December 10, 2009

Page 4 - Pipe Masters & Jesse Has Fun at Makaha

 

Last day.

Thinking about surfing, but then we discover the Pipe Master’s is going to run.

We decide to bring our boards to the Pipe Masters, and maybe surf West Side in the afternoon.

Go to board locker and get boards.

Off we go, windward side, to the north shore.

Weather finally has gone normal, complete with clouds over the Ko'olaus’s and a light to moderate trade wind.

Roll up windward side for last time.

Goodbye once more, my former home, I do not know when, or even if, I will ever see you again. Bittersweet.

Sunset Beach		What else is there to say?

Inside Sunset

First stop, Sunset Beach, which is breaking nicely. Wish I could ride it once again, but I’m too old, and too smart to paddle out into that stuff. I know exactly what this wave is capable of doing. In pictures it oftentimes looks downright soft, even easy, but once you're out in the water, it's different. Sunset Beach is a very powerful wave, and I've both witnessed and absorbed some fairly serious violence there. I still regard Sunset as the best wave in the world. I came to that conclusion a very long time ago, and in all the time since, I've yet to encounter anything to cause me to rethink that conclusion. We watch and take pictures. Jesse is suitably impressed with the place. Lots of action and one big cleanup set that gets everybody. Of course. Sunset is one of the cleanup-iest places you'll ever encounter anywhere. Which, oddly enough, is one of the things I liked the best about it. It's perfect for sitting way the hell outside of everybody else, and twiddling your thumbs for twenty minutes, secure in the knowledge that it's coming. I never surfed Sunset without a wristwatch, which might give you an idea of how I approached the place. Rode a lot of nice set waves all to myself doing it that way. Let the first one or two sweep the water clear of people, and then take the drop with the whole vast lineup spread all before you as if in a dream, grinning like a fool. Yeah, I got way more than my share in four year's time. So I don't need to go out there today. It's somebody else's turn now. I've had my turn.

Ok, enough of that. And we roll on toward Pipeline, and traffic immediately goes to hell, and there’s no parking within a mile of the place.

We drive around for a while, and finally find a place to park. Some people had set up a little home-made sign on the Kam Highway, and we pulled off the road, through their gate, and wind up on the grass in their yard. I get out of the car, look toward the cliff, and talk to the nice lady about the bunkers up on the hill, and are they visible? She doesn’t really know very much about the bunkers, and I relate the story of me living in one of the damned things way back when. She doesn't seem quite sure how to take it, which is ok by me, and I snap a few pictures of where I think the bunkers might be lurking, but the vegetation has them completely hidden, and I’ll never know for sure.

Walk across highway and a little bit toward Sunset, to Ehukai beach park.

Pipeline

Full-tilt surf contest with tents, trinket sellers, wall to wall people, blaring speakers, fast-talking announcers, the whole fucking goddamned works. I am very forcibly reminded once again why I so dislike all of this stuff, but Jesse is keen to immerse herself in it, and I'm agreeable to her wishes. I know that in a bit, I'll be sitting in the sand, and all the bullshit will be behind me, and nothing but a little sand, open water, and spitting tubes will be in front of me. I guess I can deal with that.

Rockpile in the distance

Cross the top of the dune at the park, and walk down on the soft sand and head toward Rockpile to get situated directly in front of Pipe.

Clean as a whistle, and even though the swell hasn’t got all that much west in it to speak of, it’s peaky, going in both directions, and very nice.

		Empty spinner down the beach at Off the Wall

Big crowd of people off to the right of the main break, free surfing. I always marvel at how Pipe sucks in the wave, all to itself, and right there next to it, directly in front of the beach park, a very short ways away on what appears to be a normal stretch of straight beach, there's hardly anything. The crowd does what it can to snatch a few, but despite their close proximity, they're not surfing Pipe. Not even close, in fact. In the other direction, to the left of Pipe, Off the Wall is hammering right along, but with no takers except a solitary body boarder who's tearing it up. The difference in crowds on either side of Pipe could not be more striking. The difference in waves is, too. Today, Off the Wall is throwing occasional makeable lefts, but nobody, with the exception of that lone body boarder, wants anything to do with it. Off the Wall will hurt you, and I guess all the guys shredding on the other side of Pipe know that, and don't feel like getting hurt today.

This guy had Off the Wall all to himself

The contest is on, and the pros are murdering the place, but every once in a while the place tries to do a little murdering back. A surprising number of people have been killed surfing Pipe over the years, so whenever somebody goes down, it's a non-trivial event.

Not where you want to be at Pipe

			The pros were murdering it.

I begin shooting a zillion pictures, and, as at Waimea a couple of days ago, Jesse decides to relocate, and she walks down the beach toward Off the Wall a ways, and shoots a zillion pictures too.

I stay put with all our gear.

Not much else that can be said. It's the Banzai fucking Pipeline. Look at the pictures if you want to know what was going on, ok?

Eventually, we decide to depart.

We head for the West Side by way of Haleiwa.

Bypass road around the actual town of Haleiwa and up the cane fields and through Wahiawa we go.

Down the other side, catch H-1 west, and Nanakuli here we come.

Along the way, Jesse calls the board rental place on the cell phone and they very graciously permit us to return the boards late, lock them in the board locker, and drop the key in the hole in the door. Way fucking cool! No more time constraints! We can surf till dark! Once again, if you're out there sometime, and find yourself in Town, and need a board, you could do a whole lot worse than Koa Board Sports. The lady there (I do wish I'd thought to get her name) was just a total sweetie.

Stop and look at Tracks, but it’s very small, and the stupid wind has gone northwest, onshore, and it’s crinkled up. Shit. Jesse is not happy with this turn of events.

Onward, stop for gas, and then to Maili Point.

Crinkled, head high or so, but we don’t even stop, and drive on by.

Next stop, Makaha.

Which, amazingly enough, is breaking nicely with occasional strays a touch overhead on the peak right at takeoff.

The contrast between what we're seeing at Makaha, and what we saw earlier at Pipeline could not be greater. Both waves are quintessential Hawaii, but are as different as night and day.

Twenty-five people in the lineup, spread out nicely, and the northwest breeze here is very light and isn’t really doing anything bad to it at all. A light texture, and that's all. No wobble. Nicely lined up.

Jesse lights up like a signal flare, and soon enough she’s paddling out at Makaha. Way cool! I am superstoked for Jesse, she's finally going to get to ride.

				Paddling into the late afternoon shimmer
	Jesse at Makaha

The guys out in the lineup apparently take an instant liking to her, and she gets her waves in Hawaii for real.

		Jesse, day's end at Makaha		Paddling out of the late afternoon shimmer

Getting to surf at a place like Makaha, steeped in Hawaiian surfing history and lore, just adds icing to the cake.

I get another zillion pictures, but will only include a few more, below. This thing is already over-pictured, I think.

		Makaha is a very rippable wave		Makaha is also a very mellow wave

Once again, there's not much else to say about it. Have a look at the pictures, to see what went down, ok?

Jesse finishes strong, with a nice long ride almost to the sand.

The look on her face, coming out of the water, says it all.

She will now be going home happy. Very happy.

The end.

P.S. Thanks, Jesse, for letting me include some of your very excellent pictures in this thing.

It's appreciated.

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Hawaii, December 2009, Contents MacLaren's Images & Stories