So, it's been a while since I checked in here! Those who have been following me on Instagram (keyes_92 if you're interested!) will know that's not because I have been sitting around doing nothing for the past month or so! The next couple of posts here will tell the story of an epic road trip down the west coast of Europe with surfboards on the roof, searching out all the legendary waves along the way. As well as waves we found awesome scenery, beautiful towns and villages, great people and lived a rollercoaster couple of weeks as we negotiated hurdles ranging from thieving bastards in the Basque country to storms in the Algarve. If you would like to know more, stay tuned and I'll eventually get around to putting the whole experience into words!
The Irish boys on tour...the sun comes out, the tops come off and locals and camera sensors alike get blinded by the pasty white flesh on show! You wouldn't get that in Ireland in November!
To start off, how did we come up with the idea of a surf trip in the first place? Which is a big question considering that none of us surf all that much! The whole idea started out with us looking for a destination which would have water for kayaking in late autumn and would be reasonably cheap to get to. The Pyrenees were the obvious answer, however the more we looked into that plan the more cumbersome it became. Since the only vehicles we owned were myself and Adam's Fiestas and doing such a long trip in one of those would be a ridiculous idea we talked about getting a van or large estate car for the trip. Bringing kayaks would mean bringing heavy and bulky kayaking gear plus a bike or ideally a mini-moto style bike for shuttles, so we looked into adding a trailer. The trailer would then have allowed us to bring surf boards and possibly even mountain bikes. However although doing a combined surfing, kayaking and biking trip sounds like amazing fun when you first think of it, the practicalities and cost of dragging all of that gear the length of Europe and then constantly driving from the sea up into the mountains and back means that it doesn't really make sense. Since we were going to be camping all the way, the idea of a destination with sunshine and surf was much more appealing than chasing rain for kayaking. So, after months of discussion on the topic it was decided that we would be doing a surf trip down the coast of Europe, essentially driving south until we found sunny weather and warm water!
In the end, after much talk of buying estate cars and vans, we took the cheap and lazy way out and decided to take one of the cars we had to hand. Adam's Fiesta is a 1.4 auto while mine is a 1.2 manual which can barely haul me and my own kit up some of the steeper hills in Kerry! Even with the 1.4 it was well tested on some of the roads we found ourselves driving during the trip.
So we ended up packing up Adam's car with enough camping gear, cooking gear and toys to let us survive out of it pretty much indefinitely. With the roof box, it all just about fitted in. The food and cooking gear took up pretty much the whole boot, the three pop-up tents went behind the passenger seat and all the clothes bags went behind them. Adding a guitar, ukelele and drum filled up the rest of the space we had inside the car! ...because on a surf trip you obviously have to be prepared for the inevitable flat days! The roof box was reserved for the wet or bulky bits like camping chairs, wetsuits, skateboards, snorkeling gear, gas bottle and spear gun. It took a bit of persuasion to get it closed before we figured out a system for fitting everything in there!
Campsite number one in La Sauzaie, France! After we got off the ferry in Cherbourg we decided to give Brittany a skip since the climate is too similar to Ireland's and hit the road south. We made it as far as La Sauzaie before throwing out the tents for the first time, hoping to wake up to perfect waves breaking on the A-frame reef right in front of the tents!
Unfortunately, our holiday didn't start out exactly according to plan. Rather than of pumping surf we woke up to strong onshore winds, no waves and lashing rain. Instead of cooking breakfast in the rain and getting soaked, we threw the tents back into the car as fast as possible and went looking for somewhere more sheltered. We ended up at this carwash outside a Lidl down the road which did the job perfectly! Thankfully it was unattended and we were able to cook up our first pot of porridge in relative shelter, while getting some queer looks off the locals going in and out of Lidl!
Useful information for anyone planning a similar trip: it is virtually impossible to find porridge in France! (by which I mean Lidl don't have it and we weren't prepared to go looking in too many more expensive shops for it) After cooking breakfast we decided that the most productive way to use the rainy weather was to spend it driving south. We spent the day driving, getting used to being on the wrong side of the road and experimenting with drafting behind trucks to save fuel. We got as far as Hossegor before deciding to pull in for the night and set a course for the nearest beach, hoping to find shelter from the rain and wind.
We lucked out big time when we went looking for shelter at Les Estangots beach just north of Hossegor! This three-walled shelter was angled perfectly to shelter us from the weather, and allowed us to spend a couple of days in peace while we waited for the conditions to improve enough for us to sample the renowned beach breaks in the area. The mixture of racist, anarchist and anti-xenophobic graffiti was also pretty interesting!
On the opposite side of of a large sand dune from our luxory accommodation was this world war two bunker, one of many in the area. It was possible to climb in the door in the picture and out onto the roof, giving a great view over the endless beach that the area is famous for. We were here around the time of the 'supermoon', which was indeed incredibly bright given the beautifully clear skies overhead and the bunker provided an awesome platform for stargazing at night!
