telling secrets

There’s an etiquette among surf photographers, at least in theory, to avoid naming a spot. You crop out the landmarks and pretend that no one could possibly find the secret spot you uncovered. Maybe you don’t even post a picture until days or weeks later. Of course, in practice, this rarely works especially when instagram needs feeding on the regular or it gets cranky. We all get cranky when we’re hungry amiright? Invariably fights break out online over this spot or that spot and why did you post that, bro. It’s futile, if amusing.

Last weekend was different. There was no real good reason to hide the landmarks, no need to pretend to have found some new secret wave, a long way off the grid. A combination of new sandbars formed by the rains and an unusual swell angle meant waves somewhere we just don’t see waves very often. You could check this place every day for a year, or five years even, and never see it look like this. Despite the forecasts and the models, the world is still full of surprises, sometimes. Which is nice.

I have to confess, though, I’m a little tired of looking at muddy waters. It’s so very brown. I like brown if it means chocolate and peanut butter, and ideally, both together. But brown oceans mean, well, nothing super good. Maybe it could be blue again soon.

I’d like to dive into the blue ocean.