Surfing again!

(Johan) Finally, after 5 days of work in Stockholm I finally came back to Norrland. There´s been a 4 day swell here, and I´ve missed the surf like crazy...

In Stockholm me and Niklas swung by the NORD boys to check out their headquarters, and of course, to pick up my board. They turned out to be really nice and chilled out guys, who manage to live the dream, which is quite rare here in Sweden. All props to them!

The supposed 6´3 turned out to be a 6´6, which was great, since I wanted a substitute for my broken down old 6´5. I got the 6´5 13

years ago, and it´s been a great board. My quiver now consists of a 7´10 minimal, a 6´10 funboard, a 6´6 shortie, a 6´5 wreck, a 6´2 swallow and the board of my life, my 5´10 fish.

So, back to todays surf trip. I went by my self, since rat had to work, and I couldn´t get anyone else to come.

Halfway there my phone rang. It was dropdeadfred, Rat had mailed him and said I was going, and he was up for an afternoon session. When I arrived at the spot it was big and messy. Fred came along, and we drove up to check another spot. That was also messy.... So we drove back, got suited up and paddled out. The surf was really big, but really messy... I surfed the fish for a while, tried the 6´6 and ended up surfing the malibu. It was good fun although the surf was crap... I might go at it again tomorrow, if I can find the time. Ratman is gonna update us on his trip this tuesday later. Peace.

Pictures from the skate session!

Here´s a few pics of me....

Onefoot

Nice grab

Flatback before his drop in at the tiny ramp...

Might be surf again!

This monday night coming there's gonna be a NE swell so theres gonna be tubes. Unfortunately for me (Johan) I have to go to Stockholm, so I´ll miss it.. That sucks!

Still waiting for Rob to send me some photos from the skate session, as soon as I get them they´ll be on the site.

(Ratman)..hahaha I'm on it if it's on... and you...mr businessman, have to go to Stockholm you landlubber..hahaha

Later

Flat and BOOORING

(Johan) Doesn´t look like there´s any surf up our way any time soon. Sucks to not even have knee-high surf to look forward to. Besides that I have to go work in Stockholm for a few days. Am gonna pop by the NORD guys and pick up my new 6´3, I guess that´s something though.

Here´s a link to a pretty fun pass time game: http://www.miniclip.com/games/surfs-up/en/

I´ll post a couple of photos from the nineties when me and some other dudes started surfing in Sundsvall. Note my wetsuits.. We had 4/3 fullsuits with 3/2 suits on top. Hehehe, a whole lota neoprene..

Updated report

Ratman updated the report from last time, read it here: http://200kmfromtheocean.blogspot.com/2007/05/report-from-yesterdays-surf.html

Who the hell are you?

(Johan) If you read this blog and aren´t either me, Ratman, Frexi or Jay, then who the hell are ya?

Leave your name, location and reason for being here in the comment field!

Peace!

Vacation BOOKED!

(Johan) I got a real nice deal on an apartment in this house, right on the beach in Anglet! I´ve got a 30 sec stroll to spots like VVF, Le club and Sable d´or!

I only pay 289 Euro for a week, which is hysteriously cheap... Now all I gotta do is find an apartment for week 2, it´ll be twice as expensive, but it´ll be worth it!

Click this link if ya wanna see what the surf is like right now! http://www.viewsurf-attitude.com/video.php?id=338&type=1

Allez les bleues!

Congrats to Jay!

He and Britta has had a baby daughter! Congratulations man! This means you´re gonna get some surf soon!

Report from yesterdays surf

(Johan)Yesterday we were expecting a 3-4 metre swell. Ratman picked me up at 11.50 and we headed for the surf. When we got there we hooked up with Frexi, who was going to have his first surf since december.


(Ratman)When we got there it was onshore, as expected. We figured that the swell was on it's way and after a while of watching and waiting for bigger sets, we decided that we may as well paddle out..The waves got bigger but not as big as we had been led to believe from the weather sights...




It was pretty crappy, onshore and bumpy but there were some 4ft sets every now and then and we had a 5½ hour session. Good fun! (Oh yeah, have you noticed that you can click on the picks and they get bigger!!!)




For the first time we saw other surfers..!!! After about ½ an hour we saw someone in a wetty walking down the rocks..I was surprised having never seen another soul around when we surf!
After the surfer paddled out it turned out to be a girl!! Julia from Alnön..We had a good laugh with her..she was cool..then 3 MORE people turned up!!!



It was about 9 degs in the water and with my 6/5/4 wetty,7mm boots and gloves I was roasting like a stuffed chook on the barbie, so I surfed mostly without the hood but if a set came and you were forced to duckdive more than 2-3 waves then it was a good idea to rip the hood on quickly! 3 younger fellas paddled out without hoods and I think 4/3 or 3/2 wetties on...they paddled out..and one guy said..it's not as cold as I thought it would be..then a set came and 5 minutes later they were gone!!! HAHAHAHA

Even though it wasn't as clean as we have been spoilt with over the last few surfs it was fun and we all surfed until our arms couldn't take any more..(the old spagetti arm syndrome)

Doesn't look like any swell the next few days but Norway's goin' off..maybe a quick trip over there might wet the appetite a little!!

