On the plane back home, most everyone is asleep. To my right, Gabrielle is mufled up in my warm woolen vest (the one everybody told me not to forget since evenings could be so chilly and that I didn’t wear once because the weather was so very fine during the week) and she dreams about all the great times we had… I have spent some time writing down our diary so that I won’t forget anything when I get back home and now i am trying to think about how i should start my report. I let my mind wander for awhile and some images flash back at me, randomly; I could actually start the report with any one of them and go from one to another but I feel I need a guiding line, something that will go a bit deeper into what drew me here first. “Here” being Swaylock’s first, of course, but America also. Since I was a kid, I have always been fascinated by the USA. They seemed to epitomize all that I was looking for in life, especially California. Everything seemed easier there, anything could be achieved there, I had to be there someday.
Well, here I am, and it only took me about forty years to live the dream. Not so bad: some people never see their dreams come true; better late than never. Just one thing before going into the fun that we had during one week. But one that should not be omitted: I always felt that I owed you a lot and I always tried to somehow pay back for that. Explaining to a beginner how to do a cutlap or posting some photos of boards I have made as examples of what can be done are just very poor ways of thanking those young guys who would probably have become good surfers or shapers if they had not been chopped down by german machine-guns on Normandy beaches not so long ago. This may sound a bit far from our topic and certainly not a joyful way of starting this report but I just had to say it. Let’s not forget.
Also, I chose to start a new thread for this report instead of adding to the swayloholics one. I did not intend to dissociate myself from the crew, but our journey actually ended with the Plaskett Creek event and this report is about the whole trip.
Roissy Airport in Paris is a big mess… Upon seeing our travelling agency’s papers, the guys at the Delta desk directed us to desk 5. There, we had to queue in for about twenty minutes before being told that we should have been queueing in at desk 7 instead… Go to desk 7, queue in again and, just when we are about to get in, the lady says our flight’s embarkment actually is on desk 5… All that with Gabrielle pushing a trolley with the bags on it and I pulling the giant 9’6" board-bag behind… Don’t know how we made the plane, but we made it…
That’s Gabrielle, eating up some chocolate in relief:
The flight went OK. We flew over Great Britain, then up to Iceland and on to Greenland, spotting a few icebergs along the way:
Landed in Los Angeles, spent some time with the security guys (finger-prints, photos…), picked up the luggage and we were out the doors, waiting for Afoaf to meet us. Unfortunately, our flight was a Delta one but operated by Air-france… While we were waiting at the Air-France arrivals, Tyler was waiting for us at the Delta ones… We eventually met and he drove us to his place where we spent the first night.
Morning and a bicycle run along the beaches up to “Bill’s Pancake House” where we had our first taste of what an american breakfast is (it’s actually called “a lunch” in other parts of the world…) and met Jennyfer (Tyler’s wife) and both super-kids. Then back home and time to go and pick up the van I had rented from france… Meet Mr Pelican:
Driving in the States is not that hard once you master two important things: first, traffic lights are positioned ACROSS crossroads, not before. If you stop right under the traffic lights (like we are used to), you will actually be right in the middle of the crossroad… (Lots of fun, the first time…) Then, there is this sign on the freeway: “Slow traffic merge right”. I am a very disciplined guy and I don’t drive that fast, so I obey and merge right. That’s when another sign reads: “Right lane must exit”… A glance at my left mirror: a huge Kenworth truck comes roaring by me, there’s no way I can escape… Out of the freeway we go… Fun, fun, fun…
BTW, those Kenworths are just great. Chromes everywhere, and such a look… For a brief moment, I must confess that I thought about adding a Kenworths collection to my power planers collection: a few of them out there in the garden, wow!!! Maybe talk Catherine into it first, though…
OK, we’re on the road to Corona to visit the Accurate factory and pick up one of their super-nice new planers (ordered from France some weeks before). We are greeted by Matt with which I have been in touch through E-mails. Super-nice guy and everything they are making there is just gorgeous: fishing reels and planers are machined from aluminum billets, no short cuts here. We leave after Matt has promised to think about a 220V version for Europe…
Back to the Pelican and down towards San Diego. Jeffrey’s parents live there and I want to thank them for everything they’ve been doing for me lately: go to some weird places around and pick up vintage surfboards or power planers from even weirder guys, then stock them in their garage, waiting for Jeffrey (or me, actually) to come and bring them back to France somehow. Also, I need to buy a cell phone that I can use in California (mine is only good for USA-France calls, not local calls). Again, Bud (Jeffrey’s father) will be a huge help as I couldn’t have done it without him: if you need a cell phone, you have to give a californian phone number and adress, so he gave his. So many thanks for that, Bud!
