Surfing Taylor's Mistake
One of the best things about College House is the common interests amongst the people here. If you’re interested in something then there’s a good chance you’ll find someone else who is as well. When word got round of a sneaky mission to go grab some photos of surfing at sunrise, it was only half an hour before we had a car load of willing participants all fired up and raring to go. Plans were made, forecasts were checked and before long we had made plans to head out to Taylor’s Mistake at 6 am.
Taylor’s Mistake is a 20 minute drive from central Christchurch. Known as Te Onepoto (Short Beach)/Vincent’s Bay originally, it earnt its current English name after a ship ran aground at night when the captain mistook the bay for the Sumner bar. It ranks amongst some of the most popular surfing spots in Christchurch due to its easy access and locality to the city, as well as its reasonable swell in most conditions. It also happens to be a very scenic location, which only helped with taking photos.
It’s sweet to be able to find the people and the time to do cool stuff like this spontaneously. As far as photo trips this certainly won’t be the last one, and with so many high-level sports-people around CH there will be many more photos to come. Before I leave you with the photos, I’d like to thank all the boys for making an effort to wake up to their 5:45am alarms and also for providing action in front of the camera. As well, I’d like to thank Fran for the use of her lens, and donation of her herbal tea to the cause of photo processing and the write-up.
Thanks to my ability to create an alarm but not set it, we arrived a little late for sunrise.
Dan Edwards drops in on the first wave of the day just before 7 am.
The three amigos admire the view as they wait for the next set to roll in.
These eclectic batches are the subject of a fair bit of controversy round the bay. With some of them dating back to the early 1900’s they make for a surreal setting to shoot photos around.
Matt ‘Nuggy’ Nugent drops in on some of the nicest waves Christchurch has to offer.
Given the swell forecast and weather, it was a little surprising that we were the first to arrive, though soon enough others started to follow.
Chas Wakefield took out the unofficial ‘longest ride of the day award’ with a wave that carried him from the back of the break all the way into shore. We were all stoked and it looked like he was as well after fitting several turns in.
Once the boys had had their fun we stayed for a bit longer to check out some of the more skilled surfers on the water. Needless to say this guy was one of the better ones out there.
This guy also seemed to know what he was doing. He was spinning 360’s and cutbacks on just about every wave, and it kept just about everyone beachside entertained.
We left the bay at 9 am just as the surfers started to arrive en masse.
The surf crew ft. Nuggy falling asleep. Cheers for a mean time lads.