon first session/101. 17-22ish wind, gusty and flat. Pete Toth only person on water when I got there, Bruce was packing up. I did not sail out to the channel or the other side of the island. Water temp was decent, wore booties and 3/2 but probably did not need the boots. Icon is not as powerful as Crossover but still pumps nicely and handles better, feels a little lighter. It will be a better sail in the bay and on the ocean. Ran into Rob, Sybil, Carl and Dana at Tortilla West.

4/3/09 Jockey's Ridge

4.5/5.5 S/SW/W gusty. Rob, Carl, Billy, Bob, Contos, Wayne, Tom B., Pete Toth, Steve Lowe. Good group of sailors sailing very gust inconsistent wind, good when it was good though, first 1/2 hour was great with some BIG air on the outside on the 4.4/RW. Smashed my left shin on a bail, and got published.

3/29/09 Jockey's Ridge

SSW 30-35. 4.4/74RW. Billy McKendree, Tom Britt, several others. Met Steve Lowe, lives in Ghent. Session was great, big swells and big jumps, best sound sailing other than the reef. RW is so nice, so easy to sail, handles the high wind beautifully; needs to be completely powered, no surprise.

3/11/09 Jockey's Ridge

S-SSW 20-25 FSW 101/Dan Cunnison's 6.2 North Instinct. Nicely wound, overpowered at times. Had not sailed there in a long while, shallow in areas, nice rollers on the outside. Water was cool, 3/2 no boots, could have used them though. Some nice airs, Instinct was a nice sail, still like the Icon's better. FSW 101 really turns on a swell better than the 102. As advertised I guess.

3/9/09 Sandbridge

Lou Stahl drowned last night. Did not sleep well.
Sailed FSW 101 (Maiden voyage) and Margaret's loaned 5.6 Icon in gusty west wind. Board great, as expected, sail decent, maybe had too much outhaul. Sailed with Raav and Bob. Air 75-80, water low 50's, I did not wear boots and was fine, Raav did not wear boots and was coldish. Conditions were OK, very nice to get on the water in the warm, not a place I will choose to sail if there are other options, Factory was low tide in the middle of the day, so we decided against it (perhaps a mistake, although it would have been much colder water.) Some nice jumps for Raav and I, really nice lay downs. No swells.

2/23/09 Ghent

New JP FSW 101 Pro arrived a few days ago at the offices of Atlantic Charter Insurance and was entrusted into the capable hands of Robert "RAAV" Spurgeon. He, under extreme pressures mostly from his new puppy, was able to take delivery of the board and transport it from said insurance offices to my garage where it stayed, still wrapped up, until I was able to retreive it on Monday AM. As usual the fin looks like it sucks. Tom Britt bought the 2006 FSW 102 a few weeks ago.

2/1/09 Rodanthe

Warmish air. Cold water. Good forecast, dissapointing conditions. Billy, Mary, Glenn, Marcy, Bob. Marginal 6.0 to 7.5. Tested the 7.5 X-Type lent to me by Margaret. Much more powerful than the Crossover, not nearly as manueverable. Also rode Marcy's 118 JP SS. Fast, fast. Feet got cold, watched the Superbowl. Sick to my stomach. Too much junk. Basically a reminder that I hate the cold.