SCOTLAND

I was just in Thurso, Scotland for about 10 days for the O’neill Cold Water Classic… The O’neill Europe crew were incredible hosts and put on a very well run event, but I didn’t have too much luck in the contest, loosing out in the round of 96… Being that my focus with my surfing career isn’t exactly competition based (which is no excuse for doing shitty in the contest) a round of 96 result in a 6 star prime event is actually somewhat of a result for me… Ha ha… Planning my trip to Scotland I was really excited at the opportunity to compete in the event, but I was also very much intrigued by the travel adventure ahead of me, with traveling to the Northern most point in Scotland… I had to fly into an airport 6 hours from where I needed to be… But navigating was somewhat easy with my co pilot for the journey Photographer Charlie Garcia (also from Florida) keeping me on the right roads as we came to each roundabout…

The contest was long and drawn out due to the extreme tides and lack of swell… But that allowed for much down time which turned into days of sight seeing, Castle Hunting and Guinness tasting… The Castle Hunting was amazing and we were able to come across a pretty special 17th century Castle on the edge of a cliff…

The surf finally did come up on the last day when we were able to get some really fun surf at a slabby right and left… I have some empty waves on video that I shot with my still camera before I went out But unfortunately Charlie has all the the surf shots on his computer…

All in all it was a bummer and a learning experience in the realm of competitive surfing but a great success in the world of adventure surf travel…

[Show as slideshow]

[View with PicLens]