Rock & Roll bodyboarding

I have been thinking about bodyboard design of late. It has been popping up everywhere lately, Mike Stewart's new project, that crazy dude 4EPonly on the riptide forum who has some great ideas (http://stormbodyboards.blogspot.com, http://www.riptidemag.com.au/forum/viewtopic.php?f=16&t=782), and the wooden bodyboards video in vimeo http://surfinggreen.com.au/news/Chad-Waldrons-Momentary-Film-Regarding-a-Wooden-Board . It's so rad' to see people doing something different with a bodyboard. So i was thinking, how cool would it be if you could make a totally transparent bodyboard. Just like those perspex guitars which are see through. How rock and roll would that be! I know I'm probably not the first person to have this idea and it may have been done before but how rad would it be to see a photo of a booger locked into a 4-6ft aqua cavern on a transparent board, If you could get the light right and eliminate any reflection off the board it would look real arty to see someone fanging it on an invisible sleigh. Would make a mad photo i reckon. Don't know how it could be done, perhaps some kind of air bubble sandwiched in between two thin sheets of perspex would work. Imagine the speed you could get off something that flat and smooth, with the correct rails it would fly and if you could make the plastic thin enough it would have decent flex. Don't know about airs though, perhaps you could put elbow pads made from silicon or something, a bit like breast implants haha boobies, *sigh* is there anything they can't do or inspire ha ha ha ha!

What do you look like in a wipeout?

Ha ha. Ever wanted to know what you look like when a wave gets the better of you. I thought this little sequence of frame grabs was funny because you can almost see my facial expression through the wave as i get whipped around and over the inside of the falls. I guess i went a little too deep. With my hair flowing and body slightly twisted you could be forgiven for thinking that a mermaid had taken up surfing waves! Either that or i look like some under water dementor out of the harry potter movies. Hardly a big wave but who cares, whenever you get an inside view its worth every millisecond of time you can spend in there. Getting in the ocean and having a boog is all about having fun regardless of the quality of the waves.

Have a laugh at me for me :)

Humble beginnings

Getting into bodyboarding has definitely been one of the best things Ive ever done with my life. Pure and simple it’s just about having fun and clearing your mind of anything untoward. Like anyone will tell you when you're out in the water absolutely nothing else matters. My thoughts are with the ocean and its gentle fluid movements. The ocean is a cool embrace that heals and elates. The desire is simple; to become part of nature in all its beauty and glory and to experience something that surpasses the monotony of a life lived on terra firma.
The start of my love of the ocean oddly began in freshwater. As a kid going fishing for trout in Victoria I was fascinated with what lived beneath the ripples. I remember the occasional family trips to the beach. Swimming in the ocean was an opportunity to immerse myself in a world that didn't seem real; a world so amazing that it should only have existed in fiction books. Some of my best memories are of going to Apollo Bay and bus driving the waves on inflatable surf mats. SOOO much fun I never wanted to leave.
Many years later, after probably only really visiting the beach once or twice a year and moving from Victoria to South Australia, my brother’s girlfriend (now wife) invited us to stay at their beach shack to go fishing and bodyboarding. I was 20 years old now. I was so excited I went and bought my first bodyboard (piping hot brand check the pic' ha ha) and fins from Kmart and a second hand wetsuit from cash converters. Quality gear I know but it got me started.
The beach shack happened to be in the fisherman’s village at Pondalowie bay on the Yorke Peninsular. It wasn’t pretty but it sure was in a good location as these shacks cannot be sold or bought these days. They just get passed down through the families lucky enough to have them (most of them crayfishermen who live there half the year). I spent the next week in heaven there, going fishing half the day and learning how to bodyboard the other half of the time. I remember learning how to turn and trim in the shories while watching the surfers to see what lines they drew as they surfed the nearby reef.
It was definitely one of the best holidays of my life and since then I try to get in the ocean as often as I can and get back down to the Yorke peninsular once a year. In the following years venturing back to the fisherman's village I had the best conflict of interest you could have. I used to get up every morning of my holidays at the shack and stare into the bay in utter confusion because I couldn't work out whether I wanted to go boogin or fishing more. Such a dilemma! Over the years though it’s now a no brainer as I will choose the boog over any other activity anytime. My only regrets are that I wish I had found the joy of the sponge when I was younger. By the time I was right into bodyboarding I was in my early twenties and working full time and had a girlfriend and various other commitments so I haven’t really been able to go crazy and surf as much as I like. Nevertheless, I am always super grateful whenever I get time to soak the sponge and the stoke is never diminished.