Two dud weekends

Last weekend was a total wipe out for surfing. While Brian has promised that the winter surfing was the best, it certainly hasn't lived up to his awesome description. The other day he told me that he's never seen it this bad before this year. I'm not sure what to think! I had a few good Galveston surf days during January, but February has been flat. Unfortunately, the weather hasn't been cooperative for cycling either. Cold wind and rain just doesn't make it safe or fun to ride. Last Saturday (2/6), though, I was determined to ride. It was cold, but it was sunny. Rob opted for spin class, but I joined my cycling buddies in the Bike Barn parking lot. Because of the wind direction, we went to the Monument, before crossing the ferry to Baytown and riding back across the Baytown Bridge. I rode with the 21mph+ group and had a fantastic ride. By mistake, I left without any gu or powerbars, but someone took pity on me during the ferry ride and shared his power bar. I got dropped by several while crossing the bridge, but maintained a steady pace. Three of us were able to take a short cut by turning on a feeder rode and joining our group by the railroad tracks before heading to La Porte and Morgan's Point. I ended the ride with 52 miles, and it felt good. Sunday, I opted for the gym as I did today because of the bitter cold.

I spoke with Brian and he said there were some nice, little waves. However, because of the Mardi Gras crowds, he didn't think it would be worthwhile for me to drive down. He said it was crowded on the beach and bitterly cold. A late afternoon note from him said that he decided to surf for a couple of hours, but even he had trouble with crowds on the Seawall (and he only lives a few blocks from the beach). He said only one other surfer was out. I'll be waiting for my Sunday update from him in the morning. Then I'll know if I should head to Galveston, or, once again, to the gym.

Great weekend for all my sports!

Surfing Friday, cycling Saturday and surfing again on Sunday. It just doesn't get much better than that. The weather was absolutely beautiful; with temps in the mid to upper 60s and lots of sunshine. I had some decent waves on Friday and there were quite a few people out, including several short boarders. I try to just stay out of their way. Texas experienced some warm weather for the whole weekend, which made my sports even more pleasant. Don't misunderstand: I still needed my 5-4 wetsuit because the water is so darn chilly; but at least the air temps were in the 60s and low 70s, which made it a lot more pleasant to change out of the wetsuit while standing on the seawall.

Saturday proved to be fantastic on the bike. Many cyclists were out and, because the wind was out of the south, we were able to cycle our summer route to Wee Mart in Liverpool. It was a great ride! I rode with the 21 mph group and got a good workout.

Sunday brought me back to the beach and into what was left of the waves. They were fading fast, but Brian, Bryan and I were able to get some surfing in. I only had a couple of rides, but Brian said I was definitely becoming an intermediate surfer. Not sure if I believe that yet. I still have alot of work to do on catching waves. I seem to miss them. I notice other surfers do the same thing; just not as often. What happens is that I see the wave coming; get into position; start paddling; and then, just as I think the wave is going to catch me, I fizzle out. I'm not sure why. I don't think I'm paddling hard enough, which has now made me decide I need to add some more machine activities into my workouts at the gym. I need more lat strengthening (at least that's what I think the muscles are called behind my shoulder). And, more practice, practice, practice.

Troncones Rocks!

Winter surfing can be the pits, unless you are someplace sunny and warm. To achieve this, I decided to take a winter trip to Mexico; although I originally wanted to go to Puerto Escondido, Mexico, where the surf is incredible. However, my surf buddy, Robin, investigated it and discovered that the waves can be so huge and rough there that surfers' boards can be broken. She suggested somewhere a little more calm, and I had to agree. She found a place named Troncones that had excellent smaller surf. She also explored different inns and found us a quaint little one on the coast called the Inn at Manzanillo Bay. As is the case in any travel to Mexico, travelers have to be a little more careful and things can be slightly more primitive. But, as soon as we arrived we felt we had made the right choice.

Our taxi driver Able drove us the 20-miles to Troncones with a promise to pick us up on Sunday. Although there was surf on the beach of our hotel, it was part of a point break and inexperienced surfers would end up in the rocks that surrounded the beach. We watched a couple of more experienced surfers tackle the break, and it was definitely fun to watch, but we knew our limitations and point breaks were out of our league. We were able to hire a surf guide named Beto (short for Umberto) to drive us to a beach where the sets were more defined and designed for surfers of all levels, including beginners like Robin and me. The drive itself was always an adventure. Beto often had other plans for our drive. We also had to pass through a Federales check point. We made it through two days before we were stopped. Beto said they stopped us because he was driving two blonde Americans; I think it was more random than that since we had driven through without being stopped the previous two days. Beto's lessons were brief and, although we were glad we had him to drive us, his teaching skills probably needed a little more practice. Nevertheless, I really liked him. He let us use a couple of his boards and the board I had was fantastic. It was a 9'6", but was a little narrower than my board. After a couple of falls, I started to really like it, despite it being narrower. Of course, with consistent nice waves/sets, it's hard not to feel comfortable on any board. I had one of the longest rides of my life, as did Robin, catching it midway and riding it all the wave down the wave. Beto wanted us to follow him to the outside (beginning of the wave), but since several other more experienced surfers were out there, neither Robin nor I felt comfortable getting in the mix.

Beto was a jack of all trades. Not only could he teach surfing, he owned a surf board rental shop, served as a caretaker at a house, claimed to have massage-healing hands and also could show us real estate for rent/sale. All in all, though, he took care of us, drove us to the La Saladita beach and rented us good boards. Three cheers for Beto!

As a matter of fact, three cheers for Troncones, Mexico!