All day on Friday I agonised over whether to join the masses in Gwithian for the BWA competition. The pros - it was looking like epic, mast-high down the line, the cons - 90 quid entry, 8 hours driving, port tack, I should be writing my dissertation, and I'm pretty scared of mast-high Gwithian.
Finally Clyde, my lift since I'm still carless, made the decision for me. He wasn't going but would sail locally. I was happy since the forecast was for at least 20knots southerly. Enough to get out. Possibly even enough for a decent day at Overcombe. Clyde then panicked at the thought of missing out on epic down the line, and went to Gwithian after all.
So on Saturday morning Colin and I went to Overcombe where Rod had given us a wind and wave guarantee. It was flat and barely 7.0 weather. But since it was forecast to increase throughout the day and by 7pm (when it's dark) be 24 knots, we sat and inspected Rod's new board, drank coffee and waited. And waited. And followed the progress of the so called wind on various iphones. And got more and more desperate and depressed. And got that horrible feeling in the pit of your stomach of wasting your precious weekend. And by four oclock we gave up. It was obvious that if the wind did come in, there was no chance of anything more than a freeriding session on flat water. Colin and I decided to bail out and iron some more shirts so we could miss all next week's wind too.
However, we stopped off at a secret spot on the way home just to check it out. I can't say where, only those within the circle of trust are allowed to know. Amazingly there were head high peeling waves and sideshore winds. I rigged up and planed right off the beach, straight into an overhead backloop ramp which I over-rotated horribly and bailed out from really high up. High enough to wonder if this could really be happening before I hit the water. Then just the two of us out spent two hours catching wave after wave after wave and not coming in until it was completely dark.
The best sail of the year? For me easily but it's all about context. Had I not spent those long dark hours on Overcombe beach listening to Rod tell me how good it was yesterday, and wishing I'd man-upped and gone to Gwithian it would have just been a really good sail. But washing away that kind of frustration with smooth full-power bottom turns and smacking all the lips you want is what memorable days are all about.
No pics. Didn't have time. But I wanted to write this before I hear from the Gwithian boys how epic it was down there. So I can remind myself I had a good time too!
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