Kayak Surfing Hurricane Alex

Surfed my first tropical system and, as expected, Awesome Big Rides. Kinda scary, actually.

Technically I haven’t surfed Hurricane Alex yet, but I’ll be on the leftovers  here in about an hour. I did however surf  Tropical Storm Alex on Tuesday and even though the storm was still hundreds of miles away there was some big, powerful surf to play in. The beaches way up here on the Upper Texas Coast, just  south of Galveston, were already impassable by late Tuesday afternoon.

I’ll admit that surfing on Tuesday was a bit crazy; but I’m not stupid so I didn’t even think about going yesterday. Well, okay, I did think about it, but not enough to actually drive down to the beach with my kayak. Looking at the conditions online was sufficient.  Had I drove down there then I might have done something stupid. Especially if there were some other stupid people there (which you know there were.)  Sometimes stupid does as stupid sees.

As expected there were quite a few regular surfers out on Tuesday trying to catch the big one.  There were clearly three delineations of surfers present.  There were amateurs who couldn’t even negotiate the shore break, which was substantial and would knock you down if you weren’t paying close attention.   These guys would try and try to get past the breakers but would settle for trying to work the shore break.  If you can’t go under the waves, you couldn’t get past Tuesday’s shorebreak, let alone anything beyond that.

Then there were the intermediate guys who were working the second breakers. I figure these were some tough guys (and a gal or two) just to get out to where they were but were not confident enough to try the angrier stuff a further out. Can’t really blame them as there were some plenty big waves on the second break.

Then you had the advanced. If they weren’t advanced surfers they were at least advanced swimmers.  There were actually quite a number of these guys bobbing around out there.  I didn’t see too many of them catch a wave because there was absolutely no opportunity to sit and have a look around, not even for a second or two. I had to constantly keep the kayak under power to keep it positioned correctly or else I’d be swimming around offshore during  a small craft advisory without even a small craft.  If you weren’t paddling, you were swimming.

I positioned myself  just past the third breakers to catch my waves. Curiously, since I was already out past the advanced surfers,  I could still see surfers bobbing much further out. I don’t how you classify these guys. Extreme perhaps.  Stupid maybe. The swells are so big and the troughs so deep  that you are pretty much lost to anyone on shore until you came back.

Once I got positioned it was only a matter of seconds before a wave came along that I needed to get on or be destroyed by. Unlike the surfers, when a big wave is about to break on a kayak, there is no diving under the wave. You go over the top, you catch it,  or you go swimming.

On normal days, even big days, once you get past the breakers you can get in position and let the waves roll under you as you wait for your wave. On this day, waves were breaking everywhere, not just on the breakers, so many times your wave picked you instead on of you picking the wave. I’m talking about some big waves. I’m not even sure how they are measured  or if I could estimate them properly, but I know when I was on top of one about to shoot down the face it was like looking down from a two-story house.  The feeling is indescribable.

All-in-all, in exchange for about 75 minutes of extreme kayaking I got three of the best rides of my short kayak surfing career along with one poor ride. I only fell off once but that was not due to a  wipe out so I was able to reacquire my boat and reboard in a matter of about 15 seconds.  Even though I knew it was almost a certainty, I really, really did not want to be swimming after my boat in such rough seas. It takes a lot of the fun out of it.

Surfside Beach – Back in the surf

After pushing myself pretty hard over the past few months getting in shape for kayak surfing season and then the past few weeks actually kayak surfing, I was forced to take some down time by a bad case of strep (like they are not all bad.)  There at the end I had been surfing or offshore kayaking for 7 out of 8 days.  On calm days I paddle to the rig to stay in shape for the day when the big waves finally come.

After that particularly long stretch of daily paddling  I took a couple of days off during the Memorial Day holiday. Surfing for just a couple of hours a day for that many days in a row will start to make an old fat man tired. Eventually the body says to rest. Sure enough that following Tuesday I wasn’t feeling very good. There was slight wooziness and the beginning of that little pain in the top corner of the throat and I was certain an illness was imminent,  which I knew would mean another several days before I could get any quality ocean kayaking time… so I took a handfull of ibuprofin and paddled out to the rig. That night I was sick as a dog.

