Bumbaloid first session.

I am going to back to the first time I surfed Bumbaloids in Co Clare. This is where it sort of all began for me with surfing heavy waves.

Clare has two very different sides, one side is the mellow roller reefs and beaches and the other is the heavy generally sort slabs. As a kid going to Clare I remember being a bit frustrated, as the reefs weren’t challenging enough yet the slabs where totally unrideable for me. I remember the first time I saw Bumbaloids, I wanted to surf it straight away but knew I was not able to. Watching bodyboarder’s Dan Skaj and Jack Johns getting blown out of holes in the ocean was something I had never seen before in Ireland and wondered if I would ever be able to ride waves like that.

I almost stopped going to Clare as it was too much of a tease not been able to ride those waves. Instead I focused on our tamer slabs in North Mayo, Silgo and Bundoran. This was great practise and is where I learnt all my basic skills. It wasn’t until the winter after I had finished school and had been practising surfing the reefs and slabs up north that I felt like going back to Clare, and giving the heavier slabs a try.

It was a classic Clare chart in April 2007, beautiful sunshine, nice swell and amazing offshores for days. I had met Mickey the year before up north and he was coming over with Jack, so I teamed up with those guys. They had been the guys first surfing all the heavy waves, so I knew they would be finding the best waves. When I first got down there the swell was at its biggest and Aileens was meant to be good, there were a lot of crew around filming for Waveriders along with other people there for the swell. Aileens was only barely breaking and a massive scene surrounded so we left them to it and went looking for other waves. First wave we surfed was a little left slab right in front this rock, it was so sketchy but we had a blast all the same with nobody around.

The next day the swell was a bit smaller but still solid and super clean, I remember Mickey saying Bumbaloids could be good. No surfers had really surfed it at that point and Mickey was keen to see someone have a dig. He said it to the guys that were around surfing Aileens but none were keen, and actually one surfer in particular told me not to go surfing there and to stay away from Mickey, as I would get hurt. I remember it so vividly; I was always going to go down. I knew deep down where my passion lay and knew Mickey was the right guy to learn from. You just know when things feel right.

So we went out looking for waves and surfed this fun right slab for hours, it was such a laugh everyone was getting tubed and having a ball. We get out of the water buzzing from the fun waves not really thinking of anything else. Then Mick was like “Bumbaloids is going to be pumping, lets get out there!” I was really scared at the idea as nobody had really surfed out there on a standup and I knew how dangerous it was. But Mickey has the best way of making you feel good about the situation he was like, “I am heading out to take some empty photos if you want to come join me and hang out that would be cool but no pressure” So I just thought sure why not just paddle out there and have a look. Jack sliced his foot open on a rock real bad and needed stitches but just taped up his foot and got in there. There was a londboarder from Cornwall called Jamie and he came out as well. I don’t think he really knew what he was getting himself in for. Also Tony Plant another photographer from Newquay swam out. I was planning on just watching Jack really, but then Jamie paddles in the end of one on his longboard and makes it! He powers back out buzzin and then paddles straight into a bomb gets stuck in the lip and dives straight over the falls. I was so scared for him but he was totally fine just a snapped longboard and session over. I was sitting there wondering what the hell happened but thought if he is having a go on a longboard surely I will have a better chance on my 6,1 pintail. I remember first going for the classic small warm up wave, but small ones out at the loid are more dangerous as there is far less water and less space in the wave. I nearly nose dived and could of really hurt myself, Mickey straight away told me that those ones are too shallow and to go on the sets. It’s all or nothing then.

Then I think what happen is what you call being in the zone or you feel like nothing can go wrong. For the next three hours or so I had about 15 of the heaviest must perfect barrels of my life so far. Still I have never had a session that good out there. I could not believe the feeling of dropping into those slabs for the first time and making them, thinking back it still feels like a dream. That session really made my mind up on what I truly enjoy doing in the ocean. I remember my mum saying to me “so you don’t have to surf those dangerous waves again now” and I was like “sorry mum this is what I enjoy doing and am going to keep doing it for as long as I can”. She has accepted what I do now I just try not to let her know of any of the scary tales.

Here are the shots from my  first heavy session at Bumbaloids,  still blows me away how good it was.

