Accidental Star tourist [Archive]

Tony

7th August 2006, 03:35 PM

2002. (10th anniversary of accidental touring.) July and half of the year has already blown by. Paradoxically short with it seeming like it's gone by in no time, but then reflecting over the time, so much has happened.

Like years passed, the same destinations were planned and passed by, but this year had the added element of two young fella's from Western Australia joining the tour with me for the first time, which has been interesting to experience the world again through fresh eyes which has been a lot of fun. 

The year started with the back end of a western Australian summer. A most enjoyable time hanging out with friends having BBQ's, sailing all over the state, a lot of driving and racing my remote control yacht. A newfound passion for me.

Lot's of internationals came through the state for a week here and there (Famous types), but the more hardcore tourists were the ones that came for a couple of months to really savor what western Australia is about. 

It passed all to quickly and it was time to head off for the first port of call being Maui. 

No contest to get to, it's more in the name of that's where go if you're a sponsored sailor. You sort of have to go to be a part of the whole scene!!!!. The sailing is good on Maui, it's just the crowds that are a little out of control, especially when it becomes photo shooting time and all the riders are out frantically trying to get as many waves as possible and that elusive magic shot that all the magazines are going to love. It just makes the whole vibe out on the water a little hectic.

We had our Starboard shoot as well and were extremely fortunate with the conditions in what was a pretty lack luster season, due to the el nino effect that seems to have switched on again. People were saying it was the worst season they can ever remember, but it was probably the worst season since the last el nino.

Anyway, we had the wind howling John Carter in the chopper, 6ft waves and the team going for it like all the other hectic frantics I was talking about. All a new experience for Luke and Ty who seemed to be enjoying their introduction to life as a professional windsurfer. It as a much larger affair than last year with the introduction of the boys, Sam Ireland and Rush Randle onto the team, adding some serious depth.

So after the photo shoot the winds went pretty calm for a long period with a couple of south swells for surfing, and not much else going on, until it was time for the first contest of the year at Vargus in the Canaries.

More strange weather had the winds blowing the wrong direction, and after a couple of days the call was made to move it to the north of the island, which changed things dramatically. Instead of the little Vargus rollers we've grown used to, it was 4ft and thumping. It surprising to see how many of the top sailors rather sucked when it came to a proper wave, and where others came into their own. Scott Carvill was the star of this day, no questions asked. Late vertical and lightning quick re entries would have seen him take out the contest if taken to its completion, but the top 16 was all we got to. Other notables on this day would have been Nik Baker, Polokow, Angulo and Goya

I was still there feeling quietly confidant, as was young Ty in his first world cup event ever. A super effort indeed. 
With this, the media was straight away in his face, with his first taste of the media spotlight. He was super stoked and couldn't quite place everything that was going on around him.

Luke wasn't quite so fortunate. His first heat was make able, but some nerves held him back where normal freesailing he might have otherwise gone for it. Lessons we all learn in time. So after the Canaries I wasn't quite sure what I was going to be up to. El Nino had me doubting going back to Hawaii, and the boys were going to Ireland to hang out, practice and do a UK contest that was going on. So We all flew up to Holland, we put the boys on a plane to Ireland on those new cheap euro airlines, and then Me and Anne Marie hung out in Holland a few days before I flew over just before the contest, and she flew over to Maui

I love Ireland and have been many times before, but this visit, was more of a competitive test than I have ever faced before. The conditions were absolutely harsh with a cold spell snapping the temperature to single digits.(Never above 10-One morning it was 6) 
The winds ranged from a nice 5.3 to the last day where it was 50-55 with gusts up to 65 knots, with hail and rain, making it quite miserable to be hanging out on the each all day.

Decent waves were very nice however being the perfect size for dingle. Not to small and not to big as it just becomes a big closeout then, although when I think about it, we did have that as well.

All in all three rounds were sailed, but with four finals. This being because in the first final, I would have won, but the judges thought I did a pushloop and not a table top, thus thought I did all backward rotating jumps, and only scored two of my three jumps.

Thankfully someone filmed this and I was able to prove my situation and the decision was made to re run the final. 
So the next day they ran a round, which I was second, then re ran the final, which I won. 

