The good olde boards

1959 - What a year that was. I'll never forget it!
The other day I spent a quiet moment or two going through some snaps of my old boards. Unfortunately I don't have any pics of the homemade balsa ones, thank goodness. They were horrible boards and how any of us, who were learning this new sport of surfing, didn't end up with a broken bone or two is beyond me.

Rock'n' Roll music was raging out of the radio just as much as the hormones were racing around my body. I was young, naive and craved for more excitement than my participation in the local football team could provide me with.
During the summer of that year I was fortunate enough to be knocking around with a few of the guys from my footy club, such as Graham Isaacs, Des Rudd and a few others whose names have escaped my memory. We spent the early days of that summer at our local beach, Brighton, honing our ball skills and generally trying to keep fit. And although there was no surf in Gulf St. Vincent, we had fun riding some homemade skimboards in the small shorebreak.

One night we went down to the Brighton Town Hall Civic Centre and saw a movie on surfing that would change my life forever. I was stunned and I think so were my mates to see these blokes actually riding these huge waves on the North Shore of Oahu in Hawaii. The banter between all of us after seeing this spectacle of sport was that we've got to get into this sport, and there was no argument at all. Without a doubt Graham Isaacs and Des Rudd were the guys that initially got the ball rolling as far as building our first two surfboards was concerned. During the process of making them I was an innocent bystander; I was amazed and still am at the way they made these boards.

The actual expert on fibreglass in those days was a bloke by the name of Rick Sutton who had a great deal to do with the making of those boards but for some unknown reason never actually got involved with the sport at all. Even today I remember as clear as crystal how these guys glued the 4"x4" lengths of Balsa together, which they bought from J.B. boats, cut, shaped and fibreglassed the two old logs until they looked like surfboards, primitive ones that they were. The next problem was: where were we going to launch these two huge vessels and start surfing? We were all on Christmas holidays, and it was decided that we would put up a tent at the Port Elliott Caravan Park. From past experience we knew it was a great location for bodysurfing, but after an hour or so we discovered that these huge logs were almost lethal in the shorebreak.

I believe it might have been Des Rudd who suggested, "Let's have a look around the corner at a place called "New Surfers". " And so the next day we trundled around there, I still remember quite well that it was huge as I saw the real South Coast surf for the first time in all its offshore glory. So much to our delight, and may I add to the locals of Port Elliott relief, we found the conditions ideal and more importantly safer for our green young bodies. How well I remember that summer, it was a stinking hot one and to get some relief from the blistering heat we made small tents out of our towels, using driftwood for posts. Then, taking turns, we'd leave our makeshift shelters and wade out as far as we could and ride the whitewater of the leftovers from the huge surf that always seemed to start miles out and roll incessantly in. The surf at New Surfers as I recall always appeared to be huge and at no time did we ever consider there was a chance of making it out the back. Such a feat was beyond our fledgling talents. In those days only a sandy track led to mountains of sandhills, which stretched forever and which we had to climb over to even see the beach. And do you know what? We all agreed that this was the perfect spot to learn how to surf, even today it still is!

One evening I was strolling along the beach by myself, just taking in the last rays of a setting sun with occasional glances at those wonderful waves rolling in. As if on call, there it was, my first ever sighting of a shark in the surf. At first I was transfixed, as I watched it glide so effortlessly between the sets, and then it struck me like a thunderbolt, there were some nasty bities in the area. Quite often we would step on the occasional skate, but we were lucky that none of us ever stepped on one of the huge stingrays which are abundant in this area.

We had a rough idea that there were other surfers around but in the first year or so we only just saw them in passing, as such was the solitude of surfing in South Australia those days. When it got cold during winter we'd wear our footy jumpers with the sleeves cut off, and after a session there was always a fire going on the beach. Try that these days!

As we progressed in our abilities and conditions down south were not suitable, we surfed the Mid Coast at Southport, and our old boards came in handy as barges for crossing the Onkaparinga River. Instead of trying to lug them across the bridge and over the sandhills we floated them across the river, carrying all the necessary supplies like beach tents, eskies, towels, knitting baskets and make-up kits for the occasional girlfriend who didn't really want to be at the beach anyway. I often wonder what ever happened to those old boards, I shudder to think that one of them is still around and some poor kid is getting maimed by one of those old Titanics.

Despite having to share those old boards with my mates I really wanted a board of my own. Where I was working at the time was a carpenter who I pestered for months to make me a hollow plywood thing. Even though I bothered him for ages he never made it.

The next new board I rode was one that I had custom-made by Rod Bedford of JB boats. I had it made up, drafted by my own design, based on my vast surf knowledge of two and a bit year's of surfing. It was a new foam board, 9 foot 6 inches long, narrow in the nose, wide at the back and about 2 and 1-quarter inches thick in the guts of it. It had two diagonal stringers starting from the nose and ending almost at the rear. Despite Rod's protestations he made it and what a happy young chappy I was when he did. The night I brought it home I slept with it in the lounge room, because my mum wouldn't let me take it to bed. And when Man was going up into space, I was listening to it all happen on the radio, while painting my own little logo on the nose of it, on the lounge room floor.

Looking back in hindsight, I should've listened to Rod, because it was a terrible board to ride in the finish, but on a positive note, it made me work a lot harder to overcome the deficiencies, my own belligerences and helped to make me a better surfer. When one of my mates used to say, "I feel like going for a wave!" and I'd say, "take my board!" they were quite courteous in replying to my offer, "No, thanks Ron, I think I might do a bit of bodysurfing." I might be wrong but it must have been one of the first boards made by Rod but upon seeing it everyone else wanted a custom built board. Some blokes even had big gun boards made and I thought even then how ridiculous they were, as there was no surf anywhere nearby that you could ride such a board.

