Angourie - Part 1

March something or other, 2012

Our next stop is one that we've been looking forward to for months:  Angourie and the Blue House.  University friends of my parents have ever so generously lent us their beach house for two weeks and it just happens to be at a world-famous surf break, and a ten-minute drive from the town of Yamba.  Yamba is where we would have set up for the whole five months of our Australian trip if we had decided not to move around, so we are ecstatic to get to stay at a beach house at our town of choice.

We love the Blue House as soon as we walk in the door.  It's open and airy and something about it just makes you feel relaxed.  You can see the ocean from the balcony and the front yard has a constant parade of tropical birds like lorikeets and honey eaters.  There are hundreds of great books packing every shelf and while there is beautiful art on the walls, lower down it is well set-up for toddlers and babies.  There's even a Scrabble board.  We know our two weeks here are going to go by too fast.

Rusty chillin' out on the deck

After we settle in we take a walk to explore the neighborhood.  Across the street is Spooky's Beach which is perfect for Rusty and Audrey.  It is a semi-protected bay with a wide crescent of sand and the waves don't get too rough.  A sprinkling of flat rocks near the middle are submerged at high tide and dry at low tide.  We play on those a lot, looking in all the crevices and getting splashed by the water as it comes in or goes out.

Up the street and around the corner is a lookout over The Point.  We walk by a monster of a property on our way there and find out later that it is the $30 million palace of Billabong's owner.  It looks like Ironman's house.  The Point isn't working today but some surfers call it the best right-hand point break in the world.  It is the classic point break, which means that waves break on a point of rocks or land that jut out.  Being a right-hand break means that when surfer catches a breaking wave at the point, he turns right to ride it.  If you do a search for "Angourie Point" in Google Images, you'll see what it looks like when it's going off.  Then take away the waves and the surfers:  that's what we see today.

Four or five months ago there was a shark attack here.  The surfer was just taking off on a wave when a shark came at him, and his leg was actually between the teeth for an instant.  He got cuts and scratches all down his calf, but got away with all his pieces.  The board got a perfect shark bite out of it, down by the fins.

The chances of being attacked by a shark are the same as winning the lottery the same day you get hit by lightning, but just the thought of it, when your toes are dangling off your board and you can't see anything down there, makes you want slightly better odds.

The other danger at The Point is the locals.  Territorialism is as high here as I've seen anywhere.  It's not a large break and it's high quality, so the people who live here are protective.  They were either raised here and have surfed it all their lives, or they moved here and built homes and families near it.  Either way, more tourists means more surfers in the lineup and that means less waves for them, or more dealing with people who don't know the etiquette.  The guy I talk to about the sharks tells me about a guy who got beat up the day before.  "Dropped in…  two broken boards…  they took it up on the beach to square up and I guess the guy got messed up pretty good."  Dropping in on another surfer is the cardinal sin of surf etiquette.  It means you catch a wave that someone is already riding, like cutting somebody off in traffic.  Priority goes to whomever gets on first.

All this makes me apprehensive about paddling out at The Point.  I surf the kids' beach for a couple days, but the waves just aren't as good.  I try saying good morning to the other surfers that I see, and they just turn away without saying anything.  This happens on about three separate occasions before I move over to the Point.  I go on a small day, at first light, when there are only a few people in the water.  Less chance of getting my leash cut and punched in the face, I figure, if there isn't a gang of gorillas in the water.

Everything goes fine.  I stick to the outside for the first half of the session, respectfully staying out of the way.  Then I edge my in towards the action and nobody pays any notice at all.  Most people are actually really friendly and I ask someone if there's heavy localism or not.  "Yeah, there are a few guys who will give you a hard time, but probably not if you stay out of the way."  If it comes to it, I figure I'll dig my heels in and take the beating.  I'll yell, "Nobody owns the sea!" as they punch me in the face.  That's how Gandhi would surf.  "Nobody owns the sea! BIFF! Nobody owns the sea!  KA-POW!"