“Flattest winter since records began” blamed for mental health epidemic among Australian surfers!

"Surfers whinge if it's not good for three days, let alone a couple of months. This year they had a legitimate reason to complain."

Who don’t go nuts when the strong, well-muscled waves of winter fail to show and surfers are left to fiddle and burn, often more fiddling than  burning? 

Surfers on NSW’s South Coast, a couple hundred mile strip that runs from Wollongong in the north to Eden in the south, are being driven crazy, literally, claims a prominent news source ‘cause there ain’t been no winter swells. 

According to coastal researcher Dr Mitch Harley from the University of NSW, the waves have been “exceedingly flat. Usually, winter waves are about 1.6 metres in height on average,” he told ABC. “They were about 25 per cent lower at 1.3 metres, and we haven’t seen any really large wave events over the entire winter.”

Australian surf champ Matt Hoar told the ABC he’d never seen it this bad. 

“Surfers tend to whinge if it’s not good for three days, let alone a couple of months. This year in particular they had a legitimate reason to complain.”

Bega Valley counsellor Prem Kranti said surfers were hit two-fold, the flat spell and memories of the Black Summer bushfires from a few years back after a few early season fires took hold.

“There are physical, mental, emotional and also spiritual benefits of being in the ocean and out in nature,” she told ABC. “For people on the south coast, the ocean also provides a strong counterpoint to what has been damaged by bushfire.”

Another surfer, Alice Mood, echoed Kranti. 

“You’re hearing on the radio about fires. When you’re in the water you’re forgetting about it, you’re just having a good time so it’s that time out. I was always cranky. I tried other avenues like running, the gym and even gardening, but none of it cuts it.” 

I  presume I’m an oddity when it comes to flat spells. I wake, examine the listless ocean, and am overjoyed I’ve  been gifted another day without the interference of surfing. Free from guilt, I can improve my sauna game (four hits of twenty minutes in a crowded hot box with quick dips in the ocean pool), wrestle without limit, wallow in medieval literature and extend midday naps til dark and so on. 

Where do you fall? A lover of flat spells or does your mind tend to the crazy?