Glide!

As surfers, as Co-Waterpersons of the Year in waiting, we know how important the ocean’s waves are to our overall way of life. Without them we’d be but clanging gongs. But YouTube sensation Ben Gravies sliding down funny little boat wakes and storm gutters and whatnots having the absolute times of our lives but… not really surfing.

Oh, I take absolutely nothing away from Ben Gravy, he is our world’s happy smile, but… the ocean’s waves are why most of us do what we do. Why we wake up early, get cold on purpose etc.

Thankfully, there is a way to honor the waves that mean something… more. Waves that have imprinted themselves, indelibly, on our psyches.

In 2009, “Save The Waves Coalition, along with key partners National Surfing Reserves (NSR) Australia and the International Surfing Association (ISA), launched World Surfing Reserves. The program serves as a global model for preserving wave breaks and their surrounding areas by recognizing and protecting the key environmental, cultural, economic and community attributes of surfing areas.”

Very fine.

It is a lengthy process to have a wave, or region I suppose, declared a World Surf Reserve. Applications and voting etc. but yesterday Noosa there on Australia’s Sunshine Coast joined the ranks of Malibu, Ericeria, Manly Beach, Santa Cruz, Huanchaco, Bahia de Todos Santos, Australia’s Gold Coast, Punta de Lobos and Guarda do Embaú to become the tenth World Surfing Reserve.

“Noosa has always been leading the way on how to protect surf ecosystems and critical coastal habitats proactively and simultaneously benefit local people and the economy,” said Nik Strong-Cvetich, executive director of Save The Waves.

Layne Beachley and Noosa’s mayor were on hand to celebrate the declaration, the day, and bravo Noosa.

Now, are there any places we should push as a World Surfing Reserve/

What about where World Surf League CEO and Lord Commander over The Wall of Positive Noise Erik Logan cut his supping teeth?

Manhattan Beach, California.

Can we all get behind this?

Yes?

Or Surf Ranch, Lemoore?

Very creepy.

As if Florida waters didn’t have enough worries, enough troubles and travails already. There are: Sharks, crocodiles, snowbirds, locals, NASCAR enthusiasts just to name but a few and now we can add a voodoo doll made with human teeth and skin floating somewhere off the coast, waiting for a surfer to pluck it out and curse our kind forever.

The doll was found on Cape Canaveral, very near Kelly Slater’s hometown of Cocoa Beach, by a man named Bruce Robertson as he was walking on the beach.

“What was really sort of terrifying or horrifying or interesting was it had actual human teeth,” he told Orlando’s local news.

He then tossed it back in the ocean because other beachgoers told him it was a voodoo doll and it should be destroyed and/or found by a surfer in order to curse our damned kind. That’s what I would have told him, anyhow, had I been beach walking too.

He took some pictures before setting it free and, later, after doing some internet research decided it was not, in fact, a voodoo doll but the African spider god Anansi used for good luck.

Orlando’s local news took the photos to an African bookstore owner in Kelly Slater’s Cocoa named Michelle Davis.

“This right here is creepy,” Davis said pointing to the human teeth.

She also believed the doll had human skin on it.

Davis thought it could have all been part of a voodoo ritual.

She said people still believe in voodoo.

“They do it here in Cocoa,” Davis said. “They do it all over in Florida, Louisiana, New Orleans. Voodoo is real,” she said.

Because the doll is back in the ocean, Robertson is advising the next person who may find it to not be afraid.　

“If anybody else finds it, it is not a voodoo doll. It’s really a good luck doll from Africa,” he said.

Yeah. A “good luck doll.”

Remember when Greg Brady, set to win a professional surfing championship, found a “good luck” tiki doll in Hawaii?

Exactly.

Surfers beware.

Not the nose as previously reported.

Boxing is a funny thing. In the moment, passions run so hot, fevers so high, that it is difficult to accurately assess where every punch lands. The nose and the eye are mere centimeters apart and so please forgive this morning’s report when it was revealed that a New Zealand surfer, likely inspired by Wilder vs. Fury II*, punched a shark in the nose.

As it turns out, and thanks to very fine reporting by New Zealand’s own Riley Elliott, that the surfer, 60-year-old Nick Minogue (possible relation to Kylie) punched a shark, a 9 foot Great White no less, in the eye.

And let us go straight to his Instagram account for the very latest.

https://www.instagram.com/p/B84fEkwnRVf/

When a shark attack happens on your local surf beach, and it’s likely a Great White, of which generally aren’t common in this area, it’s a surreal feeling. I spoke in length with Nick, the man who experienced this, straight after it happened, to try and get the fine details among the obvious shock and trauma experienced. The fine details help piece together what the shark likely was and how it behaved. From his description to me, which is well versed in the article from the paper, it appears to be a 2-3m great white shark.

The key points that led me to this was firstly, bronze whalers, our most common coastal species in this area, swim around us a lot when we surf here. They are very smart about knowing what we are, so it would be highly surprising to have one follow through simple interest and curiosity with a full scale nibble. It would generally be more of a bump, and generally only if you have fish on you. The main point that eliminated my thoughts on a bronze whaler was Nicks detailed description of the eye, specifically how big it was. He said it was 2/3rds the size of a fist.

Bronze whalers have small squinty eyes compared to a mako or white sharks, which have large eyes. To eliminate a mako, it is firstly odd to have one of this approximated 2-3m size, this close inshore. The colour Nick described, as grey also made a mako more unlikely, and a white the probable species. NZ is a global hotspot for great whites but generally the south islands lower half where seals live.

However our northern estuaries are nursery grounds for baby whites and when they get above 2.5m they change their diet to seals and move down the coast. This sets a scene which is explanatory for such an encounter. Yes it’s rare and unlikely, but the scenario for what was an investigatory bite by a juvenile shark, makes sense. Thank you Nick for being calm and cool.

For not letting it deter you from a sport you love, and for understanding that sharks don’t have hands and sometimes have to nibble. I’m just stoked you got your arm out of the way. Well done mate. Thanks to the lifeguards for, as always, doing a great job. I’m down in Tairua tomorrow if anyone needs any information.

Now that’s surf journalism.

More as the story develops.

*In absolute stunner, The Gypsy King wins!