Peace for now.RAT,JOHAN,FREXI and JAY

Report from the skate session

(Johan) Damn it was fun! Me, Rob, Flatback and Camping went on a small skateboard road trip. We drove to Aspås, since we wanted to see if the rumour was true. It was! There really was a vert there! The down side was that it was wet, so the skating was kinda sketchy, but fun. I slammed and hurt my shoulder though, hope it´s alright tomorrow, since we´re gonna surf.

Be back with pictures, my bad ass photographer buddy took some with his 60K camera, and he has to reformat the pictures before he mails them to me.

After Aspås we went to a new mini ramp at Ica Kvantum. It was really good fun, especially since flatback hadn´t skated ramp in like 10 years, and SLAMMED hard when he dropped in. (hehehe, there´s no doubt there´s a special thing about watching a 200 cm/105 kg guy in baggy pants slamming the flat in a ramp that is barely 1.5 meters high..)

(Ratman) Anyway, tomorrow there´s gonna be surf, and it´s gonna be BIIIIIG. We are expecting a four metre swell and it's gonna be on for young and old..(old being RATMAN.hahaha) .We haven´t had such a solid forecast since last autumn..We're gonna meet up with Frexi. Then there'll be three in the line-up..bloody crowds..We'll have to drop in on each other just to make it feel like a normal surf!! hahaha..Have to surf shitpoles tomorrow. It will be CRANKIN'..Barrels for sure..

Jay can't come yet 'cause he's STILL waiting for the missus to give birth!!! It's 14 days overdue now and he's gonna miss the biggest day this year..poor Jay..such is life..there'll be more..

Well..we'll report after the BIIIIIG DAY tomorrow with pics and the juicy details..Peace from the Midnight Runners..

Old man skateboarding

hahaha, damn this is gonna be fun! Rob, Essa, possibly Rat and me are gonna go skate ramps! There´s a rumour that there might be a vert ramp with transition in Aspås, so we might check it out. Be back with picturezzz. STOKED!!!

Hahaha, we found gold again...

070514 (Johan & Ratman) Hahaha, Jay STILL hasn´t become a dad.. Ratman and I left Östersund at 16.30 in the arvo, we had a pretty strong hunch that there´d be a swell coming sometime in the evening somewhere between 5-10pm from the info we'd gathered from the weather sights and we were hoping to get some more waves. Ratman had bought two new boards, a 6´0 Walden retro fish, and a 9' Bonga Perkins mal.

When we got to the spot, (we found a new route that cut off 20 minutes on the trip), the ocean was yet again flatter than flat can be.. We stood there watching for 20 minutes, and didn't see a set over knee high! It didn't look good...

We figured that since we´d gone all the way there, we might as well get wet. Maybe catch a small one with the mals, or paddle out to a secret spot we named Shitpoles to check out the bottom.
Then it happened again.. I swear the second we hit the water, the waves just started getting bigger, and bigger and BIGGER.. We had a few with the mals at the point, then went in to the shore, switched to the fishes and paddled out at another spot, a wave with a decent left& right.

We surfed for like 2,5 hours, and got so damn hot in our wetties that we had to take the hoods off. (The water was like 8 or 9 degrees, and compared to 5, thats warm..)

The surf was really really good..completely glassy with 4ft waves and 5ft sets and, of course, as usual..... no-one else out, just the 2 of us again..It's a tough life up here, so crowded..hahahaha

We had a really great surf and got out of the water at about 22.15pm. We changed and the minute we sat down in the car, it started pissing down raining! hahaha, classic! Talk about perfect timing again...

It might sound a little like we're just bullshitting to make the story(ies) sound good but it's all true..We promise if we get shit surf that we will write it as it was/is.!!!!!!

Then we drove past Stugun to say hi to Jay, since he was working night shift. As we pulled the car over, he stood there with 2 fresh cups of coffee! Classic again! Thanks so much for the coffee buddy, it was really appreciated! We got back to Östersund at around 01.20. Another super trip!

Sorry for the lack of photos, the batteries in my camera died after one picture.. Peace!

Small but clean ones..

070507 (Johan & Ratman) The swell came again. We drove to sundsvall after work, and surfed chest high glassy waves in the sunset.. Super surf, few photos. Jay couldn´t come this time either, since he´s gonna be a dad REAAAAL soon.

Midnight runners find gold from heaven

(Johan & Ratman, 070430) We had checked the swell and wind charts at least 30 times and saw that, FINALLY, there would be swell up our way, good swell! But we only had a really small swell window to try and nail, somewhere between 3.00 and 9.00 am. Besides that, it was Valborg, which is kind of a big deal when you´ve got toddlers. Ratman had an exam, and Johan had a 7-year anniversary with the girlfriend. Hence we had little or poor chances to even try to get away.

