nice….. the Chargers won… the Halloween party downstairs with literally hundreds of children dressed up in costumes seems to be going as well as can be.  Hopefully the haunted house isn’t too scary, there are lots of screams but definitely lots of smiles.  Thank you Shannon, Yana, Happy, WRSC maintenance crew, and literally the dozens of others that helped put this whole event together.  I think everyone is really stoked.

Pretty lame that my own kids aren’t here, but being bummed about it isn’t going to change the fact that they’re still in Colorado.  Happy finally got his cast off a couple of days ago, he now has a leg brace, but after this week he can start walking on it.  His leg is healing perfectly.  Happy is such a trooper and has been nothing but great through this whole endeavor, and his big brother Otis has been really great too.  Last week when I was up there with them I watched as Otis opened the front door of the doctor’s office for an elderly man pushing his elderly wife in a wheelchair.  I didn’t ask Otis to do it, I was across the street watching from far away.  He just did it, and I couldn’t stop smiling.  I’m still smiling as I think about the incident.  Wow these kids are growing up fast.  I’m a lucky man.  Wait…  if they’re getting older, that means I’m getting older too.  Oh shit.

Here we have my son Otis, dressing up as our dog Sammy.  Adorable.

So I went to New York last week…. what a trip that place is… a completely different world than Tamarindo.  Unfortunately there was no surf, but of course I still found myself at a surf shop, this time visiting a friend Bill Homer at his surf shop East Coast Surf Skate Snow.

I went to New York to meet with Adam Korn, who is now my literary agent and helping me as I begin to write my book.  The book will be in the inspirational / motivational / self help section of the book store, it’s message will be one of following your passion. Ironically I was asked to speak at Awesomeness Fest next month here in Costa Rica on the same topic.  I guess people like to hear stories about stoner surfers that drive school buses to Costa Rica in search of nothing but waves and good vibes.  Fortunately there is more to that story, and after my NYC meeting I’m feeling really solid about the project.  It helps that Adam has helped to publish books for other clients such as Forest Griffin, Zakk Wylde, and my friend Blake Mycoskie.

I stayed with my friend Gary while I was in the city.  Gary is the drummer for the metal band Angry Dragon and one hell of a good guy.  We went out and saw some bands at Arlene’s Grocery, a venue in the lower east side where he plays often.  Gary and I also jammed out a bit at his rehearsal space in Brooklyn and it sounded really sweet.  We’re trying to collaborate on music between him living up there and me down here.  I think the name of the band should be Vaporizer.

I’ve been back in Tamarindo for the last week.  The weather has been INSANEly good.  My friend John Alexander came and went, we surfed a ton while he was here.  Now my friend from college Sophie is staying at the surf camp, along with other friends Mark Tucker, Danny Mitchell, and Mike Oldani.  I’ve been hanging out with them a bit, but mostly I’m just surfing and working in the workshop.  I’m waiting on some sun cure to arrive tomorrow so I can finally glass the four surfboards I’ve shaped over the last few weeks.  Below is a finless board that is now fully shaped, fine sanded and ready to be glassed.  It was shaped from dimensions given to me by ex-WRSC employee Mike Shaw, who got them from his friend Derek Hynd. I’m sitting here with some orange spray paint, just itching to paint something orange.  I’ll spend a few days on these surfboards, also start grinding on that old VW camper van.  I’ve got Sammy to keep me company while I wait for my family to come home.

Saturday will be here before you know it and I’ll be on an airplane headed to Lima, meeting a group of WRSC guests and guiding them to remote point breaks in northern Peru.  I get to hang out with my friend Antonio, plus Andres, Flash and Elizabeth are coming to help guide the trip.  If there is a south swell we’ll be making the trek north to Chicama, otherwise we’ll head to the go-to point break we’ve surfed on my previous 4 trips to Peru.  This “secret spot” breaks on both low and high tide, the wind is offshore all day long every day, and there is normally NEVER anyone else surfing there.  Peru is another trippy place to visit, I can’t wait to get back there….

finless surfboards

Here we have the Tamarindo Rivermouth, showing early signs of life last week.  I had postponed my trip because the weather began clearing up and the wind was blowing offshore, and as luck would have it the surf gods rewarded me with some great waves over the period of a few days.  On the day before I left for New York I got this super long barrel and finally decided I could leave town and not feel like I was totally blowing it.

Thank you local Tamarindo photographer Patrick Pehrsson for these great pics.  Patrick can be contacted at (506) 2653-4238 or pat.pehrsson AT luukku DOT com for any photography services you may need.

tamarindo costa rica,tamarindo rivermouth surf

Costa Rica and Nicaragua have a had a dispute over the Rio San Juan since their independence from Spain in 1821. Today, the conflicts are still very much alive and kicking.

Heavily armed police was sent to the border last Friday, following the news that Nicaraguans soldiers trod Costa Rican soil, and had caused damages to some properties. While Costa Rica is proud to have no army, its police, armed right down to the teeth, far from looking pacific, looks more like soldiers than guardians of the law.

