My first board

[Wilbur Kookmeyer]

In this image below are a few boards that I once new. The board on the left is of particular interest to me. I bought it for $45 from Island Water Sports in Deerfield Beach, Florida in 1981. It was a used rental with a bungee cord leash. The bolt for the single fin box was broken and the fin was loose. It would wobble and slide to and fro.

It is the first baord I ever paddled out on, and the one I learned to surf on. I passed it to other friends and they each learned to surf on that same board. It ended up with my one of my friends, and to my amazement, he still has it. This photo was not taken in the 80's, or even the 90's. This photo was taken last weekend as he was cleaning out his garage.

I rode the other two boards as well. The G&S with the fat squash tail was sweet.

I wonder how many others rode that Natural Art before I had it. I wonder how many of them took a skeg to the head from the bungee cord leash. Or how many of them nearly drowned like I did.

The one time that I for sure was done for, without a doubt, dead or waiting for it, I was on that board. A big sloppy day at Deerfield Pier. Breaking out of control way out by the end of the pier. The first bottom turn I ever made was on that board. The first time I ever stood. The first time I ever got chased out by a shark, was called a kook, was laughed at, rained on, or sat longingly on the beach waiting for waves to show up..... The first time I ever lived.

I can only pray that before the last time I ever know any of it, that I will once again know that board.

[holddown]

WTF. Who removed the "like" button?

[Spent]

f@#K yeah for this post.

[OSeditor]

That's pretty damn cool, Wilbur.

[Hump]

Wish I had pic of my first ever board as it was a Bing, 9'6" David Nuuhiwa Noserider model. Some pos stole it in 1973 here in Campbell River. I'm still pissed off.

Here's my first new board in 1974 at Juskatla in the Queen Charlotte Islands. Shaped by Mike Eaton it was 8'4" and a basic funboard shape, perfect for the beginner I was.



And here's my later quiver in 1985 at Jordan River.

Left to right:

8'2" Herbie Fletcher Trestles Noserider model, #00032.
7'7" Sunset, shaped by Bill Shrosbee. (Loved that board)
7'10" Cleanline square tail.
Note black marks on decks from wetsuit covered buttocks.
Note boat for up-coast adventures too.




Take care.

[Doc]

I don't have any pics but the first boards are mythical in memory...
Just carrying the things to the beach was a lesson in persistence...
I surfed as a kid (like 5) with my uncle who would drive us to the beach...
And we could surf whatever board was available...
But surfing wasn't the focus at that age, just being a kid at the beach was...
Then, as you got bigger you had to carry your own weight...
Lugging 2 boards down the cliffs to Blacks with you cuz...
Then paddling out and trying to survive barrels there when you're 12!
And of course now the focus is surfing and there's heckling & ego coming in to play...
When I was in about 7th grade a family friend gave me a memorable board...
It was backyard shape, prob 8-9 foot single fin, pintail, no rocker, pinched rails...
He told me "It doesn't turn very good...but when you stand right "there", it goes...
And it really did, I surfed it off and on from 1974 to 1983 in San Diego...
It was heavy and a hassle to deal with so it didn't get a ton of use...
But it paddled fast & was the big wave go to board...
The last time I surfed it was in January 1983 at Ponto beach in North County San Diego...
It was an epic swell that January, many days of overhead surf...
I went out with a friend and picked off a right that walled up and reeled...
I went to the "there" spot on the board and I don't know if I have ever gone as fast on a surfboard.

I moved to LA that year and left the board at my Mom's house...
It disappeared somewhere along the way.

Doc

[Bubalus]

I bought my first board in LA on a road trip with my three best friends from Colorado to Mexico. We stopped in Cali to buy boards and I bought an 8' fun shape, we crossed the boarder the next day. First time I ever sat on the board was in the sea of cortez, paddled out in flat water just for fun, was such a noob I could barely sit on the thing without falling off. Six months later I was well south of there and in a small town with the most beautiful girl I had ever seen. She hardly ever went to the beach and never talked to gringos but one day she was watching as I was coming in and I took off in the shore pound to try and catch her eye. Rode into ankle deep water and when I stepped off the board it dug into the sand caught some wash and snapped in two. She never gave me the time of day and I went back to the states a few days later.

[pro moe]

My first board was a 10’6’ surfboard Hawaii elephant gun my dad bought for $35 back in 1967 I didn’t know it at the time but now when i look at a picture of this the board towering over this 9 yo towheaded grom you can see the tapered nose and tail, nose rocker, diagonal red deck stripes traits of a board designed for charging the big bowls of makaha. Don’t know what happened to that board nowadays I imagine that I would have delved into the boards heritage, but alas it disappeared in the haze of the shortboard revolution. It was standard procedure back then to strip the glass off any board over ten feet get the saw and cut out a sub 6 foot “miniboard” that’s what they were called back then. There is nothing like an absolutely flat paisley covered miniboard glassed and finished by a 10 yo. Best board the ones ive got are pretty nice especially the 6’8” winged swallow shaped by dane perlee but the best
Was a 8’ Tom Parrish bolt I picked up at the shop next to kammies for $100 turns out to have been one
The bronzed aussies that was left behind it worked everwhere never a rough edge in any type of surf

[2tone]

Mine was a 7'6" gun... Yes... A gun.. That was what they sold me to learn on... It was a shop in Northern h Vancouver. It was very wobbly and I rode it in whitewash for 2 years... May explain my poo-like stance...