The Sydney Swell Keeps Coming

This photo sums up the conditions on the eastern New South Wales Coast of late.   Crazy, with more on the way this weekend.

Byron

Spent a very relaxing Christmas at Byron Bay.  Here is a picture of Ingunn posing on Christmas morning with the fantastic view from Mt Warning behind her.  It took us about 2 hours to hike to the top of it, and when we eventually arrived, the sun was replaced by huge stormy clouds and pelting rain.  Oh well.  More pictures from Byron Bay can be found Byron Bay 2007.

 

I managed abit of surfing whilst we were there, what a difference good waves and empty beaches can make.  This photos was taken at Surfers Paradise, a day or two before the cyclone hit.

 

Christmas Time Again

I still can't get used to Christmas in the Southern hemishphere.  Plastic Christmas trees all around the city are wilting from the heat, fake snow sprayed on the windows is used to give a good block from the sun, and seeing santa at Bondi beach this morning with board shorts on was hilarious.

So this year Ingunn and I are escaping it all again, and driving up north to Byron Bay for a weeks break.  We're staying in an apartment that is literally spitting distance from the main beach itself and only a few minutes walk fromo the heart of Byron.   Byron Bay is one of my favourite spots in NSW and i reckon this break will be an excellent opportunity to do nothing, surfing, reading, eating, drinking.

Although I'm planning on doing quite alot of surfing in Byron i'm quite wary of all the white pointers that have been spotted in the area.  This one was spotted by a fisherman in Newcastle, and there were some surferes/kayakers stalked by one in Byron recently. I'd love to see one in the wild though.

 

Christmas Time Again

I still can't get used to Christmas in the Southern hemishphere.  Plastic Christmas trees all around the city are wilting from the heat, fake snow sprayed on the windows is used to give a good block from the sun, and seeing santa at Bondi beach this morning with board shorts on was hilarious.

So this year Ingunn and I are escaping it all again, and driving up north to Byron Bay for a weeks break.  We're staying in an apartment that is literally spitting distance from the main beach itself and only a few minutes walk fromo the heart of Byron.   Byron Bay is one of my favourite spots in NSW and i reckon this break will be an excellent opportunity to do nothing, surfing, reading, eating, drinking.

Although I'm planning on doing quite alot of surfing in Byron i'm quite wary of all the white pointers that have been spotted in the area.  This one was spotted by a fisherman in Newcastle, and there were some surferes/kayakers stalked by one in Byron recently. I'd love to see one in the wild though.

 

Marathon pics

Marathon pics

Marley Beach

A great find, in the Royal National Park South of Sydney.   It's a bout a 45 min drive to the national park itself, then a good hour walk to the beach.  Due to the isolation there was almost noone else there.  Marley beach itself has crystal clear water, but a huge surf which makes swimming almost impossible.   Little Marley beach just round the corner though is a great spot for a dip, and having a beach to yourself and being so close to the city is quite unique. 

 

 

 

Marley Beach

A great find, in the Royal National Park South of Sydney.   It's a bout a 45 min drive to the national park itself, then a good hour walk to the beach.  Due to the isolation there was almost noone else there.  Marley beach itself has crystal clear water, but a huge surf which makes swimming almost impossible.   Little Marley beach just round the corner though is a great spot for a dip, and having a beach to yourself and being so close to the city is quite unique. 

 

 

 

Fact

• It is physically impossible to lick your elbow
• A shrimp's heart is in it's head
• On average women blink nearly twice as much as men
• The "sixth sick sheik's sixth sheep's sick" is said to be the toughest
  tongue twister in the English language

Surfs Up

Decided that Iam ready for a smaller surfboard, so have traded in the old one.   It (the old) was 7' 6'', and abit cumbersome.  Was great for learning on, once on a wave you could stay up on it, but awkward to maneuver in the water, and getting to and from the beach.  Paddling out through the breaks was very difficult too due to the shape and inability to dive under waves.  So I got a smaller 6'6'' board.