Christened my new cell phone by calling Bill Thrailkill, in case we could meet. Unfortunately, it didn’t turn out possible for some reason. Next time, Bill! Since we had to be in Huntington Beach the next day and visit the Surfing Heritage Museum in San Clemente before, we decided to hit the road north so we wouldn’t be too much in a hurry the next day. We reached san Clemente by 7.30 PM and crashed into the first motel we found:
At 2.30 AM, as I was peacefully dreaming, my phone rang: some customer, unaware of my trip and thinking I’m in France, wanted to talk business… I may not have been very polite. Since I’m awake, and being sure that people don’t sleep in France, I call Catherine. Everything is OK back there, so try and get some more sleep.
Next morning, we hit the SHF Museum. I’ve been in touch with “Cindy” and she just happens to be there. We are in for a full hour of awe and ecstasy, both drooling in front of unique boards from years, decades and centuries past. Gabrielle has been taught a few basics about surfing history so nothing’s really new for her here, but actually seeing the boards is just something else… I will have to pull her out otherwise she would have stayed there… Barry has arrived and he shoots some photos of us in front of some of the best boards:
Back on the road up to Huntington, we stop in San Juan Capistrano for a visit to PeteC. Talk business (a bit) and plenty of other things (a lot). Meeting you was great, Pete. Thanks for the coffee, too. See you soon.
Called Whitney since we were not far from newport but she told me she was going to Plaskett, too, so we decided we would rather meet there. Went to Costa Mesa instead to have a look at Mike Ward’s factory. Another fine greeting, and a full tour of the factory, guided by a guy whose passion for boards is intact. He runs a machine and cuts blanks for quite a number of people around but still hand-shapes some under his own label. We also come to meet Tanner (who I had read about here). It’s great to see young talents in this industry.
Huntington Beach, “Surf City”… Let’s do some real tourism and have a walk in Main Street and on the pier…
The famous Walk of Fame:
Gabrielle on the pier (trying to impersonate Pamela Anderson, maybe?)
The view from the pier, looking towards Main Street:
Here comes one of the highlights of our stay in California: a few years ago, I got in touch with Bob “The Greek” Bolen here on Swaylock’s. I had been willing to thank him for a long time since my second board ever when I was a kid had been a Greek Maui Model and it was just a magic board for the times. I sent Greek some old photos and we talked quite a lot and I ended up ordering a new/old Maui Model from him. I posted this board here before so I won’t again but you know how great it is. Well, to make a long story short, when Greek knew that I was coming to California he just invited us to stay at his place “for a night or two…” I must say that I was totally stunned since I was just another customer for him and being a shaper with maybe a couple of thousands boards under my belt at best was no challenge for a man like him (how many could he have shaped?) So i didn’t answer at first, thinking that this was just one of those “polite” offers that you don’t really mean to carry out. But, as our trip was getting nearer, Greek kept asking me for the exact dates of our stay at his place and so I ended up thanking him very much and, yes, we would be very pleased (and honored) to come and meet him… That’s why we were in HB that day.
Besides making the finest boards ever, Greek has a real estate business office on Main Street. Not quite the usual real estate office that you would think of, though:
To be continued… maybe.