Of course if you follow me on twitter you know all this already and have seen the pictures.

So I’m laid up till last Sunday when I couldn’t stand it any longer and went out and tried to get on top of some lazy rollers. The water was blue green to the shore break  and was full of bait, mainly schools of mullet. It was like floating in a big fish tank.  The were some decent sized waves capping out beyond the 3rd sandbar but they just weren’t breaking and would roll lazily by, leaving you in it’s wake.  The shore break was big enough for beginners to play around in or to just catch a glider but I don’t like surfing in the shore break that much; I’m there for the big stuff.

So back to the present day, some decent surf is beginning to build with persistent onshore flow.  The steady SSE winds yesterday had the surf sloshing around like a washing machine but there were some loggable waves if you could get on top of the right one, otherwise the chop was too nasty to get a nice long clean ride.  You could see the wave you wanted to be on all around you, but the inconsistency and sloshiness  made being in the right place at the right time difficult.

I don’t know how many miles I paddled right there in front of my truck to  log three decent rides but It was great exercise and well worth it. Today should be slightly better than yesterday so after my chores  I’ll be heading out sometime later this afternoon with the wife and kids.

Check my twitter feed for updates.

Spring Break 2010 – A Bully-fest

What an adventure I had this Spring Break! We had mostly beautiful weather, flat surf, and a stiff breeze. Typical March at Surfside. Not so typical is I almost got beat up for taking pictures.

As anyone who knows me or reads this publication knows, I spend a fair amount of time throughout the year at Surfside Beach either taking pictures, fishing, and/or kayak surfing. When I say Surfside Beach I mean from San Luis Pass to the jetties. It would be more accurate to say Sufside Island but old habits die hard. And just like every other happening outdoor/wildlife venue around here I am a mainstay and I have photography from summer, winter, spring, and fall from the beach and everywhere else in this county and beyond.

So I am at the beach taking photos the first weekend of Spring Break. On that Sunday I went out about mid-morning and took my normal bird shooting tour which takes me down the beach and back, from the jetties to San Luis Pass, and randomly in and out the bay access areas. At two-ish in the afternoon the Spring Break partiers are starting to pile in down at the start of free beach, Follet’s Beach it’s called, so I decided to partake vicariously for a bit.

I pull into a spot not too close to anyone and I’m going to take some beach party action shots. Spring Break 2010 at Surfside Beach, right? Appropriate content for an outdoor magazine. So, right about five minutes after I get my camera out and I’m taking some shots of a group of young, hip looking partiers playing horseshoes and tossing a football from about 100 or more yards away — too far away for my small zoom, really — a group of girls walked by, as they commonly do on the beach, and continue on towards the group I had been photographing. Believe it or not they waved down a sheriff’s deputy and whined, “Ooh, there’s a creepy guy down there taking pictures of us.”

So the cop rolls up on me and says those girls said my taking pictures made them “uncomfortable.” I told the deputy hey Spring Break 2010, right. He said he told them it’s a public place and anyone can take pictures of anything at anytime, as many people there at the beach were doing.

I told the deputy he had told them right and I don’t see what the problem is. He said they were just young girls, 15, 16, years old. I said come on, they are like 50 yards down the beach and they walked in front of the camera; you can’t tell how old they are. I then said if they are ashamed of how they look at the beach they should put some clothes on. Besides I only snapped off  a few frames because I didn’t see anything up to my publishing standards. One decent looking young-lady surrounded by a pack of dogs doesn’t cut it.  (Sorry if that’s rude, but they did put the cops on me behind the arrogant assumption that I actually wanted photos of their fat, flabby asses and pot guts. They should consider themselves lucky I’m not putting their fat asses and thunder thighs on here. )

“Be careful,” the deputy said and drove away.

