Evening
The sun had long passed overhead and was slowly dipping towards the horizon. Staring at a screen had taken its toll, so it was time to square the work/life ledger. I threw a board in the back of the car. Just the one.
Ten hours of daylight had provided one surf check, two drive bys, and who-knows-how-many surf cam scans, so there’d be no surprises. There rarely is for the late session. The magic comes not from discovering what’s in store, as it does for the dawny, but from capturing what you can before it disappears. I put the keys in the ignition, twisted, and drove off with the clock ticking.
Crossing the train bridge provided enough elevation to see the wind was still light offshore. For whatever atmospheric reason, the seabreeze was held at bay, and with the air now cooling it was gonna stay this way till the day was done.
It’s quite possible for late sessions to be nothing more than routine: wash off the day; informally check in on the crew who surf the same wave; tie a bow on yet another day among the living. In fact, that’s what the majority of lates are. But when it’s pumping at the end of the day…well, it’s a special day indeed.
Be it summer or winter, no region in Australia has consistently good wind for the late session. Our west and south coasts are too close to the storm track, so often get spoiled by the fetch, the East Coast is too variable and dynamic, while the northern regions are just that bit too far away from the stability of the trades. Unlike the tropics, where tradewinds consistently kick in through the afternoon, Australia rarely allows for perfect late sessions. There's a reason they shoot the beer ads in Indo or Hawaii.
Point being: When perfect late conditions arise, as they had today, you’ve gotta jump on it. Grasp the nettle, suck the marrow, seize the day before sundown slams the door shut.
The carpark was an album of familiar faces. Tradies drying off grinning after their 3pm head start, others hurriedly changing into wetsuits, exchanging quips across the asphalt, each set grabbing our collective attention - even the attention of non-surfers stopping to look seaward on their afternoon stroll.
I was into my wetsuit in two minutes and up the beach, legrope on, in just two more. The mind might have been dulled by drudgery but the body was limber and ready to move. There's never a need to stretch for the late session, and it doesn’t take a few waves to wash off the sleep and cobwebs either.
From the top of the creek down to the surf club the bank was in fine form, but of more spatial importance was the height of the sun above the horizon. Forty-five minutes of light. An hour tops. Surfers often pride themselves on spontaneity; their ability to react to the whims of nature. The surf is here now, and it won't be tomorrow. How high can you jump?
Out in the water, an early season northeast swell was bowling headlong into a light northwest wind, offering multiple hollow sections down the bank. A few more feet would be ideal, but the surface conditions couldn't be faulted. The usual after work banter was at a minimum, replaced by a more diligent, even workmanlike, ambience. The session was approached with higher hopes than a mere wet down.
I alternated between deep and wide, looking for the waves that presented as less than ideal, the ones that others passed up, yet would stand up and offer their best sections further down the bank. It was a succesful ploy, and I was quickly in double digits before changing tactics, slowing down, and making a play at the better sets.
This gave me time to sit for the first time during the session. "Alright, hey?" Asked Muzz excitedly.
"Reckon it's getting better and better," I answered.
"Get 'em while you can then," replied Muzz, before paddling toward the next approaching set. I let him go and sized up the second wave which pulled taut across the bank so I could sit in the throat of it from takeoff.
"Nice one" said Muzz on the paddle back out, before taking the first wave of the next set and offering a farewell over his shoulder. "Later..."
I watched him throw spray off the first turn then looked back at the rest of the set. Where possible I keep my eyes in the dark during earlies and lates. Don't let them dilate, make them work hard on little light, and have them in the state you want when the waves come.
Three or four more sets came in that state, the sky getting by degrees darker, depth perception harder. I held off the throttle and enjoyed the waves for what they were rather than what I could impose. Fatigue was taking hold anyway. The last set I swung back into a wedging right that, while slow, took me all the way across the bank to shore.
Looking west and the now-unseen sun was playing tricks of the light on the clouds above the horizon. High wispy clouds. Pre-frontal. Atmospheric signposts that a change was heading up the coast; that we were in the very last stage of the cycle before a new round of southerly wind and swell would follow. It would start tonight.
For now though it was calm and it was dark.
The lights of the surf club guided me back to the car.
(All photos by Craig Brokensha)
Comments
Yes - now we're talking!
I'll do dawnies, but the evenings are just better - maybe because they're rarer down here.
