Bowls was pretty good, if you were lucky... and good

A mid-week south swell beckoned, but I was too busy to catch the peak on Thursday. That was when Buddy and Makani surfed separately, scoring good surf, and both seeing sharks during their sessions! Maybe missing the swell peak wasn’t so bad.

Anyway, Buddy and I hit it out early Friday morn, targeting the Ala Moana Park area. Unfortunately, it looked surprisingly small. What the hell?

We decided to check Bowls, before resigning ourselves to another Diamond Head foray. Good thing we did. Bowls looked decent, with an occasional well-overhead set and a smallish crowd (by Bowls standards). We were on it!

Early on, I was fortunate enough to dial into some pretty good lefts on my tank. Just don’t have the skills to pull in going backside, so I wimped out and turned wide around the cascading lip. Still, the waves were shapely and long.

However, the inevitable crowds pushed me into chasing after the inferior (but still damned good) rights. Hey, I’m not going to challenge the likes of Larry Boy Rios.

Buddy was going off, just mixing it up on the inside peak going left. Typical Buddy caught his fair share in the agressive lineup. He caught one exceptionally deep barrel, just driving before finally getting taken out from the inside.

After coming in, I was embarrassed to find Ben Aipa on the beach. The reason I felt bad was because I wasn’t riding his board--it broke back in January--I was on a borrowed stick. Ah, no shame. His board died a noble death; and it’s not like I’m sponsored by him.

Went straight to work with my longboard, a slight tan and a big grin on my face.

Aloha from Paradise,