In those early days of surfing, most blokes changed their boards more than they did their underwear. Everybody wanted to have the latest board orbit of surfing gear available, and that included board shorts. I remember my mum making me a pair of boardies from leftover material from the rumpus room curtains and I felt really stoked wearing them. I can't remember the year I traded my old board in but I do recall falling in love with a red "Gordon Woods" translucent creation at John Arnold's surf shop in the city. Now, I wasn't like the other surfers of my day, but this board seemed to whisper to me, "Buy me and I'll give you the rides of a lifetime". So I bought it and I would have to say that it was an absolute screamer of a "good" board. I rode it on almost every break, on every coastline that was within the reach of my meagre salary; I rode some of the biggest and best waves of my life on that board.

The first year I took it over to Bells and rode it, all the local blokes couldn't resist checking this strange looking board out. Besides being an unusual translucent red colour it also had a right hand hook on the end, which prompted numerous questions from the Vicco surfers. When they came up asked the obvious questions, "How does it go on your turns, is there any noticeable difference, is it better, does it hang in better?" , with my tongue fully implanted in my cheek I answered, "Yeah! Ya gotta get one of these, it's improved my surfing outa sight!" Besides riding it at one if the biggest days at Bells, I think I'll always remember it as my lifeline on a small and crumbly day near Triggs #2, where I wiped out and got a severe stomach cramp, I thought I was a goner. I could hardly move with the pain. Luckily enough my old board wasn't far away and I managed to drag myself back on to it and somehow made my way back to shore.

It's strange how the tides of memory flow in and out. What I'm trying to say is that old red translucent board was a terrific board but for the life of me I don't have any good reason for why I ever got rid if it. Eventually realising the hook served no purpose I hacked it off and went with the trend and put a laminated block on the end. Not that it made any difference to my surfing but it looked more like an up to date board.

My next board was a 9-foot plain and simple "Don Burford". I knew that Don rather I never asked him to make a board for me because he knew I was an ex con but I paid him good, hard, honest money for it and he did an excellent job. I paid Don $100 for that board and he made it to my specifications, which were none.

This board I would call it my "West Coast" board, because like myself in those days it saw more of Eyre and Yorke Peninsula than any other waters. Don Burford was a pretty good shaper and I suppose that's why he's now living up on the Gold Coast making foam blanks and a fortune. I surfed that board at Pondie, Daly Heads, Cactus and all the breaks in between. I recall taking it out at Triggs in the "Mid" one day but that was a rare exception.

The first time I took that board out at Cactus it was done with a fair amount of trepidation. I cannot recall the exact reasons why I felt that way then, but I guess that I must have heard some scary stories about the local wildlife from some of the other blokes that had surfed it before me. A major put off was probably seeing two big dead sharks hanging from the jetty, around the corner at Port Le Hunte the day before I went out at Cactus. Nevertheless I entered the water and made the long walk across that pitted limestone reef, which is covered, in a strange type of brownish coloured, bubble-like seaweed. Once I got to the stage where I could start paddling, I hesitated and took the gold ring I wore on my finger and put it in my mouth, just in case the glint of it might attract some undesired denizen of those dark waters.

After making it out the back without a problem, my next worry was how to approach this lefthand, barrelling wave I'd heard so much about. The next wave coming through took care of all my worries, I picked it up and almost straight away it started threatening me. As I bottom-turned on my backhand the lip started to envelope me. I bit the bullet, walked a few steps down the nose, grabbed a rail and went for it. To my delight the wave held true to the rumours I'd heard and for a few glorious seconds in time it held me in the hollow of its watery green curtain. I don't remember how many sessions I had that week but it was consistently good every day we were there and I made a real pig of myself.

When I eventually got married and started moving around the country with my various jobs, I took my Burford with me. And even though I didn't ride it so much during those years due to family and work commitments I never ever thought about getting rid of it. I guess I always had this one thought in the back of my mind, I was always going to be a surfer, even if I was one who thought he was over the hill; an old aging surfer needs one in the spare bedroom to prove it. Sure, I used to take it down the beach from time to time but I was never able to rekindle that special stoke from earlier years. Every now and again I'd sneak down to a local beach and take it out to rekindle my love affair with my true love, the sea.
I got that board in 1970, and it was just a few years ago, during a low period in my life that I sold it to a collector of old Mals for a very cheap price. As I considered my surfing days over I had no regrets doing so.

Over, until I met the girl who got me more interested in an extreme sporting life again. I have made some very bad decisions in my life but meeting her and persisting through some awkward and painful moments have paid huge dividends for me. Early in our relationship I took her down south, one hot summers day, to Chiton Rocks for a bit of bodysurfing. I walked over to the life saving club house to see if we could borrow a board to give her an idea of what real surfing was all about. One of the crew there lent us a shortboard. We took it out and when we got to the right position where she was lying prone on the board, I pushed her forward onto a nice looking wave. She loved it! The power of heading shoreward on this wave was the beginning of her surfing life.

In all my surfing life I've been a bit of a loner but I must say that surfing with the girl is something special for me. For the first time I have someone who is close to me that I can share the stoke with and that's special. In closing I would like to quote what a good old mate of mine from those early days, Trevor "Gus" Dawes, said to me…

"I'll always remember those early days as the best days of my life, with no comparison!"

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