I'll gladly push myself into that hairy late drop in the evening session. Dawnies on the other hand...are generally played safer. The contrast between absolute security and comfort (i.e. warm under blanket in bed at 5am) to fear and discomfort (i.e. free falling and landing on your board on a sand-sucking beast in cold water at 6am) is just too significant to ignore. In the evenings, you take the beatings as a chance to rinse off the day you've had.
Great pieces - lunchtime sessions next? Love the 'off peak' surfs too, mid afternoon, late morning - away from the traditional times.
1-3PM with the entire beach to yourself before the tradies start turning up, love those ones.
Ditto regarding injury prevention. Im too dazed in the mornings. Slow, cold... nah. Give me a bit of wind at 9-11am anyday, use a board with chines an you won't even feel the lumpiness, its just more ridglelines to play-off.
Whilst I absolutely love and live by the dawnie (kids, work, the hope of 20-30mins with only a handful out etc), some of my best surfs have been the mid-week 10:30am enter the water when you’ve managed to protect your diary from any meetings.
You can get a good 2-3hours out there as you surf through the typical work lunch hour.
The evening surf is so good when you can get it, just so rare on the SC which is a shame.
Nice one. The rarity of a good late session in these parts makes the memory of those you do get stand out. The walk back in the glooming is the icing on the cake.
The bit about not having to stretch for the late is a good one. I've never been a morning person and the early, or the very early, just cannot be done satisfactorily with the kids, job, commute conundrum. Add the twenty minute stretch routine and it just cant be done without rushing everything. I preferred the late before my life became encumbered with those things anyway. They both have their positive and negative aspects but with the day ahead of me it doesn't have the appeal that it does when the day is done.
Great stuff Stu. What a great bookend, and yea the Latey is a precious way to finish the day.
Nicely written. Captures the mood.
Stu. Very nice, well composed. I put down the tools preparing tonight’s dinner and got pleasantly sucked into your visual vortex, I was taken there for a moment and enjoyed every word of every wave, congrats to you and Steve for the Early and the Late.
Noice. The magic of the late is also that it only gets less busy, and someone's gotta be last one out. May as well be ... me
It was always you
Gotta love a LAGOS after an onshore day. Even better when the tradies who wrote it off are in the pub.
Many moons ago I lived at an East Coast point break during an extended run of El Niño’s. The spring nor’easters would roar for days, but very occasionally, if you said your prayers and sacrificed the odd goat to Hui, a mid week southerly change might run up the coast in the afternoon.
A quick burst of wind and noise from the accompanying storm before the sun might reappear revealing an unexpected playground of clean wind swell running down the point, with just a couple surprised punters making the most of the sudden change in conditions.
The challenge was then how long to enjoy the uncrowded waves before coming in and would you be the last one out in the darkness, with your legs out of the water, willing the next wave to appear and then, not to kook it.
Epic, just as it is.
Quote stunet
But when it’s pumping at the end of the day…well, it’s a special day indeed.
The carpark was an album of familiar faces. Tradies drying off grinning after their 3pm head start, others hurriedly changing into wetsuits, exchanging quips across the asphalt, each set grabbing our collective attention - even the attention of non-surfers stopping to look seaward on their afternoon stroll.
Looking west and the now-unseen sun was playing tricks of the light on the clouds above the horizon. High wispy clouds. Pre-frontal. Atmospheric signposts that a change was heading up the coast; that we were in the very last stage of the cycle before a new round of southerly wind and swell would follow. It would start tonight.
For now though it was calm and it was dark.
The lights of the surf club guided me back to the car.
And quote from Mr shearer's early.
Got to the corner and a wide set pushed in square. I could see the wall straining against the bank in the moonlight. It was a wave surfed by feel more than sight: racing a streak of moonlight that constantly sucked into a metallic cylinder, smooth as polished steel. A little split in the fabric of the work-a-day world, where something that can't be bought, sold and commodified is there for the experiencing.
Great read. But you left out the part when you get back to the lock box on the car and it's so dark you can't see the combination lock numbers. And you're squinting at those numbers with all you have, swearing and cursing, trying to bounce any light from the surf club off your palm and onto the digits to give you some chance of retrieving your key. Any thoughts of the last sweet wave you got have completely evaporated. Even worse in winter when those numb fingers won't cooperate.