The rock wave!

Jack

Jamie bumbaloid experience

This was my first proper wave, it was a real eye opener.

Here is my Jerry lopez impression.. ha

How Jack made this wave I dont know!

The Loid throws out the coolest shapes.

THREE COUNTIES-ONE DAY

Second addition of the new style of posts. This session is just a follow on from the one before. A day or two later after Lowey bust his shoulder the chart was looking real good, it was the same crew minus Lowey of course. Try and guess which three Irish counties these waves are in…

In The early morning light made it looked dreamy…

Then I preceded to get my ass truly kicked on quite a few occasions.

Smiles of relief after one of the worst doings I have had.

Greg

This day was all about the jet ski, no paddle boards here. I was expecting Greg and Twiggy to be all about paddling when they came over and could not wait to get shown a thing or two. But they were like “you cant paddle these waves” it was comforting at the time to have the big wigs say it was too hard to paddle. Since then I have learned a lot and now know you can paddle into waves like this, it is no easy task with all the variables you have to deal with in Ireland but it is doable sometimes. This for me is where I see the progression of surfing in heavy waves.

Twiggy was buzzin at this second wave we surfed.

February

Greg at the last wave we surfed this day.

Twig on his best wave of the day.

I I By this stage, we had been in our suits since 7am and it was now around 3. I had some of my worst wipe-outs this day and can vividly remember by this stage I was just hanging in there.

Now thats what I call pumping!

If you haven’t seen Dark Side Of The Lens yet, watch the video below, if you have and it inspires you as much as me, click on the link and VOTE for Mickey and Wilbot..yeww.

https://vimeo.com/awards/vote/actionsports

This is the first addition of a new style of blog for me.
I am not very good at keeping anyone up-to-date with whats been happening in my life as you may have noticed. This is partly because I don’t really like the constant in your face vibe that seems to be the norm these days.
So what I am going to try and do is, post up photographs from Mickey’s vaults over the years, of memories and sessions that stand out for me or feel are worth talking about.
First off I am going to post up this session from January 2009 when Greg Long and Grant Baker where over and Tom Lowe dislocated his shoulder on a heavy day at Aileens.

This was my first look when myself, Mickey and Andy our filmer came around on the ski.

I was shitting myself sitting on the ski, while Lowey was already on the peak solo dodging bombs.

Lowey paddle.

We all went for a shoulder hoping paddle to have a look but they were scary conditions if you wanted to get barreled that day.

Twiggy

Greg got smashed on this wave, his brand new leash got wrapped around his feet as he tried to get up and he ended up body boarding down instead.

Thats Twiggy on the shoulder, he reckon it was the best wave he had ever seen at the time. When Tom see’s waves like this he can’t hold himself back.

Loweys first warm up wave.

Serious man down, it was three months until he was back in the water but he re-dislocated the same shoulder again in Tahiti two months later and had six months out after that. These are the harsh realities of surfing heavy waves like this.
Also in more up-to-date news Tom is out of action again for another couple of months from breaking a bone in his foot. It happened on a really heavy day back in March. He know he will be back in no time, cant keep the big man down for long. Good luck brother x

paul morgan from vanessa gonzalez on Vimeo.

Here is my mate Paul Morgan’s video from the past year or so. Take a good look what kind of waves he is paddling into, he is really pushing surfing the way it should be going. Hats off to ya Morg’s!! Yew

I have no photos from the last week of waves as we have been focusing on filming only, but I kid you not some days looked and felt like this day in Tahiti last June.

Here is an old shot from out the cliffs: May 08. I remember the session so well, it was right before we headed off for WA the weather was perfect and the waves were pumping dreamy…

The idea of my new website is to keep the content very small on the site and use the blog more like an updated site.

The plan for my blog is instead of telling you what I get up to each week which more often than not is quite boring. I am going to put up really memorable photos and write accounts from stand out sessions over the years. The idea is that anyone who is interested can hear what really happened in those sessions.
The only places we hear about sessions is through websites and mags, which for whatever reasons rarely paint a true picture of things.

So here we go, here is a shot from January two years ago just to remind us that we do get good waves this time of year sometimes!