The River San Juan actually does belong to Nicaragua, however Costa Rica has the right to navigate it. This is obvious banned to provoke conflicts. Costa Rica accused Nicaragua of causing environmental damages by dredging the river; Nicaragua fought back by responding that the dredging was a necessity if navigation on the river, from Lake Nicaragua to the Atlantic Ocean, was to continue.

more…

costa rica v nicaragua 2010,nicaragua costa rica news,nicaragua vs costa rica surfing

Tamarindo is a small town.  News travels fast.  Unfortunately news gets drunk along the way, and by the time you hear it, news is wasted and threw up something completely untrue.  Did you hear the one about the gringo that got murdered in Tamarindo this past week?  Let me help set the record straight, because I’m sick of talking about it.

Two or three weeks ago I was sitting at the WRSC bar watching the San Diego Chargers lose.  This fat, drunken man slowly makes his way into the restaurant, mumbling about needing to use the telephone.  He looked like he had been up all night.  His eyes were mostly shut and he reeked of booze.  The guy had definitely seen better days (and he wasn’t more than 25 years old or so).  I gave him a few bucks to go buy a phone card somewhere else.  To this offer he then asked me for a free meal, but I wasn’t in the free-meal-giving mood at the time.  I just wanted him to leave because he was wasted and I was watching football.

Over the next couple of weeks I would see the guy meandering past WRSC from time to time.  He was always really fucked up.  I never thought much of it.

Last Thursday, I’m in Denver and I get a phone call from the surf camp.  Apparently the guy came into the surf camp around 630am and asked for a water, which he could barely get into his mouth. He stumbled into the bathroom for a few minutes.  Then, as he made his way out of the surf camp entrance, he started walking north and literally collapsed and died a couple hundred feet down the road.

Was there a big shoot-out in Tamarindo or some drug deal gone south?  No.  Was this gringo guy murdered?  No.  Sorry people.  The truth is much sadder.  From what I saw, this guy came here to kill himself in a Leaving Las Vegas kind of way.

October 27, 2010 at 10:38 am

I would like to clarify this story by adding these two points:

#1 When the guy came into WRSC with a nasty head wound as if he had been in a fight and/or had a bottle broken over his head.

#2 Carlos Arias, who was working in the surf shop at the time, immediately called the police. The police said it was the second phone call they had received that morning regarding this guy.

It is getting dark right now as I sit here at my desk in my bedroom in Tamarindo.  Today was such a beautiful day.  The last ten days have been amazing.  The wind blew offshore almost all day long today.  The rivermouth gave us a preview of  it’s classic winter-style tubes.  Just watching some of those sets fold over the sandbar and throw big barrels made me sit back and smile.  The surf wasn’t huge, but definitely there were some clean head high waves all day long.  I surfed for 6 hours over three different surf sessions and by now I am completely exhausted.  Exhausted and smiling, though my eyes are sunburned and not feeling the best.

I went hunting for river shrimp a few days ago.  These little fuckers are so fast, it is quite the skill to swim underwater and spear them.  With some diving masks, a few of the guys and I hiked downstream near Pinilla looking for shrimp.  We caught quite a few, during which time we encountered a 4 ft. crocodile sleeping in the hollow of a submerged tree.

We caught the small crocodile, took some pictures, and were about to release it when it flung itself out of Luis’ hands, tried to escape, then tried to bite Pira as it made it’s way back into the river.  Fortunately I had my iPhone so I shot some video of the scene.  Turn your volume down when you play it, otherwise my annoying-as-shit laugh will be even more annoying.

Besides playing in rivers and above sandbars, I have spending a lot of time in the workshop.  The shaping room turned out awesome and I’m currently shaping board #3.  We ordered some more tools and other supplies, and we’re going to be receiving 10 blanks this next week.  I figure shaping 1o surfboards will keep me busy for a while, and I am excited to make both a few longboards and shortboards.

I am very interested in spending the additional time in the surfboard making process to build beautiful boards, so custom colors and fine sanded / polished finishes are things I want us to be good at.  My brother in law Happy has been spending time in the workshop helping us get our glassing / painting room organized and then painting boards for us.  Between Chilo, Happy, Javier and the rest of the crew, I feel that we have a solid team here and bring a lot of different valuable skills to the table.  This is totally fun work, making surfboards, fins, surf wax, so on and so forth.

I was pretty torn up for the last few days.  My wife and boys left for Colorado to visit family, and last Sunday my little boy Happy broke his leg on the slide at the park.  Up until that point neither of my sons had had a serious injury.  I was pretty shaken up, feeling so incredibly bad for little Happy and there was absolutely nothing I could do about it.  I have been hanging out with him a little bit the last couple of days using video skype and he seems to be doing great.  Happy is a tough cookie for sure.

Tomorrow Holly is taking Happy back to the doctor to see how his leg is doing.  From what I understand, at best he will be in the cast for at least 3 weeks.  I’m pretty sure they are going to need to stay in Colorado longer than they had expected in order to stay with the same orthopedic surgeon and to ensure that Happy’s leg is properly taken care of from start to finish.  Once we understand what we’re dealing with, I think my plan will be to fly to Gunnison to visit my family while I’m in the US, since I’m anyways going to New York anyways and since they might be up there for a month or longer.  Gunnison is a mountain town 4 hours west of Denver sitting at almost 8,000 vertical feet.  It is quite different than Tamarindo.  I will need to bring shoes.

burning eyes in costa rica,small crocodile