I’m shocked. Kinda. Well, not that much I guess.  People think they can just come up and make you do what they want by making serious threats regardless of whether you are doing anything wrong. A little over a year ago  I fought a bully all the way to the State District court without a lawyer over something I wrote on another blog, defending against emergency restraining orders to make me take down my blog, and on and on.

I won that fight, of course. We live in America and we have the right to free speech (for now) even if the rich and powerful don’t like it. But I won not because I was right, which I was, but because I refused to back down in the face of an onslaught of lawyers. An onslaught of lawyers is much more frightening than the story I’m about to tell.

Even though I wanted to take some more photos of Spring Break 2010 I also wanted to sit at the beach, listen to music, watch the people, and drink a couple of beers without being harassed by the law so I put the camera in the truck. Down here, and I guess everywhere else too, after you have taken even one drink when a cop says be careful you really need to be careful or go home unless you want legal problems. After you have had a drink an officer can take you to jail for just about anything he or she wants under the vast alcohol offense Rubicon. You might beat the rap, but you can’t beat the ride as the old saying goes.

So I’m sitting on my truck minding my own business, watching everyone around, getting some sunshine on my winter pale skin, and having a beer or three. The older people with kids are starting to leave and the younger people are starting to get a little crazier. As each quarter hour passes the crazier they seem to act. Several, if not all of them, were consuming alcohol and smoking so I assumed they were over 21.

While sitting there watching the show without my camera a couple of young girls came walking by — as they commonly do at the beach — and they both had their cameras with them. I’m thinking “Grrr!” I said hello and asked them if they were getting any good pictures and they said enthusiastically, “Oh yeah!”.

Damn! Every one can wander around and take pictures of this crazy shit but me because I make people uncomfortable? The more I thought about it the more upset it made me. Since so many other people were taking pictures it must just be the way I look. I start to feel profiled, stereotyped, and discriminated against. A target for hatred and violence for no other reason than I took some pictures of some Spring Break partiers at Surfside while being an old, pudgy, white guy.

I had had my couple of beers and was just about to burn out when a truckload full of what turned out to be morons came roaring in and parked a ratty looking black 4-door Ford truck right next to me. They jumped out and started setting up the horseshoes and were soon joined by another truck then another car. Well, by that time is was getting late in the afternoon and only the crazies were left. I guess that kind of includes me so I thought what the heck, I’ll have just one more brew and see what these guys get up to. I didn’t know then that they were there to kick my ass. Fools. My guess looking back is that they had been off somewhere planning this all out, drinking their courage up.

Since all the older- and family-type beach goers had left, including the whiny girls from across the way, I figured I would snap a few shots before I left. Lo and behold I started a riot. I am a careful watcher of people and I watched the whole thing develop like stop action animation.

Frame 1: One of the mooks from the truckload that pulled in next to me began to antagonize the head-moron-in-charge against me. This mook has been designated the 1st instigator.

Frame 2: The two of them and another young tag-along punk who looked to be 15 and who had obviously been given copious amounts of alcohol by one of these would-be protectors of society then proceeded to march the 100 yards across the way to the partier’s camp and started pointing back over at me. I’m thinking, here we go. (When I later told the tag-along that he can’t whip my ass today, tomorrow, or in a hundred years he actually said he will get his dad to kick my ass. I believe his dad would have given him a spanking had he been there.)

Frame 3: Successfully stirred by the moron and the mook, an apparently tipsy if not drunk girl worked up an offended posture and stumbled purposefully back over to my truck to slur out a complaint about having their pictures taken. She told me I couldn’t do it and I told her I could. She insisted I couldn’t and I insisted I could. I told her if she didn’t think I could take pictures at the beach we could call the Sheriffs office and have them send the cop back down. For some reason they didn’t want to do that. They would rather just kick my ass it would seem.

