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A Brush with Death and a God

by Old_Rock_Guy_in_NH, as originally published on NYNJSurf.com, April 24, 2006

OK, here is the deal. It is actually so well etched in my mind I only needed to think about (and feel) the day and it all started filling in pretty well. So sit back brothers and sisters we are going surf tripping to SoCal…

This was back around 1986 to 88 in either January or February. It had been a real wet and cold winter for Southern California, raining a lot. Mudslides and chaos everywhere, and with lots of big Northwest swells, one right after the other. This next one was different though; this was going to be a mega-swell. This was a giant storm system that covered the entire northeast Pacific Ocean. Predictions were off the charts. Buoys were 20’+ on Friday night and folks were scrambling. My friends and me had surfed at home in El Porto for the last few swells, but those had been lonely, sketchy sessions, especially for the two girls, Deb and Shirley. They were both very core and beyond expert skiers, tough as nails, but giant winter swells were past their comfort zone as far as surfing went. And the way the sand bars were torn up at home they were getting past mine too.

El Porto thumps normally, never mind at triple overhead. Plus my other buddies Jose, Richard, and Javier were starting to show mental signs of wear and tear from having to paddle out into constant 10-15 foot brick walls. I had to try and remember that my East coast insecurity/thirst/wave fever complex sometimes made me the odd man out in SoCal. Yeah, I guess a road trip to some mid-sized, under control fun would be a good call. Why not? It’ll still be good, just smaller. So we huddle the night before at my house and run down the choices. Go North to a point, or go south to somewhere slightly out of the max window? North points will be everyone’s call, and it’s Saturday, so the crowd factor could be a big factor too. Since the girls had been pushing it hard we decided to take a safe call and head down to Old Man’s figuring it is always a harmless ticket, even at double overhead it’s a soft-ish, kinda wave the won’t kill you and can hold any sized swell. And we could always walk over to Church if that was working. Plus I could break out my 6’4” love of my life board, which had not gotten wet in over a month. Cool, we’ll meet at 4am and we’ll just have fun!

Next morning, icy cold, pitch black and still as glass. My house was a mile from the beach, up on a hill in El Segundo and when the surf was really big, you could hear a slight rumble. That morning, standing in the street and loading up it sounded like we were standing 10 foot from the waters edge. You could hear the snap and crush of every wave. We were just staring at each other thinking, Holy sh*t, it’s HUGE. I immediately started having second thoughts. We could surf here, alone. What if it’s flat down south, what if, what if?? I could tell by the resounding silence that I was locked into the south trip. Oh well, come on 6’4” lets go play somewhere else. We’ll burn a few bones and just have a kicked back session.

The ride down was pretty quiet. I just sat way in the back listening to my favorite Dead tape and replaying one of the greatest Bertha into Fire on the Mountain jams, over and over, thinking about what we were driving away from. Dam. That rumble was downright scary. Maybe Hammerland was holding it?

So we pulled up to the gate at the State Park and got into an already long line, in the still pitch-blackness. We had a good 15 minute wait until 6 when they open the gate at San Onofre, so Shirley kills the engine and we get out to stretch. Listen, holy f*ck, there’s that sound again. We run over to the cliff area and you can feel the ground at the top of the 100’ cliffs shaking with every wave. It’s just pure thunder cracking. Oh my god. My heartbeat cranks immediately right up to maxi with wings. Vrmmmm. And the very first thought in my head? 6’4”, pure freakin genius I am! F*ck!!

Ok coffee gets sucked down, pisses get taken, boards waxed and rewaxed, we finally get in and snake down the road to S.O. Now if you have never been, the great thing at Old Man’s is you park right there on the beach, in dirt lots and just hang out of your car all day. So we pull up to the north end by the fence so we can see Church as it gets light. Plus that is usually were the corner is and its ALWAYS a dry hair paddle out from there. Get out to look into the first peek of light and all you can see is whitewater. Constant, from S.O. all the way across the bay, about a mile that is usually flat, to Church. Immediately it becomes apparent that this ain’t no safety session. This is serious. Normally it’s a good ¼ to ½ mile paddle outside at Old Man’s. Today was a serious mile and even that may have been conservative. Now the lots are filled, but there is not a lot of talking, just a little nervous banter once in a while. No one was ready for this. I start timing the 6 foot shore pound in the bay, just to see if it’s possible to get out there and go around. Slowly people start to try and get out in front and the results are not looking good. A few folks get lucky and make it through the inside pound and then get swept into the bay where you can head out. OK there’s hope here. I decide to head to the porta-potty and get ready for what could be a long paddle. The others are wavering on chancing it or just watch for a while and let me be the guinea pig. Fine, I can play that role. I am a not fully packed up top at times, so my judgment regarding surfing safety can be called into question at moments like this. OK 6’4” it’s you and me old girl.