At 23.14, after a movie and a quickie to the pub with my girlfriend I called Ratman. He sounded sceptical to the fact that we could make a 400 km round trip just to MAYBE score knee high surf. To tell ya the truth I wasn’t all that stoked my self.
Anyways, after a couple of minutes of hesitation we decided it was worth the chance. But then we had to leave NOW. Ratman packed up his car with boards, food and coffee and the most essential ingredient of any night mission, BEER.
He came and got me and at 00.45 we left Östersund. The idea was that we´d drive down, get to the spot at 3am, sleep a little and then hit the surf at sunrise. After a two and half hour drive we got to Sundsvall. It was pitch black outside. The sea was completely flat and glassy when we got our first glimpse, and we started to get really, really depressed.. A road trip is always fun, but not in the middle of the night, when all you wanna do is surf… We continued out towards the open sea and finally arrived. We got out of the car, ran over the cliffs and there was actually swell, but about knee high, with an irritating onshore breeze that chopped up the surf.


- O well, whatever.. we thought and drove to another spot to park the car, drink some beer and sleep for an hour. When we got to the other spot the disappointment continued. Knee high, onshore and pretty much uninspiring.
So, we popped open a beer and soaked a little. All of a sudden we had to make a choice! Do we sleep for an hour and risk the knee highs to get ankle high? Or do we suit up and paddle out in the crappy surf? We decided to solve the problem with a quick game of scissors,paper,rock. If Ratman won we´d paddle out in the crap, and if I won we´d sleep for a while and see what happened. Ratmans paper beat my rock, so we suited up.

To get naked in when it´s 2 degrees out, is rarely an inspiring thing to do, and less so when the waves are crap. When we stood there outside the car, we suddenly realized that the onshore wind had stopped. All of a sudden knee high surf felt like a really good idea, and the disappointment turned into STOKE!
We brought our malibus and skipped down the beach. At 4.52am, the second our boards hit the water the wind picked up again, but this time it was a light OFFSHORE breeze! We looked at each other and couldn´t stop smiling. We were in the line-up, all alone and we had offshore winds! Nothing could be better, right? WRONG..







All of a sudden a head high set pounded in, and screaming we paddled for the waves. God is good! Our knee high onshore slop had turned in to head high, slightly golden glassy offshore spraying walls! Nothing could get better now right?





Damn sure it could!!! All of a sudden, in 5 degree water at 05.12 in the morning in Norrland, the waves started TUBING!! I surfed the mal in to the beach and ran to the car to get my fish.. I got slotted again, and again, and again! Ratman, who must have had struck of genius, surfed in to land and started taking some pictures. He stood there hooting like a madman with stoke!





















He got his newly bought 1975 Hot Buttered Terry Fitzgerald and paddled out and started RIPPING! The waves got even bigger for about an hour up around double overhead takeoffs and there was some solid sets coming in.. Unfortunately we didn't get any photos of the sets because we were in the water surfing them, hahaha!




After 3 hours of SUPERSURF with a Norrland tube record, we got out of the ocean, happy and surfed out. What do ya think happened then? Well, the swell dropped back to knee high and the wind switched back to onshore…
We had counted on the swell window coming... but to have the luck that EXACTLY the moment we paddled out the wind would swing offshore, the swell would more than double in size and start tubing and then swing onshore and drop back to shitty slop again EXACTLY the moment we got out was too freaky to be true. Even luckier... imagine what would have happened if the paper scissors game had gone a different way and we had folded our seats back and gone to sleep and missed the whole fucken lot!!!??
We grinned like madmen and got in the car to drive back to Östersund, and our duties as fathers (play with firecrackers, light fires with gasoline and other responsible stuff) The trip was indeed one to remember, and a fantastic start of Valborg. The rest of the day was a haze of offshore wind and golden tubes on a completely empty line-up AGAIN... rolling around in the minds of 2 surfed out lads after having been awake for 36 hours in a row.

First surf of 2007

After a completely landlocked winter, with the ocean covered with ice, the swell finally came. I (Johan) went by myself, since Ratman had to work, and Jay´s gonna have a baby soon.

The surf was pretty small with onshore winds, but I was so stoked to get out anyway.

I had just gotten my brand new board, a Lost... fish, 5´10 x 20 x 2,25 and was really keen to try it out. The waves were shoulder to head high and the water was 3 degrees Celsius..

I had a cosy little 2.5 hour session and then drove back to IKEA, where I had left my girl and our son.

This is a picture of me and my board pre-surf..

Here we go!

This blog´ll cover all the surf trips we make, and some of the other fun stuff we do. It´ll be updated every now and then, so stay tuned. Peace

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