Our little strike mission this day was with a tribe of really cool kids - groms
that already paddle and know to respect the place. They’re part of the
generational shift that’s engulfing the core crew out there now, with
the Mainy and Southport locals of the 1980s and ‘90s passing the torch
and throwing the reigns. It’s crowded these days, a lot of people are
in and out like the spinefex that has rolled down the Stradbroke dunes
for centuries. Everyone owns the place but only a handful belong to
the place.
Fathers and sons are out there now, their daughters too, and despite
the infernal water taxi that’s often written off by those who secretly ride
it, there’s still moments like this amongst the usual boiling mess of flailing
bodies and fibreglass, of kooks and southerners that blow in most days
just to reap and run, leaving some burned sections, straighthanders
and wasted waves in their wake. The message is the same today as
it was in the 1990s though - if you don’t know how to surf, and we
mean really ride an A-frame barre