Rather than the bay route I go the other way and jump right into the pit by the entrance and hope to get lucky. I must have done something right because just a few hard dives and I was getting ripped right out, with a little pull north, but that was to be expected. Now from this point the only reference I have is the cars and the cliffs, because in front of me is nothing but whitewater and lots of it. Thank goodness for my paddling gloves, and days in the gym, because it was a long hard paddle out there.

Now I finally get around what feels like the corner and I just start stroking as hard as I can to get south. It felt like I went 3 miles out and sideways just to get near where I wanted to be. And at this point, being WAY outside, the cars are tiny on the beach and to say there is a lot of water moving around is a vast understatement. Waves look like cold, black, steel mountains that just keep rising up until they can’t hold their own weight and just heave out into space. Remember I said Old Man’s is mushy? Forget that. This day it looked like a reef break. 15 to 20 foot faces throwing out as far as they were tall. There was absolutely no resemblance to the Old Man’s I knew and the place I was at.

Looking down and outside there are a couple of surfers but no one is riding. I head over and start to try and calm down and scope out a spot to get a shoulder from. Just as I pass over what I think is a wave where I want to be, I see an old gray geezer sitting outside another 40 or 50 yards, on a, get this, a florescent pink longboard. OK, there’s my safety marker. I can use him as a gauge to judge wave height as the pass under him. And as I start to zone in a little to the situation and try and calm down, I suddenly notice that the old guy is looking at the horizon. He starts to paddle even further out. Oh f*ck, is he just crapping himself or is it possible there is a wave out there. As soon as I start to paddle, deciding not to be stupid for a moment, I see what he saw. Now I am not prone to exaggerate about big surf or my own fear. I rarely ever hit that point, but let me just say that once I had fully grasped this situation I think me adrenal gland gave out, because here I was staring up at the biggest wall of water I had ever seen and I had little to no chance of get over it. I will all ways remember that there was a wave in front of it that was a solid 15 foot face and the one behind it DWARFED that one.

Now I have to stop and tell you that as fast as all this is happening, it’s all somehow seemed in frame by frame slo-motion, and still is how I see it all today. It's just like I am still there. My own personal Ground Hog Day.

OK, so, instincts being what they are, they severely kicked in, and I paddled like I have never paddled before, or have since. As fast as my webbed gloves, 6’4” and all the adrenaline my body had propelled me over that first wave. Just in time to see old pink geezer paddling up the face of the wave that is about to kill me. And if he does not start stroking harder he is going to be the object impaled in the lip that is going to impale me. F*CK. Move old man. You stupid son of a bitch, we’re both going to die. SO as I track a little more north hoping beyond hope to bust over the top of this monster outside of the death zone of the pink longboarder, what does this moron do? He wipes his board around!! Holy mother of freaking Jesus, you’re out of your mind grandpa. You’re as good as dead AND you’re going to take me with you. But does reason affect his mind? NO! And to make the cherry on the freakin sunday here what does gramps do on this about to explode, left from hell. He paddles right, jumps to his feet and fades right, straight into the pit. OK ,so you deserve the pummeling and possible death you are due now, pops. I might have given you points just for attempting to take off, but that was absolute, pure stupidity. As I see him drop into this thundering pit from my eagles view, what does this nut case do next? Pretty much the most amazing non-chalant 270 degree, full speed, drawn out, arched back, no-hands bottom turn I have ever seen. All this with an iceberg sized eye wall just clipping his rail, as he redirects, back and straight up the face, directly at me, who is scratching for the top now, as the lip which I had forgotten about is about the unload on my head. “OH, this is like some bizarre, dream, Fellini movie thing going on now. I am just going to have to quit the weed if I ever live through this.” And as I look back down at psycho longboarder, he’s not where I thought he would be, noooo, much worse, he is coming straight up the vertical wall and directly at me. GOD NO! At the last second as I hit the peak flying up, and get ready for impact, geezer goes straight up, puts 9’ of his 10’ board out of the wave above my head and does an off the lip right next to my ear with the grace and style of a cat. Not a move or motion out of place, just like it was 2 foot Trestles. Straight up to right back straight down a pure vertical wall. The most graceful thing I had ever seen, never mind in death defying, mind numbing waves like this. And as I finally get that millisecond to look the old guy in the face, I flash that David Nuuhiwa is looking back at me, right square in the eye and just smiling from a very pure soul, and whoosh he was gone as everything exploded. It was way beyond magical; it very much felt like a moment with a god.

Post note- The ending lacks a little as I was getting tired and I am not that good a writer to begin with. But it is also very hard to explain in words the poise and calm that Nuuhiwa was surfing with in those moments. I have been around the surfing block a few times and seen lots of great surfers, but none were ever near the same "other worldliness" control and cold steel nerve that I saw exhibited in those few seconds. It was if he was in absolute control of the ocean itelf at a moment, when no one was even near their peek level of self- control because of the heavy, heavy situation. It was a pure black and white exhibit of what a "legend" really is compared to the rest of us.

Copyright 2006; Reprinted by permission, all rights reserved by the author.

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written by Zach, December 17, 2007

Great story, man. Just wondering . . . Did you make it over the lip?

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