So going into the last day, which was the 65 knot day I only had to make the final and I was home to win the contest. I did this and then right at the start of the heat completely overpower to the point of not being able to turn I did a chophop just to do something. I got punished for doing something I normally see as lame and went over the front snapping my harness line. So as you could imagine I didn't have the greatest of heats. But it was enough to take the event and it was off to the pub for an Irish prize giving and after party that was very entertaining. 

The boys did all right as well with a third and fifth, and I left them at an after party where they wherein the process of taking off someone's wheels of their car, in pay back for an unfortunate wedgie situation in the pub. 

A day or so later and I was off again to re-unite with Anne Marie as I needed to get back to Hawaii for the Naish photo shoot, as the worst season ever continued and they still hadn't done all their shots. 

Scott Carvill's parents had gone on Holiday for a few weeks, se we were invited to stay in his house while he looked after his parents. This was very fortunate indeed. His house is one street back from the ocean in Lanikai on Oahu, with his new boat moored just out the front. Very styling. We had one mediocre day of sailing at Diamond Head, and that was the end of the wind for two weeks. Dead calm winds had us wondering and cursing el Nino, but Carvill was stoked. He was out fishing and diving and just loving the dead winds, making a bit of extra coin on he side with some beautiful Mahi Mahi and other types of fish. I knew Carvill was pretty into his fishing, but one trip out with him showed me he and his mate were seriously on it. 

He took us for dives to caves with his aqua scooter and me on my first ever scuba dive, so I wasn't really too worried that there wasn't a whole lot of wind, as we seeing so much other cool stuff .Pete Volwater was also over for a day or so and we did the full tourist Longboardiing Waikiki with a hangover style day. 

I'd also never surfed the North shore and was told it was firing one day. We went up there, and it was and I got to surf Rocky point at about 3ft. Apparently back yards was sailable that day and Maui had the best day in ages, so the next day it was back over to Maui for more photo shooting. 

Early up, race to the airport, fang up the hill when we get to Maui for breakfast and the sails, and then back down the hill to get on the water. 6ft going off and we go down to lanes to escape the crowds. Some nice bowls lined up with Darrel Wong, which was hopefully paying off for all the travel. The afternoon session was a little crowded and I couldn't line up at all, but all in all a memorable day for late in the season, in the crappiest of all seasons.

So the next day it was back to Oahu to get ready for the next sector of the journey. One last thing to do was to celebrate the Bachelor night of Bjorn Dunkerbeck. A memorable night with not much memory of it. I remember it started off with a visit to safeway where a lot of alchohol was bought. Then it was in the back of a van with the eskies full of alchohol, which was moved to a Limo full of Bjorn's mates, and then it moved through Waikiki where my memory get's a little selectively hazy. 

So then we were off to Holland for a little while for Anne Marie to get things sorted and a flight down to The Canary Islands. Everyone is upping the anti down there jumping higher and cleaner every year, so the only way to keep up with the locals is to spend as much time down there as possible. I gave myself six weeks and was hoping that that would be enough. Focus being height on the back loops with one hand off, tweakier tabletops and bigger push loops. I also wanted to get 360's consistent to be able to throw em in a heat. 

Time melted into one kind of ground hog day. The boys were here a week before me, and I was here a week before Anne Marie. Stayed up at Bar Ola while Anne Marie was away and lived with the boys. A real flashback for me as I've been traveling with Anne Marie for three years now and haven't done the whole living with the boys thing for a while 

There's a pretty positive vibe going on amongst everyone that's there early, along with the people who are there and not specifically there for the contest. And as the contest get's closer, and more people begin to arrive everyone starts to get more serious. 

Just before however, was the Big mans wedding, which was a beautiful affair set on an Island in the south of Gran Canaria. A top afternoon & evening which saw the champ off in style. 

The comp came and went, and was a bit of an anticlimax as the losers round couldn't be completed. Kevin ended up winning, in a close heat, or did he. At the presentation night they showed the winners and some of their sailing, and with Kevin, they showed his contest winning One handed / footed back loop. The thing was, it showed what really happened on the landing, and that he didn't really land it clean, with one of the judges being overheard saying," Whoops, I think we fucked up). 