Frame 4: [Occurring at same time as Frame 3] The head-moron-in-charge then stops by the next camp of Mexicans. He recruits a belligerent from the Mexicans. The Mexicans must have been mad because they were simply not photogenic and I hadn’t taken any pictures of them at all, except for one when I noticed them being assholes earlier in the day. Unfortunately the belligerent isn’t in the photo but I’ll know him when I see him, unless he shaves that natty assed facial hair off, which I recommend he do.

Frame 5: The morons push the drunk girl aside and take over her action because she was being too reasonable after I explained that I am simply a photographer taking Spring Break pictures at a public beach.  The mob had no time for that and wanted some blood and I was their guy, they thought.

Then it got silly. There were four primary belligerents surrounding me and each of them had a second to hold them back. And there were numerous other guys and gals standing around watching, a few of whom I had to assume were of dubious intent.  You could easily call that 10 to 1. They were full throat and determined to have their way with me. They wanted some blood so I played along and offered two options: commit violence against me and suffer the consequences or shut up and go away.

They had me surrounded and way out numbered. I am sure if they were half as committed as they were acting they could have beat me down to a bloody pulp. Turns out they weren’t committed to the battle at all; yet they wouldn’t just go away either.  I had to endure about 45 minutes of the normal BS tough guy act. They were going to do all types of horrible stuff to me, and my children according to the chief instigator, who stayed well to back making faces at me. He in particular was hurtling the most incredible, outrageous, and filthy insults at me. Pervert, child molester, fag, and the worse, old man. He is so high on my shit list it isn’t even funny.

The head-moron-in-charge, the self-described “ex-marine” was the only one that had the balls to get within reaching distance. He at times had the ol’ hold-me-back thing going on, too. Like that little guy could hold him back if he really wanted a piece of me. Its a good thing his little buddy was holding him back though because he was about to get a face full of mag light and he didn’t even know it.

Same with the Mexican belligerent. He never got closer than the end of my truck (I had moved to the driver’s side door well to protect my back and to get right next to my trusty mag light.) He talked a lot of sheeet but he had his butt-buddy holding him back too, even though he was twenty feet away. He was straining so hard to get at me but he just couldn’t quite get free of his boy. “Joo know what joo need to do?” he would scream at me as he fought against the one so bravely restraining him. “Joo need to git back in jure truck and roll on down the beech.”

“Roll me down the beach!” I’d tell him simply and he would strain against his friend real hard for a few more seconds. We did that routine on at least four different occasions during the ordeal. “Man, we are going to kick jure ass if joo don’t leave.”

“Kick my ass then,” I tell him, simply. “I like it when people try to kick my ass.”

It soon became obvious they hadn’t drank enough courage yet to actually fight a lone, overweight, “old man.” If they got drunk enough to actually fight I probably could take them all without the mag light. They finally guessed I would not scare away and since the guy they were all waiting on to hit me was an all-bark-no-bite bully the mob slowly began to disintegrate. Another bunch of drunken crazies in modified pickup trucks were taking over the show by cutting donuts at 30, 40 mph and everyone moved to watch and to get the fuck out of they way lest they get run over or buried in an avalanche of sand.

After the belligerents began to lose interest and had faded out of the forefront of my audience,  the non-belligerents began to come by imploring me to leave before something bad happens to me.  Not gonna happen. I was dug in, determined to stay until ready to leave on my own free will or by ambulance. Besides, nothing bad was going to happen to me without something bad happening to them and I think they eventually began to figure that out.

At one point the original drunk girl worked her way back into my audience and started saying… something and I asked why are you here again. “I’m just trying to tell you what you need to do before…” blah, blah. I think at this point she was flirting.

“Save the advice,” I say, dismissing her. “I just backed down a mob of ten angry, drunk men and I’m still standing here talking to chicks. I think I know what I’m doing.”

Now comes the funniest part. After the morons concluded they couldn’t make me do anything without beating me death and got tired of hurtling insults at me and had left the vicinity, several of the young people from the camp across the way and even from the ratty Ford truck came over and had a laugh with me. One of the gals kept saying repeatedly “I like having my picture taken.” And from another, “Do you have another cigarette.” And, “Anymore beer?”

