May 2006 - the month that was

Early Start

Early (for me) 9am drive around from St Clair, to Blackhead, and back to St Clair again.. searching for some waves, but just snatched a few pics instead. Looked like Green Island was going off too, larger sets every 10 mins with some huge peeling waves.

not much

What to say? not much really, just painting. Surf around dunnos is pretty messy, caught a sunset over St Clair and St Kilda tonight, after I took the shots of St Clair from Seaview Terrace.. so thats it!

Drizzly Dunnos .. time to paint.

A yuk drizzly Dunedin day, a nice preamble for the long, cold, wet winter. Didn't even go near the beach today, but spent time trying to fix my new photo printer and getting stuck into some painting. I have been having a play with some abstract waves this week, I have one listed on trademe at $1 reserve to see how they go. Also I finally finished the "Lawyers Head at Dusk" Diptych.. and got that listed there too. I am also quite rapt that for a wave painting I sold last week on trademe I got a great feedback!!

"Fantastic trader! The wave painting was even better than photo on trademe! Only a fellow surfer (and amazing artist) could paint a wave this well!"

all really encouraging for me, as I was beginning to think nobody wanted to buy my art, let alone love it when they saw it!! signing off with a grin :0)

Blackhead Breaks Hard

Finally got round to loading the pics on from my quick shoot round at Blackhead yesterday, I decided that I would take the rest of the afternoon and whole evening off to just do nothing, unlike the last 3 months I have been working constantly, not taking any time off to do nothing. Anyway, it was around 3pm I got there, a fair swell powering through with some larger 4-5 foot sets, inconsistent peaks.. and a very high tide. so the rocks were covered by surf. Unfortunately it was hard for a few to see rocks submerged, which resulted in a snapped board and one with bent fins both within 2 mins of each other.

:: RETRO :: to Feb 11th 2006

I only started this Blog on the 23rd of February, but proir to that I had my new digital camera November the year before, where I was pretty much out every day or so taking shots, thats why I started this blog, because I didn't want the pics rotting on my hard drive.

So some sik ones from Feb 11th .. All taken around 3-4pm.

Kinky Kilda

I find it so unbelievable but believable that there was only one surfer out at St Kilda this avo, here's some shots of the action he was dished, along with a few breaking behind the pool at St Clair. No post yesterday.. I have been busy painting, just finished a diptych of a dusk scene at Lawyers head, will try and load some photos tomorrow.

.. liquid gold ...

Another dawnie, thats what I love about winter in Dunnos, you don't have to get up too early to catch the dawn light play :0) Just one surfer out at St Clair, basking in some regular clean peaks and the odd barrel.

Who'd have thunk.. barrels at St Clair

Yesterday in the post arrived a parcel from germany, my new EWA Marine rain cape, so I can happily shoot away in the windy-rainy and sand-blasting Dunedin winter conditions without destroying my beloved camera. So to take it for a test run today was purfect, because.. it was raining.. BUT who'd have thunk today that conditions were perfect also at St Clair for some 3foot barrels. Those lucky surfers out there today were having a blast in more ways than one in the wintery conditions at 2pm when I got there.

SUMMARY of the practicality of my new rain cape: 1. It stops the rain getting to my camera and keeps my hands warm.. 2. its like wearing gumboots in bed.. the most horrid difficult thing to operate a camera inside of. I guess I'll get used to it

an extra bite at lunch

Got pulled back to St Clair at lunchtime on the promise from a text that it was going off again.. hmm well 10 mins later it had turned to mush.. but caught a couple of shots in between talking to a few of the locals

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Symphony @ Dawn - St Clair

Bye Sunday morning sleep in, when I saw the sunrise out my kitchen window.. grabbed my gear and took the short skip down to St Clair by 8.30 .. some gorgeous colours and light plays on the water, so I decided to go for the atmosphere shots. herin a handful of the 40 I rattled off there,

and a cherry from St Kilda before I swung home.

OV to St Clair

Got out to Brighton this morning, but nothing to write home about, large sets coming thru but closing out. Ocean View .. nice, a few guys going out, but went back to ST Clair and set up there for a few hours.. not too crowded, a few groms in the shore break, and the rest out back catching a few large sets coming through.