Lucky for Kev, unlucky for Bjorn, but that's competition. For me, I ended up 5th. Was pretty happy, but also a little disappointed for one reason or another, but in the end, pretty stoked. 

Especially so because I was truly heading home. Somehow or another I've managed to pull enough money together and buy a house in one of my favorite places on earth. Margaret River in West oz. having been pretty much a traveling Gypsy for 10 years, I was about to move into my first house, and the excitement was quite overwhelming. 

Anyway, spent a couple of weeks working on that and Surfing, whilst at the same time getting ready for another trip to the North west of Oz. This involved a couple of guys you might have heard of such as Bjorn Dunkerbeck, Robbie Naish Scott Carvill and Tristan Boxford. 

These guys came into town over a few day period and slowly sorted themselves out with Camper homes four wheel drives and other camping equipment. These campers not really being short of the old cash department. 

All kinds of shit went down on this trip with some epic sessions, some big fish caught, funny moments around the campfire. Some Gnarly injuries, and some good laughs. But what I found interesting was the leveling effect of the desert and the west Aussie mentality, where guys, who normally famous got the chance to be just one of the boys hanging out in the desert. 

It was also a top early season with a load of swell and wind to saturate the surf and windsurf glands, to keep me all stoked for the upcoming European leg. Some epic sessions to be had for sure.

Was especially unfortunate for Bjorn though shooting himself through the foot with his spear gun, which may have an impact of his retaining his overall world title. He was just about to shoot a fish, when a wave caught his tag line, pulling the gun back and somehow hitting the trigger. All the way through his foot, but luckily missing all bones and tendons. No screams of pain, but a very worried Bjorn, which you don't get to see too often. 

So we then got ready to go back to Europe for the next contest at Sylt in Germany. Long ass flight from Oz to Bangkok, to Holland, van pick up and an 8 hour drive up the coast. To cut a long story short, nothing happened in Germany. The whole rigging waiting, weather forecasting, waiting, drinking hanging out process went on for the whole time with nothing happening. So it was then pack up, get back on the train, drive back to Holland, get on a ferry, drive over England, get another ferry and head to Ireland where for sure we'll get something done there, but as it happened, nothing did again. 

It got close there on the first day with some wind and swell, but it wasn't enough and the whole day was on hold, and that's as close as we got. Some epic surfing was a good time dwindler though with a few epic sessions and even a few Barrells. So I was stoked after that, although not many people seemed to be. Basically a paid surfing holiday with the prize money split basically covering costs of getting there and accommodation. 

So that was it. Year over.?? One and a half events counting to an overall world title. All that was left to do was get pissed on the final night and celebrate the victors, and look forward to next year. And who was Rookie of the year? Our young mister Ty . This was a pretty funny moment indeed to see him up on stage at a complete loss for words. 

With not much contest time but a whole lot of moments that create a full year non the less. So many situations and discussions in various places with different people. Funny moments, sad moments, happy, angry experiences that I wouldn't trade for the world and hopefully can learn from. 

Right now, I'm in Holland. After Ireland we took a little detour past Alex Williams house in the south of England. Couple of days sailing not really worth mentioning, but one surf that definitely rates a mention. The day before it was maxing out the whole coast and not that windy, but the next day it was smaller, perfectly clean and pretty damn nice. One wave in particular had me in the pocket for about 100 meters, where I didn't have to do a thing. Just take off and sit there in a crouched position A perfect wave, in England of all places. 

Anyway, in a few days we're off to Hawaii to do the pro sailor thing, but what I'm really looking forward too is to get back to Oz. We've got some new Acid boards to test out and I want to get working on a project which has me excited after surfing one of Alex's Surf boards. It was called a snub nose vector, which was so simple, fast, forgiving and carved oh so well, so I'm going to try and apply what that looked and felt like into a sailboard, which should be fun if nothing else, but could be something special. So watch this space and see if my hunch is right. 

Hasta Luego 

Scott McKercher