“I know you do, sweetheart. “  “Nope, last one. ” “Nope, last one.”  Respectively.

The head-moron-in-charge came back over. Now the mob was gone and there was no one to hold the “ex-marine” back. He kept his distance from me now and he said menacingly, “I better never catch you out.”

Now that was funny! I guffawed and smiled a bit and said, “You caught me out now.”

“What?” he said back gruffly, bowing up a bit.

I took a step out of the door of my truck without grabbing the mag light (I wouldn’t need it for just him) and said, simply but firmly, invitingly even, “You caught me out now.”

There was a long few seconds as he stared into my eyes. It was his last chance at the title; all he had to do was step up and seize the moment. Without saying another word he turned and melted away into the chaos of the crazy donut-cutting drunks edging ever closer to us. I can see why he is an ex-marine.

The guys cutting donuts in the modified trucks are getting close, throwing sand everywhere; it is time to leave now.  The mob who rolled up in the Ford truck were re-loading, their thirst for violence would have to remain unquenched this day. The 1st instigator, the coward who stayed well out of my reach, was already inside and as I pulled away I stopped right next to them and told the fellow still outside the truck that I leave when I get damn good and ready to leave. He relayed the message inside the truck as I pulled away laughing.  I could here the expletives boiling over from the cab of the truck. Fools. I always get the last word.

Those folk out there who know me are probably wondering why someone didn’t get knocked out. They know normally I would have dove into the mob, tagging the belligerents with a famous jaw-breaker in order of threat posed.  It’s been my experience that after tagging the first two usually the rest disperse rather quickly.  Anybody wants gratuitous violence, I’m their Huckleberry. All you have to do is accost me.

The only thing that kept me from flying into a blind rage and taking care of business was my camera. For once in my life I was able to maintain a rational line of thinking when my first intuition is to start fighting before getting hurt. Gandhi would have been proud. When the mob first started coming towards my truck I had quickly sat my camera rig into the bed of the truck. I didn’t want to be holding it when they arrived and there wasn’t enough time to secure it in the truck. The whole time I was standing there with that moron screaming in my face I was worried that if I got busy fighting one of the other punks might steal it. I had my whose case in the truck with all my lenses, adapters, cables, memory cards, etc. I don’t mind getting my ass whipped, but I couldn’t stand to let anything happen to my very expensive gear.

You can find me at the beach regularly. Don’t come down to Surfside if you don’t want your picture taken. Who knows, if you do something interesting you might even get published.

Pier 30 Live Streaming Surfcam

The good folks over at Pier 30 Bait & Tackle have put up a nice, live streaming beach cam on Surfside Beach

The next time you visit Surfside be sure to stop by Pier 30 and say hello to TJ, Robbie and the rest of the gang.

DIY Alaska big game hunting

Scotty Lamkin, a long-time Alaskan writes a great piece about hunting Alaska on your own for the bargain price of about $3,500. He makes a compelling argument and I’ll have to put the Alaskan hunt on my bucket list.

As a former professional Alaskan hunting guide I want to give you some of the information you need to get your Alaskan hunt underway in 2010. I’m talking about information you won’t get anywhere else. Most guides want to sell you a hunt- I don’t; I want to help you do it yourself! Coming from Kentucky 30 years ago, I knew how to hunt like most of you. Same rules apply here it’s just a LARGER place to apply them. What you don’t know is the terrain, the weather, and the logistics. You’ll need some help with that.

I didn’t realize that hunting for most Alaskan big game requires a guide. Moose, Caribou, Black Bear, and Sitka Blacktail Deer are the only game that can be hunted legally without the use of a guide. If you are an experienced hunter but have never hunted Alaska, Lamkin recommends saving about $5k by booking a river hunt without a guide. The experience, he argues, is invaluable when it does come time to hire a guide for the more exotic game in Alaska.

