ロブのサーフィンアドベンチャー

Surfing Chapter Twenty Nine: Epilogue/ ｻｰﾌｨﾝ

Don’t stand at the dock of the bay, wasting time...

2022/09/28 15:20

Surfing Chapter Twenty Eight: BINGO! ($10,000)/ ｻｰﾌｨﾝ 第28章: ビンゴ！(100万円)

The bus had other things wrong with it. The front left shock absorber was completely useless and the whole vehicle, needed about two thousand dollars worth of work on it. Fortunately Vegemite managed to eventually find the brake reservoir, and when he topped it up the brakes worked like a dream. Alm

2022/09/14 14:53

Surfing Chapter Twenty Seven: Geralton/ｻｰﾌｨﾝ第27章:ｼﾞｪﾗﾙﾄﾝ

At last we had a bit of money, enough for fuel and a bit to spare. We drove the eight hundred and thirty five kilometers up to Broom while the girls stayed on at Karratha. I remember seeing camels on Cable Beach and having another run in with some locals at the pub. Eventful places... No luck. Wit

2022/08/31 13:28

Surfing Chapter Twenty Six: Karratha/ ｻｰﾌｨﾝ第26章:カラサ

We spent a few days at Exmouth, killing flies and walking out on the reef at low tide. By the time we got up to Karratha we were almost out of money. There were a lot of young people up there looking for work on the Burrup Peninsula Gas Project. Jobs were high paying but difficult to land, unless yo

2022/08/03 12:00

Surfing Chapter Twenty Five: Tombstones

The next day we decided on a change of scenery, we pulled up stumps and took the bus up the sandy desert track a few Kilometers further North to Tombstones.

2022/07/20 15:59

Surfing Chapter Twenty Four: The Big Swell (Day one)/ｻｰﾌｨﾝ第24章:巨大なスウェル(1日目)

We had two more calm days at the Bluff before a rumor began to spread around camp that a big swell was on the way. We had swum with turtles, ridden up sand dunes, and the fishing had been great. We used up a whole bottle of soy sauce just on sushi alone... On the fourth morning we awoke to long sw

2022/07/06 13:37

Surfing Chapter Twenty Three: Red Bluff

In the morning we had a quick breakfast and then followed the North West Coastal Highway twenty four Km North of Canarvon before taking the turn off to the Blow Holes. The way was sealed for fifty kilometers and then turned into a dirt road. "KING WAVES KILL" read the road sign by the rock

2022/06/22 15:21

Surfing Chapter Twenty Two: Western Australia/ ｻｰﾌｨﾝ第22章:西ｵｰｽﾄﾗﾘｱ

We crossed the Nullarbor once more, this time without incident, and arrived gratefully back home in Perth to the welcoming arms of family and friends. It had been an AWESOME TRIP, but the best was yet to come...

2022/06/08 14:00

Surfing Chapter Twenty One: Tempers Flare/ｻｰﾌｨﾝ第21章: ついに男たちの気性がぶつかり合う

By this stage we had been living, almost on top of each other, for 4 months. We had all gotten along well, 4 egos coinciding in relative harmony, but the incident with the engine and the inevitable stresses of life on the road were about to surface in a big way...

2022/05/25 14:19

Surfing Chapter Twenty: The Mirror/ ｻｰﾌｨﾝ第20章:鏡

It was my turn to drive. We passed the Clybucca service station honking the horn and yelling from the windows. We stopped in Kempsey and refueled at the last out of town service station. Immediately after pulling out I was faced with red traffic lights on a 4 lane bridge.

2022/05/11 12:00

Surfing Chapter Nineteen: Seven Days by the Road/ 第19章:道路脇で過ごした7日間

The next morning we were back at the wreckers in Kempsey. We purchased heavy chains from them and hired their driver and a tow truck to go out and pick up the new engine from the farm and then deliver it to the bus. The driver was a very short, round, fat little man and I remember telling him that w

2022/04/27 12:00

Surfing Chapter Eighteen: Blowing up the Engine/ｻｰﾌｨﾝ第18章:ｴﾝｼﾞﾝ大爆発

A few kilometers out of Coffs Harbor, we said goodbye to the girls and headed off on the busy inland route to Kempsey, a rural town about one hundred kilometers away. About seventy five Kilometers in, with Spit Ball driving, we were going down a hill when suddenly there was a huge BANG! and smoke st

2022/04/13 13:16

Surfing Chapter Seventeen: Hitch Hikers/ｻｰﾌｨﾝ第17章:ﾋｯﾁﾊｲｶｰ

Somewhere between Lennox Heads and Coffs Harbor we picked up a couple of female hitchhikers. Illana, a small dark skinned Israeli girl and her big boobed German companion, Helga, were more than welcome. The bus was actually six berth, when the couches were used as beds, so there was plenty of room.

2022/03/16 12:00

Surfing Chapter Sixteen: Blood Bath!/ ｻｰﾌｨﾝ第16章: 血の海

We eventually headed down the coast and stopped briefly at Byron Bay for a day before moving on a further twenty kilometers to Lennox Heads. The big swell, still persisting and Lennox- a world class reef break, was holding up nicely. Parking the bus at the top of the hill we grabbed our boards and m

2022/03/02 12:00

Surfing Chapter Fifteen: Epic Surf !!!/ｻｰﾌｨﾝ第15章：エピックサーフ!!!

