Surf's Up Dudeee!

A few weeks ago I was browsing around, looking for fun weekend getaways. I found a place in County Sligo called SurfNStay – a hostel right on the beach that offers surf lessons. I immediately booked a weekend for October, completely disregarding what the temperature would be around that time. Lorraine was heading up to Donegal for the weekend so she dropped me off at the hostel on the way. Even though I’m getting used to going places alone, showing up solo in a completely new town is always nerve racking (in a good way). You never know what to expect or what kind of people you’re going to meet. It is a true adrenaline rush. This weekend I met some absolutely amazing people.

Meet Linda – 27 year-old originally from Southampton, UK. Just in the past couple years she has lived in Vancouver, worked at a ski resort, lived in Toronto, traveled around the US, mountain climbed for weeks in Spain, lived in a Caravan and worked at a music festival in Scotland as a champagne server. She is currently cycling around Ireland. She wanted to learn how to surf so she showed up at the hostel one day, got to know the owner & was offered free surfing and accommodation in return for working at the hostel. Her story was so inspiring to me. In fact, in November her and a couple of friends are caravanning from Wales to Greece where they’ll be picking olives for 10 days and she invited me! I haven’t ruled it out yet =) After asking a thousand questions, I finally said, “How do you do it? How do you afford this type of lifestyle?” Her answer actually came from an old Zen saying – “Take the leap and the net will appear.” AS IF her entire life wasn’t an inspiration enough, she had to answer my simple question with such a great philosophy! It did really get me thinking though. I’m only 24 and I hope to have a lot of life ahead of me but this short statement made me realize how much time I spend calculating my future decisions and worrying about all the possible outcomes. If you really think about it, have you ever found yourself in a position that had absolutely no solution? Things always work out. Maybe not the way we want, but somehow life has a way of making sure everything works itself out. I can honestly say this conversation definitely changed my perspective.

Meet Anthony – 40 year-old from Melbourne, Australia. He is currently on a one year sabbatical. He spent 3 months traveling around in South America, flew into Florida, drove to New Orleans, flew to San Diego, drove to San Francisco and then drove to New York. He is spending some time in Ireland & then finishing his year traveling around northern Europe. Oh, and on top of this he has been to pretty much every single country in the entire world! Another true inspiration.

Okay, now we can talk surf. The conditions weren’t good enough for surfing at the beach close to the hostel so we hopped in the instructors van and headed to a different beach. After a 40 minute drive, we arrived at a pretty empty beach with big enough waves to surf. I’m naturally a cold person. I am ALWAYS cold. Kelsey used to get mad at me when I would turn the heat on in April. When the average person is sweltering hot, I’m comfortable. It was about 45 degrees at this point and I was already freezing! I got into the back of the van to get changed into my wetsuit (a weird experience in itself) & hopped onto the board to learn the basics. We headed for the water and I plunged myself in. Seeing a wave come at you is scarier than you would think. Getting up on a surf board is also much more difficult than it looks! I did get up a few times. I also crash landed into a pile of rocks a few times too… No pain no gain, right? In order to get yourself up on the board you have to use your hands. When it got to the point that my hands were so numb that I couldn’t use them anymore, I decided it was time to get out of the water.

The remainder of the weekend I spent trying to recover from hypothermia at the pub with my new surf pals. We also explored a little bit and found these huge sand dunes next to the beach. 

My weekend concluded on Sunday with a coffee and a beautiful stroll down the beach.

The family that I was supposed to stay with in Cork for two weeks never got back to me so I am taking advantage of my extra time and traveling! One of my good friends from home spontaneously bought a flight to Ireland so I will be meeting her in Dublin on Saturday! From there we will be taking days trips to different places and coming back to Mayo for a couple of days as well. Very excited to see a familiar face =)