After reading Lamkin’s article I am definitely down for some Alaskan big game hunting. You Betcha!

USPA National Skydiving Championship

Went out Saturday to the USPA National Skydiving Championship held at Skydive Spaceland in Rosharon Tx. It was a beautiful day, blue skies, mild temps, and a vibrant crowd.  The size and scope of this event, held in little ole Rosharon, was astounding. Even more surprising than the size of  the competition was the sheer number of first time jumpers that were constantly going up and coming down. It’s great to see an adventure business right in our own back yard doing such a good job.

Here are a few pics from the Saturday afternoon activities:

Surfside Surf Report

There has been a couple of low pressure systems hovering around Texas and with all the rain we have been having over the past few days it was a nice break yesterday to have some mostly sunny conditions. I was out visiting a friend at Bastrop Bayou where I store my kayaks and decided it was a good idea to throw a yak into the back of the truck and shoot down to the shore. I keep a close eye on the surf charts and I knew there had been enough surf  to make the ride out to Follets Beach worth it. I have been jonesing for several weeks as all we’ve had is flat surf conditions. Typical summer conditions, I know, but come on. Where are all the tropical systems caused by global warming when you need them? I was really counting on surfing some tropical waves this summer.

Coming over the Surfside bridge I could see the water was beautiful; blue and green with tiny flecks of white caps interspersed as far as the eye could see–a result of the stiff SW breeze blowing at15-20 knots. Yes there were several kiteboarders out too.

I was in the water by about 2:30 and surfed for about an hour and fifteen minutes before tiring out. With such a stiff breeze you have to paddle constantly or you will quickly be a few miles from your truck.  It’s best to have someone follow you in a vehicle so you can expend your energy on surfing and not so much on fighting the wind and current to stay in the vicinity of your ride.  I can usually paddle for quite a bit longer but the lack of any surf over the past 8 weeks has  me out of ocean kayaking shape.

There were some rideable waves ; nothing too big but past the 3rd sandbar on the  outer sand banks you could catch a nice wave if you were patient and got lucky. There was  almost enough punch in the waves to get you to the reform, but  not quite. If you can get on a wave on the outer banks and stay on it to the 3rd sandbar, stay upright through the breakers and  catch a reform on the 2nd sandbar… let’s just say you will be out of breath, literally and figuratively. It’s a lot of work, but it’s a hell of a ride.

Wait for your wave and get on it!

Kiteboarding at Surfside Beach

I’ve been seeing several groups kite boarding at Surfside quite a bit this year.

Bastrop Bayou Trash Bash

Join in and help clean up Bastrop Bayou at the Bastrop Bayou Trash Bash Event

Join the next Trash Bash® Event
Saturday, March 28, 2009!

Once a year thousands of volunteers gather along the Texas waterways to do their part in cleaning up the environment and participate in the largest statewide event to educate the public about the importance of our water resources.

Time Trash Bash is a half day event and begins between 8:00/8:30 am in the morning and ends at 1:30 in the afternoon. Start time, registration and end time vary from location to location. Please go to the individual cleanup sites for details.

How to…
To get started, pick a cleanup site near you.Volunteer at any of the sites and receive:
Free Lunch
Entertainment
Door Prizes
T-Shirts

Go to TrashBash.org for complete information.

San Bernard National Wildlife Refuge: Winter Tour

I have been having some difficulty uploading hi-res (DVD quality, not hi-def) videos to YouTube but I managed to get a lo-res version up. The quality is not great but is decent I guess considering the file is only 50 meg. It would sure be nice to be able to upload better quality so fine details are preserved and the sky is not splotchy.

Winter Tour is a composition of clips from several days out at San Bernard National Wildlife Refuge during January 2009. Bird Park South is what I call SBNWR, as you will see why.

The music is William Tell Overture – Finale, Eine Kleine Nachmusik – Allegro, and 1812 Overture – Finale.

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