River Surfing

Aloha Tribe,

The last few days, I've been training in the river near my home. The water is snow fed, and as such, is about 36 degrees F. It's been a touch on the cool side with my 4/3 wetsuit, but you know, the coolness has felt really nice. 

What I've been focusing on mainly is my paddling. I'm really finding paddling fun, it's so in-the-moment. Today was interesting. There I was, paddling away, when something ran into me. First thought, of course, is shark, which, immediately made me giggle out loud since I was in a fresh water river. How silly can a girl be, goodness!!! Of course, I knew instantly it was a salmon. how big, I don't really know, but good enough size to have a pretty sturdy and startling hit when it collided with me.

It was a lot of fun to experiment with different paddling strokes and fighting the strong,  flood stage river made paddling a true challenge to simply stay in place. I just love workouts like that.

Last weekend I went to Westport to do some surfing and I  had a beautiful time. The waves were perhaps double overhead or so. It was a solid offshore breeze, helping some of them lift and peel beautifully. Just seeing them made my heart race. In fact, reflecting on the rides of some of my friends still makes me smile. I so love watching others catch awesome rides. To me, that's what surfing is all about, sharing the feeling of joy with all around you, not merely for your own rides, but more so, for theirs too. There was one guy out there, my gosh, a god. He had it so wired, he was just utterly on fire in a calm, peaceful, perfect, relaxed sort of paradoxical way. Nobody the whole weekend could touch this guy had he been around earlier. He came out when everybody had left, as darkness began settling. His surfing was so beautiful. It sends shivers through me just thinking about it.

I'll work the river a bit this week, trying for at least two sessions a day, preferably three if I can. My inspiration will be that lone surfing god.

Along the training note, I've been swimming a lot with fins lately to build my legs and buns. Now that's something that really kicks a girl's ass. I truly love rough ocean swimming with fins, I find it challenging and exciting and a great way to build power for surfing.  Interestingly enough, the stronger one becomes, the more one can relax. A funny paradox, perhaps, but that's at least how I see it.

I hope to hit the river again this afternoon once I finish the dishes. It'll be dark soon but I should have a good hour to hour and a half if I'm lucky.

This coming weekend I'll be heading to Whidbey Island. I have some interesting soft balance training I want to try on my board. It'll be a great weekend and I can so hardly wait to go.

Bodaciously Stoked,

Lily of the Valley