The pointed nose and smaller surface area means getting out through the breaking waves is much easier now, however, it is has far less balance.  You have to be going quite fast for the board to become at all stable, but can turn alot more.   So far it has been quite challenging on the new board, it has been like learning to surf all over again infact, but think I'm slowly getting the hang of it. Perseverance is definitely needed with surfing.

For inspiration i'm reading "High Surf" by Tim Collins.

"Leading surf journalist Tim Baker has profiled the surfing world's most inspiring characters, encountered over two decades of surf writing, to highlight the life lessons and boundless inspiration to be gained from a lifestyle built around waveriding. From salty old surf legends to modern pro–surf stars, to surfers from all walks of life –– writers, musicians, aid workers, ethicists –– the common theme in all these surfers' lives is how their personal journeys have been shaped and informed by their experiences in the ocean."

It started off a bit "surfing is all about finding waves of energy in ocean and earth" hippy crap, but after awhile becomes an excellent collection of short stories from some the greatest surf legends, and a good history lesson in it (surfing).

What else have been up to?  Not much.  Ingunn and I are spending a week in Byron Bay over Christmas.   Still trying to decide on the wedding,  very difficult to do anything from here.

South West Rocks & Hawkesbury

Cave diving in shark infested water,  a great 3 days .

See more pictures here

A relaxing weekend at the Hawkesbury.  I caught 1 fish, Ingunn got 3.  How come this always happens?

 

Looking forward to England's match against South Africa in the Rugby World Cup next weekend.  Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory?

Sydney Marathon 2007

Despite being unsure about this years marathon, things went alot better than i was expecting.  The race started off pretty cold in the morning, but as soon as the clouds shifted it quickly became blisteringly hot.  I felt good running the first half of the race, no problems with the legs/feet and full of energy, but after about 30km really started to tire and began wishing i'd worn a cap to block out the sun, especially as there few trees around for shade.   The last 10 km were absolute agony, reminiscent of the horrors of my first marathon, but i managed keep going without stopping (apart from drinking at the aid stations) as I just wanted to get it over and done with.  My finishing time was 3 hours 26 minutes 32 seconds, which I'm quite proud of, and surprised of really.  I was aiming for just under 4 hours at the beginning, but decided to go at a pace that i felt ok with.   The first half i ran in 01:38:23, which was why i think i tired so much in the second which was run in a slower 01:48:09.

The winner of the Sydney marathon ran it in 2 hours 14 minutes which is an astonishingly fast time, he must have bionic legs.  (here are the full 2007 race results)

If i run the marathon again, I think i'll find it hard beating that time, it really took everything out of me;  who knows, i'll re-asses it in 6 months time. For now though I'm in agony,   walking is just so painful, my front thigh muscles feel like they have been torn out and stretched on a rack for a day or two, but it was worth it! 

Looking forward to a summer of surfing now. 

Yarrrgghh

it's talk like pirate day today.

So bring me a noggin of rum, now, won't you, matey?

Last Sunday

Naturally, I didn't catch anything. 

Been doing more surfing which i'm realoly enjoying, booking a christmas holiday in Byron Bay, reading Will Self books, avoiding facebook, and being pretty busy at work.  Off to South West Rocks with Gav and Chris next long weekend for a scuba diving trip with sharks and potentially whales (not just Chris). 

Running the Sydney Marathon this sunday which i'm not particularly looking forward too.

APEC

This week Sydney is hosting the APEC summit. I'm not actually sure what the summit is about, but as 21 world leaders are going to be in the city at one time, the police army, navy seem to be involved in some enormous security operation.  There are 8ft high seclusion barriers all around the CBD, lots of men in black suits wandering around Martin Place, and over the last week or two, black hawk helicopters have been buzzing around the cbd practising for goodness knows what.  Seems like totally unnecessary overkill to me, i'm just wondering why they forgot to dig trenches and put barbed wire on the top of the fences.

Friday is the day the George Bush actually arrives, so Sydney has been given another public holiday.  Can't complain about that i guess.

Our wedding plans are progressing, a time and place has been set: 28th June next year in Drammen Norway.  Here infact, at the Spirallen.  Seems a long way off, and anyone would think we are organised.  Ha!

