Marco points out to our right, sighs and - with a sad voice - says: “my favourite wave used to break right there”.
Marco (his real name is Made) is a Balinese surfer from Tuban, near Kuta, who makes a living by taking surfers on a boat out to the outside reefs by the airport. But the wave he is talking about is not one of those legendary coral reef breaks where hordes of surfers have had their first surf in Bali for years. It is (or rather “was”) a small fast peeling sand bottom shore break wave that would only happen for a couple of hours at certain tides. Only the local kids and the boat drivers used to surf that wave on their old beaten boards, normally in between trips to the outside reefs, displaying a performance level and style that many of us will spend our whole lives trying to match. Now, where that wave used to break there is a brand new T-shaped rocky pier, one of many along this stretch of coast. Their purpose is to keep the sand of the brand new man made beach - that runs the length of several kilometres in front of fancy hotels and resorts- in place.
Many of you will wonder what this has got to do with wave pools and with Tenerife’s Siam Park. For plenty of surfers (me included) one of the most appealing things in surfing is to found ourselves immersed in nature: the light, the colours, the textures that the breeze draws on the wave’s surface, playing with our own shadows on the sand bottom… or the opportunity to spot some wildlife. For many of us surfing is more than just a quest for adrenalin; depending on our mood we might even prefer a surf in crap waves, but in a breathtaking scenery, than one in perfect waves in a grey and dirty industrial area.
The human being has not quite gathered –yet …and let’s hope it never does- enough scientific knowledge to duplicate nature’s features at its own will. To this day several wave pools have tried to bring a solution to the ever growing problem of overcrowding and/or the lack of surfing conditions… only to fail. Some have shut down and disappeared altogether, and some reconverted themselves into mere wave pools for bathers. In some cases the lack of business has been the cause, like Myazaki’s Ocean Dome, which produced the best man-made waves by far. To try to duplicate the perfection and randomness of a natural wave in a chlorine pit – albeit with an intense turquoise-painted bottom- is something we haven’t quite managed to learn. To do it somewhere like Tenerife, an island blessed with high quality breaks but where several of those waves disappeared not too long ago and some more are endangered because of human development, is an insult to our collective memory. If we accept wave pools as a valid alternative –especially in those places where real surf spots are in danger of disappearing – they might be offered to us in exchange for taking away a natural surf spot. We shouldn’t be taking this risk, especially when the whole world is trying to clean its energy production and, no matter what, no wave pool engine will ever be as clean as the winds that create the swells we hope to ride in the ocean. Let’s just hope that we shall never be Marco and point at a pier to say “this is where the best right hander I have ever surfed used to break” while walking to the nearest wave pool.
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A new 3sesenta has come out (issue #131, check the cover on the right hand side column) and it features this short text (above) in which I express my views regarding wave pools. In this same issue there is a large feature on the brand new Siam Park wave pool located in Southern Tenerife; hence my rant.
I’m off to Southern Portugal for a couple of weeks …or three, but I shall be updating the blog regularly. Cheers.
Marco (his real name is Made) is a Balinese surfer from Tuban, near Kuta, who makes a living by taking surfers on a boat out to the outside reefs by the airport. But the wave he is talking about is not one of those legendary coral reef breaks where hordes of surfers have had their first surf in Bali for years. It is (or rather “was”) a small fast peeling sand bottom shore break wave that would only happen for a couple of hours at certain tides. Only the local kids and the boat drivers used to surf that wave on their old beaten boards, normally in between trips to the outside reefs, displaying a performance level and style that many of us will spend our whole lives trying to match. Now, where that wave used to break there is a brand new T-shaped rocky pier, one of many along this stretch of coast. Their purpose is to keep the sand of the brand new man made beach - that runs the length of several kilometres in front of fancy hotels and resorts- in place.
Many of you will wonder what this has got to do with wave pools and with Tenerife’s Siam Park. For plenty of surfers (me included) one of the most appealing things in surfing is to found ourselves immersed in nature: the light, the colours, the textures that the breeze draws on the wave’s surface, playing with our own shadows on the sand bottom… or the opportunity to spot some wildlife. For many of us surfing is more than just a quest for adrenalin; depending on our mood we might even prefer a surf in crap waves, but in a breathtaking scenery, than one in perfect waves in a grey and dirty industrial area.
The human being has not quite gathered –yet …and let’s hope it never does- enough scientific knowledge to duplicate nature’s features at its own will. To this day several wave pools have tried to bring a solution to the ever growing problem of overcrowding and/or the lack of surfing conditions… only to fail. Some have shut down and disappeared altogether, and some reconverted themselves into mere wave pools for bathers. In some cases the lack of business has been the cause, like Myazaki’s Ocean Dome, which produced the best man-made waves by far. To try to duplicate the perfection and randomness of a natural wave in a chlorine pit – albeit with an intense turquoise-painted bottom- is something we haven’t quite managed to learn. To do it somewhere like Tenerife, an island blessed with high quality breaks but where several of those waves disappeared not too long ago and some more are endangered because of human development, is an insult to our collective memory. If we accept wave pools as a valid alternative –especially in those places where real surf spots are in danger of disappearing – they might be offered to us in exchange for taking away a natural surf spot. We shouldn’t be taking this risk, especially when the whole world is trying to clean its energy production and, no matter what, no wave pool engine will ever be as clean as the winds that create the swells we hope to ride in the ocean. Let’s just hope that we shall never be Marco and point at a pier to say “this is where the best right hander I have ever surfed used to break” while walking to the nearest wave pool.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A new 3sesenta has come out (issue #131, check the cover on the right hand side column) and it features this short text (above) in which I express my views regarding wave pools. In this same issue there is a large feature on the brand new Siam Park wave pool located in Southern Tenerife; hence my rant.
I’m off to Southern Portugal for a couple of weeks …or three, but I shall be updating the blog regularly. Cheers.
2 comments:
You are a seriously impressive guy Niega... you write better in English than most people I know ... and amen to the wave pool thing. Never got the logic.
I've surfed that little wave in Indo. If I'm right it used to be the shorey of Kuta reef, kinda, only on the right swell and tide it was a lovely little zipper. This was back in '80 mind you.
Cheers mate
Mick
Thanks Mick. It helps being married to a lovely Scots lady.
Spot on with the little right by the boats... it is no longer there. RIP.
Cheers,
Niegà
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