Welcome to Marton, England.
Captain Cook, as you well know from the historically significant book Welcome to Paradise, Now Go to Hell (buy here), was likely the first European to witness surfing and let us honor the work by reading a passage together.
The history of surfing itself is as shrouded in fog as any ancient art and it certainly was an art as practiced in Hawaii. It involved praying, carving boards from giant koa trees, and showing off for topless babes on the beach. Tongans, Samoans, and Tahitians all take credit for being the first “wave sliders.” It was the Tahitians who were first observed, by a European, riding waves in 1767. Captain Cook and his men witnessed surfing in 1769, also in Tahiti, on their first journey and in Hawaii on this their third.
Well, it turns out that Captain Cook was a beach living man himself, hailing from the small town of Marton which has since been swallowed by the larger Middlesbrough there on jolly England’s north east side. Our J.P. Currie might know of a worse place to surf but I can’t seem to find one. The waves, freezing and toe-high, are unable to push an anorexic VAL on a 12-foot softboard. The sky, perpetually grey but these facts don’t even begin to dent the locals’ passion for the “Pastime of Kings.”
They love it!
And I love the sorts of little BBC interstitial programming that gets shown on long haul flights to London Heathrow.
Let’s watch together and pretend that’s what we’re doing. Flying to London Heathrow together on some fun adventure like… I don’t know to Piccadilly Circus.