After one cold, wet day spent fishing and sampling locally made pastries in Hossegor, the next morning dawned bright and clear and we were finally able to go searching for our first waves of the trip. The banks at Les Estangots didn't look great so we moved down the coast before settling on a peak where we saw two surfers in the water, casually tucking into chest high barrels just north of the world famous peak at La Graviere. They got off the water just as we were getting on, which was our first clue that everything might not be hunky dory on the water! We hit the water confident and full of enthusiasm after our couple of days cooped up in the car, jumping into the water and paddling out without a second thought. After all, this was a beach break and what could possibly go wrong?! The next hint that the day might not totally go to plan came when we reached the impact zone and discovered that the waves here had slightly more power to them than your average Irish beach break! After several not-quite-deep-enough duck dives and the associated gentle poundings, we convened out back and went hunting for waves. Which is when we discovered that take-offs on chest high barreling waves are much steeper and trickier than on similarly sized waves at your average Irish beach! After several more poundings following failed take-off attempts, Adam finally took off on a wave and made the drop, surfing all the way to the inside. Around this time, we discovered why the other surfers had got off the water when the mother of all long-shore rips started moving, meaning that non-stop paddling was required to stay in position and that when you finally found yourself in position for a wave, we were too knackered to put a meaningful effort in to catching them. Leading to more poundings. So we headed for the beach to catch our breath and make a new plan. Which ended up being identical to the old plan; ignorantly paddling straight out in the general direction of a channel leading to a good-looking peak. We immediately found ourselves being dragged down the beach faster than we were moving out, leaving us directly in front of the peak we were hoping to surf and getting pounded a few more times! By the time we finally admitted defeat we had drifted a solid couple of hundred metres down the beach, and decided to study the other surfers on the water for a while before starting the long walk back to the car.
It turns out that we are spoiled rotten here in Ireland with our uber-mellow beach breaks and nearly as mellow reefs. Most of which back off into deep water with a dry paddle back rather than closing out. Of course we have higher quality waves on offer if you go looking for them but it's very easy to spend your time surfing easy breaks and fool yourself into thinking that you're a competent surfer! As I certainly did before starting this trip. After watching the vastly more competent surfers on the water at La Graviere a pattern emerged, which seemed blindingly obvious as soon as we saw it. The secret to paddling out here was to be just inside the impact zone, at a channel, at the time a lull started. Which meant wading as far as possible off the beach during the previous set, far enough along the beach that the cross-shore drift would leave you in the right place when the lull came. Which if the rip was strong enough would be well in front of the next peak. Once you get out back and catching waves, make sure to peel off them before they close unless you want some serious duck dive practice and are feeling very fit! Mis-timing this whole routine would leave you with a set wave landing on your head, and these had so much water behind them that they would push you so far down the beach that you might as well head in and start again! It's all simple, basic stuff which makes it easier to paddle out anywhere, but just how critical it was to paddling out in France was certainly an eye-opener for me!
With our tails firmly between our legs we headed back to the car to cook a pot of scrambled eggs and make a plan for the afternoon. In the guidebook we found a break nicknamed 'Kiddies Corner' just down the road in Capbreton which sounded perfect for us considering what we had just been through! At 'Kiddies Corner' we found a beautiful, small, mellow high tide shore break, which had an easy take-off followed by a short ride before closing out pretty much on the beach. We surfed there until dark, trying to wipe the memories of the morning from the system. The layout of the beach looked like it would have waves at low tide in the morning so we cooked dinner in the carpark, went for a wander around the town and waited until most people would have gone to bed before throwing up our tents directly on the beach, in the hope of not being disturbed at least until we had a good nights sleep! The last screw-up of the day came when we called into a local bar to grab some wi-fi and were charged €21.50 for three beers, which felt like a final punch from a day whose main priority was beating the daylights out of us!
Waking up in Capbreton the next morning to this view was pretty special! Glorious sunshine, warm water, warm air, and beautiful small, clean, mellow surf. We threw down a quick breakfast and then spent most of the day on the water, just cruising around and chilling out in some of the most relaxed waves imaginable, just what was needed after the utterly demoralising time we had the day before!
That's where I'm going to leave the story for the moment because if I tried to fit this trip into one post it would start to resemble a book, and if I thought people were interested in reading a novel that's what I'd create instead! Check back over the next couple of days for the next portion of the journey, when shit really hits the fan and we're left wondering if some higher power really doesn't want us to go surfing at all! Happy Christmas, happy New Year to you and your family, and if you enjoyed reading this post and are looking forwards to the next update give it a share around the internet so that other people can have a chuckle at our progress!
Good read, Eoin
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