Cooloola National Park, now called "Cooloola Recreation Area" is located between Noosa Heads and Rainbow beach in Queensland. Heading North, it is one of the very last places that you can find good surf in QLD, but on the day we arrived there was none. After an extensive search, we turn

2022/02/25 11:27

Surfing Chapter Fourteen: Smashing up the boat / ｻｰﾌｨﾝ第14章: ボートを破壊する

We took our little boat "S.S. Snubby" out once more along the shores of Northern New South Wales. It was a hot day as we putted parallel to the beach, trailing lures. There were plenty of Red Lobsters on the beach, tanning themselves in coconut oil and sipping cola. Not a bite. Not eve

2022/02/02 12:00

Surfing Chapter Thirteen: The surfing routine/ ｻｰﾌｨﾝ 第13章: ｻｰﾌｨﾝのﾙｰﾁﾝ

We surfed a lot of beaches in Northern New South Wales. By this time our game plan and routine were always the same. On the bad weather days, we would travel, heading towards the next most promising surf spot. We would aim to arrive there at night, pulling into the local pub (hotel) car park abo

2022/01/19 12:00

Surfing Chapter Twelve: Flick Knife! / ｻｰﾌｨﾝ第12章:ﾌﾘｯｸﾅｲﾌ!

It was a perfect Sunday as we pulled the bus up and parked it at the top of the hill overlooking Bondi Beach. There were many people about enjoying the last day of their weekend. Just as we had stepped out of the bus and locked the door behind us this weird looking dood appeared from nowhere. He sta

2021/12/15 14:21

Surfing Chapter Eleven: The Cop/ ｻｰﾌｨﾝ 第11章:警官

Just before Sydney we stopped for the night in Coogee, a beachside suburb only eight km from the city center. There was nowhere to park that Saturday night so we just stopped on the verge outside a normal residential house. In the morning I was under the bus changing the engine oil when a pair of

2021/12/01 15:28

Surfing Chapter Ten: The Bridge/ｻｰﾌｨﾝ第10章: 橋

At the time of our trip, in 1987, Spit Ball, who I think was the youngest out of all of us, had the least driving experience. Vegemite and I had driven a few farm trucks, and clearly Bazza, being a mechanic, had driven his fair share too. Spit Ball was the only one without his motor bike license.

2021/11/17 12:00

Surfing Chapter Nine: Shark!/ ｻｰﾌｨﾝ 第9章：サメ！

Despite Mad Max, we stayed on at Cactus a few more days and got some good waves. Then we hit the road again before making a brief stop at Port Lincoln, a peninsula surfing spot j ust short of five hundred kilometers further East. While Bazza and Spit Ball played cards Vegemite and I went for a s

2021/11/02 14:02

Surfing Chapter Eight: Cactus Localism (Mad Max vs Vegemite)/ｻｰﾌｨﾝ第8章: カクタスローカリズム(マッドマックスvsベジマイト)

Cactus is known as a remote, world class surf break . After a few days of offshore conditions and reasonable swell our supplies began to run low, particularly the all important beer. Vegemite and Spit Ball decided to take the bike for the 20 minute drive back to Penong, to pick up a fresh carton. O

2021/10/21 12:33

Surfing Chapter Seven: Out to sea in an old, leaky, plywood boat.../ｻｰﾌｨﾝ第7章:浸水寸前の古い合板船で大海原へ

The next day, despite the threat of sharks, we were excited to try out our boat for for the first time. "S.S. Snubby" was what we had named her because she had a rather flat, snubby bow. In our rush to get out of Perth we had purchased her in haste and now as we launched her for the firs

2021/10/07 15:44

Surfing Chapter Six: Cactus Beach South Australia/サーフィン第6章：南豪カクタスビーチ

By the time we reached Penong we were about 74kms from Ceduna and 850 kms from Adelaide, which put us about four fifths of the way across the Nullarbor. We refilled our tanks once more, stocked up with supplies and took the 22 minute drive out to Cactus Beach. It was about 20kms. The road out was pe

2021/09/23 23:24

Surfing Chapter Five: Across the Nullarbor / サーフィン第5章：ヌラーバー横断記

The Australian Nullarbor, also known as the "Eyre Highway" forms the boundary between Eastern and Western Australia and takes at least two days or more to cross. It was first carved out of the desert limestone as a dirt track in 1941 and was finally sealed in 1976. It is the longest stretc

2021/09/08 21:00

Surfing Chapter Four: Game On ! Heading Out on the Highway.../ サーフィン第4章：いよいよ出発の時が来た！高速へ繰り出す・・・

It was a Sunday Afternoon when we excitedly started her up and pulled out of Vegemites driveway. We had said our goodbyes but still had a few family members around to wave us off. This was FULL ON, this was REAL and as Nike says we were just DOING IT!!! It would seem that even nature was putting

2021/08/25 11:00

Surfing Chapter Three: Desperate Surfing Dreamers/ サーフィン第3章：夢追い人 サーフィン編

At this stage of the proceedings, back in 1987, protocol suggested that we now had to put the bus over the pits for a police safety check. If it passed we could register it as a motorhome. We had just spent a further 5K on decking out our dream and we now had 7.5K invested in it, but we were about t

2021/08/11 12:19

Surfing Chapter Two: Building the Bus/ サーフィン第2章：バスの改造

The first thing we did in constructing our new mobile home was to rip the seats out. I got in there on my hands and knees with an angle grinder that I had borrowed from a friend. Boy did I put that grinder to work!, By day three the motor had burnt out and I had to replace it with a new one. The sea

2021/07/28 11:54

Surfing Chapter One: Getting the Bus/ サーフィン第1章：バスとの出会い

It was a hot weekend summers day in 1987 when me, my brother and good friend “Vegemite” drove up to Perth’s Scarbrough Beach (Commonly known by locals as “Scabs”).  We surfed some pusy onshore 2 footers for about an hour before coming back in to the car park to dry off. …And there she w

2021/06/01 10:57