this year

is different to the last, as it should be...but its been a hard year. Full of challenges. The sea has always been there.

one from a summer i remember fondly

a few of my favorite people

this was the same little group of people that met in an empty camping ground on the beach, prai da guincho - portugal. The surf was wild that day - so beer, wine, barbequed fish and a lunar eclipse filled the day/night - and I met my wife.

So a few years later, the four of us, and a few others, got together in bournville, the birthplace of caburys, and me and the now missus tied the knot.

Good times.

shapes and waves

With Instagram, ive been neglected the blog of late, in fact if shaped another 4 boards since I posted up ed's shred sled - so I thought i should post up a little of the recent work.

Ive refined my log, and have a template now that really works for me, a heavier surfer, with a harder edge in the tail giving it plenty of release, but still holding enough in the face of the wave for noseriding. Here it is mid way...

I kept the deck patches rough, with strands of black pigments 6oz falling on the deck, the like the rough finish, its a little different to the neat cut edges. I put a leggie loop in 6oz glass on this one, as I'm thinking I might sell it one day and someone else might like to use a legrope, and I made the fin from Paulownia - based loosely on the fin I put in Eds stick - i like the way the wider fuller fin feels, forcing you back down the board for nice turns.

All in all, im pretty happy with it, paddles nice too.

Ive also made a shorter board for myself and said goodbye to fast eddie. Its with mixed feelings that I let it go, and im sure i'll regret it one day, but its stayed in the family so to speak, so i know its gone to good home and will get ridden not just gather dust.

In replacment i;ve shaped myself a 7'6", im not sure what, I put a few templates together, played with them, with some ideas I had around tail shaped, and gave myself more edge - lots of width for a board so short, but brought down the volume, and its the best thing ive ever shaped, it really does "paddle like a longboard" every board ive ever bought thats claimed that, never has but this thing, just glides... hardly any rocker - super wide, it flies...

All in all, im pretty stoked with how my shaping and glassing is coming along. I had intended to stop, but Sean (The Brown Shed) sold me half a roll of cloth yesterday, so Im commited to another 100ft of surfboards! - still i need the practice - Seans boards astound me, and his glassing is something I cant ever imagine being able to even come close to.

As for the other interest, ive been snapping a few, but have been enjoying shooting waves that have noone on them, or shorebreaks. heres a couple: