Counter cultures

Home sweet home.....

I was hanging out at Avoca Beach a few years back.  Well, doesn’t everyone?  It doesn’t have quite the caché of Copa Cabana or Bondi, but it boasts a superb break on its day. On a slightly glowering afternoon, with an onshore breeze knocking the top off the swell along the rest of the beach, about twenty guys were having a ball out at the point.  Low tide had uncovered the most spine crunching of the boulders and the waves were straight onto the beach.  This meant those brave or foolish enough to pick up a wave only twenty feet from the point could ride endlessly, breaking left to right, fully two hundred yards to the beach.

But it was the cast rather than the stage that fascinated me.  The usual full-timers were there, blond-tressed youngsters with six-packs, picking up with practiced ease, executing numerous flashy cutbacks before backing up onto the wave and paddling back for another go.  But they were in the minority.  The bald fat guys were in the ascendant, the seasoned surfies busy growing old disgracefully.

I watched one take off on a huge Malibu and tittered as he wobbled shorewards.  Which just goes to prove I know jack shit.  Next time up was pure poetry.  He took barely two strokes to catch the wave, nimbly hefted his paunch into a standing position and proceeded to dance down the wave.  First he executed a couple of leisurely cut-backs, deftly manoeuvring a board the size of a battleship.  Next he walked the board.  Back and forth he went with the urgent footsteps of a prima-ballerina, standing on the nose to urge the board forward then skittering back to sink the tail into the wave. Watching from my front-row seat on the rocky promontory, I’d’ve gladly paid to see such artistry.

Judging by the palpable sense of camaraderie, these guys had known each other for years.  The easy understanding of each other’s intentions, the unspoken etiquette, the speed with which they ditched a wave as soon as someone else staked prior claim, they had grown up together and were growing old together doing what they love best.  It was like watching a live version of the classic film, Big Wednesday.  They had probably heard on the grape-vine earlier in the day that the point was working, made some dodgy excuse to an impatient client, shut up the shop, grabbed the board off the top of the pick-up and headed for the beach.

I felt by turns homesick and nostalgic watching such accomplished sportsmen.  Homesick because nothing beats being on your home turf or surf, pulling on a familiar hold, cresting your favourite break.  Sure I love travelling, but I pine for home rock when I’m away.

Nostalgic because the parallels were all too obvious.  The wisdom of age often trumps the exuberance of youth, the old climber uses guile and wisdom to overcome the same piece of rock as the power-packed youth, the old surfie just looks damn cool doing the simple things well.  It was a riveting window onto a semi-familiar world.  It made me wish that sometimes I wasn’t so damn obsessed with climbing.

But that’s the beauty of counter-cultures.  They’re seductive but impenetrable.  Climbing’s arcane language, all gnarly moves, dodgy gear, red-points, is matched by the wizardry of rope-work and the sheer technicality of climbing steep rock.  It demands an apprenticeship, requires application, a bit of love even.  Damn we’re lucky to do what we do, to go the places we go, to know the things we know.  Pity the poor sap who gets no closer to adventure than a Billabong t-shirt or a Gore-tex jacket.  I wish I could surf.  I wish I could walk the board and cut back like a champ.  But even if it never happens, at least I’m on the same wavelength as those die-hard surfies, making my life fit round an obsession with no compromise.  I guess we’re all in the same gang.

After a while, my old mate Paul’s dog got impatient with all this hanging around and dragged us off round the point to dodge waves and fishing lines.  The sandstone cliffs of the point are pretty poor, but I kept searching for some bouldering potential.  A number of plaques had been set into the soft rock.  The one that caught my eye commemorated a world surfing champ who had been found dead in the water off the point.  Out alone he had suffered an aneurysm and was now carving perfect breaks in surfer heaven.  What a way to go.