Or trying to find where you left your keys in the secret hiding spot or worse someone has taxed your towel thinking you've been eaten.
Surely I can't be the only one left who leaves the windows down and the key in the ignition.
Haha. Where I grew up, there were two types of theives. The drug-addict opportunist and the one who wouldnt steal it unless it was locked, chained or bolted down. I cant do much about the latter, but I figure if I cant find my keys, what hope have the drug-addicts got.
Yeah I can relate to that. Stick something outside with a "FREE" sign on it and it just sits there for weeks. Put a "For Sale' sign on it and it won't be there the next day.
How about leaving the engine running? I've done that and can only assume that they assume the owner was insane and not to be fucked with. I've also left boards in car parks. Panicked drive back...I'm 2 from 4 on successful recovery.
So you've left a surfboard in a carpark four separate times?
You're reaching the point where you need a tattoo reminder. Some olde english cursive on your forearm: Put board in boot.
Maybe SN bumber sticker reminder, eh? Haha
I like to think of it as once a decade. Might have been a bit of weed involved...
Haha, had a couple of sticky situations like this where I can't find where I hid the key.
... for me, it's being unable to read the combination lock for the key/surflock. - ain't that a joy!
had the same recently where I had to wait for a car to drive past so its headlights would give me a flash of light
only problem was each car would only give enough for one number
Had an unusual late session at Summerland Bay on Philip Island in the early 90's. There were 3 of us out and by the time we all came in the lights were on, the tourists filling up the seats and we had to scale the fence as the gates had been locked. The late session means you can get home, shower, eat and morph into relaxation mode.
Amazing read Stu. Felt like I was there. If you’ll indulge a little prose I wrote a few years back in honour of a magical late session:
“Sitting in my hotel in dreary grey Melbourne, similarly looking back at my weekend with appreciative glances. I think my best moment was sitting in the ocean with a spreading vermillion sunset bouncing off the scattered clouds. The wind had swung then dropped; Blacks Head provided the final bulwark against what northerly zephyrs remained. As the light flattened and the fire spread from west to east to west the scene began to reflect in the too still Pacific. At a point the horizon ceased to be a clear division, and merged into a zone of deepest aquamarine, purple, and flecked with the crimson flashes of the sun just departed.
Clean 2 foot runners formed out of the indistinct but serene sea, surging and spilling themselves onto the shallowing sandbar. I rode these as the embers faded to the bluest purple before their shape, size and proximity became almost too hard to discern. I rode my last wave to the beach. And was met by a curious old dog, a stout bitzer, mostly Lab with a touch of Kelpie, who splashed out to meet me, sniffed my offered hand and then, apparently satisfied, loped back to meet his lingering owners. They were a respectable couple in their 60s. They waited for me to approach.
As I jogged from the waters edge he half-stated " you're a brave man, surfing this late"
my reply,; "dunno about brave mate, just happy", was accepted, and the three of us paused and looked back out to sea.
She pondered..... "its beautiful"
Nothing more needed to be said.
I turned left, and trotted into the deepening darkness along the winding rainforest path. They continued north along the beach, toward the warm lights of their holiday town.”
“Nothing more needed to be said”
Nice one E.
I never surf before 9 AM. Late afternoon surf till dark is one of my greatest joys.
Remember reading an article about Tom Curren saying he never felt great in the mornings and all his best surfs were late arvo (or words to that effect).
Late late on a Saturday on Sunday evening on this coast is awesome. All the day trippers, frothers and general flotsam and jetsam have disappeared...have had countless sessions with a few crew or solo, at this time
Great memories of a late from the spot in the top pic a few years back. Just me and a couple of mates plus another random guy who we ended up having a beer with in the car park afterwards watching the last bit of light disappear.
Great memories of a late from the spot in the top pic a few years back. Just me and a couple of mates plus another random guy who we ended up having a beer with in the car park afterwards watching the last bit of light disappear.
Great read, always feel I surf better in arvo. Many times I've spent wishing for more daylight in the day ...
I feel the most special moments, both visually and emotionally are those evening sessions, a late glass off, burning sunset and here on the East Coast, getting barrelled as the kaleidoscope burning colours wrap in and around you, almost blindingly.
That and paddling in where it's pitch black to then get a good feed, brew and bed. Pure happiness.