Green waves

So another weekend spent in the sun and surf, and i reckon it's all starting to fall into place now.  I managed to catch a few of the 'green waves'  and ride them wave all the way to the beach.  I found by shuffling towards the front of the board you can keep going for longer on a wave, i guess if the board is losing momentum, tilting the nose abit forces it down the wave more.  Next thing is learning how to turn properly.  Ache all over today though, i nose dived a couple of times and had some big waves crasg on top of me.

Finally feels like summer is just around the corner now, it is the best time of year in Sydney. 

This made me laugh

New Gadget

My Garmin Forerunner 305 finally arrived today, all the way over from the USA.  It's basically a high sensitivity GPS receiver & virtual trainer on the watch and wireless heart rate monitor all in one.

I've just given it a test run around centenial park tonight, and have been able to upload all the GPS tracking info, pace, altitude, heart beat  and awhole ton of other  metrics to my laptop.  Using the proprietary Garmin software, i can then sift through all these measurements in relation to a map.. pretty amazing really.  In this case, i ran 11.30km at an average pace of 13km/hr with a average heart beat of 165bpm.  I can see exactly at what points around the park i ran the fastest/slowest, and when i was about to have a heart attack etc.  The cool thing is that next time i run that route, i can run against the virtual me; the watch will tell me how far infront/behind iam of myself in realtime.  

 

The best part of it all though, aside the Garmin software, is that you can import this all this GPS data directly into Google Earth (see below).  Your route is plotted to pinpoint accuracy,  every little triangle represents when the device recorded a  GPS signal. If you click on one of those triangles, you get presented with the longitude, latitude, altitude, heart rate, speed and direction you were heading.  So, even if you aren't runng/cycling, you could forexample take this out on a walk/car journey then upload the data into google earth to check out your route.

 

This is a very smart gadget, you barely notice it when running and i just love having a GPS device/map on my wrist that is synched with a heart monitor.  The only gripe i have is that it takes ~30 seconds to lock onto satellites. 

Then again, perhaps this is too much technology; perhaps i should just keep it real and run up snow covered mountains in Russia with bricks in my backpack like Rockie Balboa did? ..

Easy

To get something clean, one has to get something dirty. To get something dirty, one does not have to get anything clean.

Last weekend

So I went surfing at Bondi Beach on Saturday and Sunday again.  Both days the conditions were ideal for learning..  fairly calm with 3-4ft waves rolling in, along with blues skies . 

Some of the other more experienced surfers were out too, amazing to watch and you learn so much from just talking to and observing others.  Physically though I think you need powerful shoulders to be able to get the initial speed on your board, strong arms/abdominal muscles to be able to quickly get up on the board, and ofcourse balance/finesse to be able to avoid falling off straight away.  I fail on all 3 counts, but am thinking of doing some swimming to build up the arms/shoulders.  Not so much a problem this weekend, but one of the hardest aspects i'm finding is actually swimming out through the breakzone;   anything bigger than 4 ft and i'm knocked off my board and washed up on the shore.  I end up using about half of my energy just getting out to the waves.  

This article offers 3 techniques for paddling through waves: Pushing Up. Busting Through, and the Eskimo Roll.  I've tried all three and usually just try busting through, but i don't think i'm able to get the board fast enough and so end up gettting carries backwards eachtime, particularly when doing the eskimo roll.  I think i need to get a smaller, lighter board so that duck-diving is an option. Here's a good thread on duck-diving for anyone interested

 

Iam still blown away by how good Google reader is.  it is simply the most efficent way to trawl through unread news items. As you read items it scrolls them down one at a time and marks them unread (all using the space bar). And, it is all very well done with AJAX.  As I continue using Google Reader I've been looking through my reading behaviors and stats and have learnt alot about my reading habits.  If anyone hasn't tried this yet, i highly recommend it.

Currently reading Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson, listening to Hed Kandi BeachHouse 2007, and watching Mantracker on Nat Geo Adventure channel.