It was the biggest I had ever seen on the charts; 40ft+ swells expected on the west coast of the island. It was my last 4 days of Easter break for uni, so I made the call to go two or three days beforehand and we started packing our gear.
On the plane ride over, Baden spotted Migaloo, the only Albino (pure white) Humpback Whale in the world. We knew we were lucky, but we realised just how lucky we were when our pilot said that he had never seen a single thing in his 900 flights above The Straight.
We ended up camping on the beach two of the nights, however we thought we should take cover during the peak of the storm and sorted some accomodation out close to pub in the centre of town.
We had a few smaller surfs Friday arvo and Saturday, but when we arrived at the beach on Sunday morning (the forecasted peak of the swell), we were faced with some of the heaviest 6-10ft beach breaks I have ever seen. Some of the better surfers got some seriously good waves, but my mates and I struggled to cope with the size of the playing field and the sheer magnitude of the heaviest, thickest lipped waves we were amongst and witnessing; Baden hit his head on the bottom (concussing himself in the process) and we all had our fair share of beatings; we didn’t mind as it was pretty amazing to sit and watch from either the water or the safety of dry land.
The weather was changing erratically all trip, from freezing cold and windy, to clear skies and barely a breeze. At one point a storm front pelted down on us with shows of lightning and hail, and completely passed over our heads within a 15-minute window. Most people spotted it coming a mile away but it caught the others off guard; Alex, Baden, Ben, and Dad were still in the water surfing.
Later that night we met a guy at the pub. He was telling us how some poor old guys’ down the beach were lying on their backs on the sand, holding their surfboards to their bodies, as protection from the hail… We found it pretty funny when we replied and told him it was us. Baden’s board clearly hadn’t been big enough to cover his feet, because they started bleeding from the hail.
We were pretty lucky the wind and weather died off over Sunday night because after a glassy surf in the morning it was perfect weather for flying home. I got back for my first Uni class after the Easter break with less than an hour to spare.