Byron Bay - The Surfing Capital Of Australia :: AustraliAccommodation

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The Surfing Capital Of Australia

By Kadence Buchanan

If surfing is your thing, then you must check out Byron Bay, the Mecca of surfing in Australia. There you will find a place where surfing is not just a sport or favorite past-time but a lifestyle and local obsession.

Set against a back-drop of warm weather year-round and spectacular beaches, Byron Bay is an inviting venue that promises a laid-back lifestyle. Why, you can even go native and be part of a teeming “alternative” community whose ranks are constantly being bolstered by an increasing number of writers, artists and filmmakers.

Byron Bay is nestled at the North Coast of New South Wales in Australia. It boasts of four main beaches. Byron Main, the most popular of the four, is perfect for surfing newcomers because of its smaller swell that usually breaks close to the shore. It has non-stop breaks and is great for swimming.

The Pass is the next most popular beach in Byron Bay just south of Byron Main. It is a favorite of long boarders who comb the beach in droves during summer.

Watego Beach is hidden from view and, as such, is ideal for surfers who want to avoid the crowds. The challenges it offers are more difficult for surfers, which is why the most advanced surfers prefer Watego Beach.

Finally, there is also Tallow’s Beach, the most isolated of Byron Bay’s four beaches. Most tourists have not discovered it yet especially since it is only visible from Byron Bay’s headland. It is rare to find outsiders wandering around Tallow’s Beach but the locals just love it.

Aside from surfing, Byron Bay is also a great scuba diving venue and one of these rare places where you can sit back and occasionally catch a whale or two passing by. At night, dolphins come out to play and it is not unusual to see these friendly creatures swimming side by side with people.

There’s also an excellent fine dining restaurant on Byron Bay called Fins which offers succulent seafood and an impressive wine list. Fins is one of Australia’s best restaurants.

Fine Dining

Fins Restaurant

Fins Restaurant offers fresh local seafood spiced with local herbs and supplemented by an attractive wine list. The Sydney Morning Herald Good Food Guide has awarded FINS with two chef’s hats every year since 1998. Fins also received a Restaurant and Catering Award of Excellence as "Best Seafood Restaurant All Regional NSW" in 2005 as well as the award for "Best Seafood Restaurant in Australia" in 2004.

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- About the Author:

Kadence Buchanan writes articles for thetravelinglifestyle.com - In addition, Kadence also writes articles for theoutdoorslifestyle.com and recreationsource.net.

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Surfing / Bodyboarding

Surfing for Others
Posted on 24 Jul 2010 at 9:47pm

The vast majority of us take life for granted. We take each breath for granted. And, as logic would follow, we take surfing for granted as something that will always be there. But like our loved ones and the environment around us, our time in the water is precious and finite. There will be a time when you (and I) will no longer have the physical capacity for surfing. Are you in the frame of mind to imagine a world without the artistic and athletic release that our sport provides? Now think about the millions of great humans who have never experienced the joy of wave riding (or have had it taken from them) by way of an illness or physical disability. Okay, non-surfers, I understand that surfing may not seem important to you in the big scheme of things, but what you know? You don't surf. The deal is that surfing has proven itself a healing and mind expanding activity, affecting the subconscious and cardiovascular system like something akin to a religious awakening or three rounds of boxing or an atom bomb full of stoke. We're talking something special that needs to be accessible to those who seek it and deserve its magic.

And there are special folks out there making it happen. In California, the Adaptive Surfing Foundation, founded by "Happy Barrels Surf & Pro Surf Coaches" owner Robbie Nelson who was misdiagnosed after a surfing accident and told he would never walk again. That moment sparked the foundation concept which states as its goal to help disabled athletes fulfill their surfing dreams and to make surfing available to anyone regardless of disability. In Australia, the Disabled Surfing Association is making dreams happen. Formed in Sydney, Australia in 1986, the DSF helps surfers with a serious illness or disability get back into the water. After a motorcycle accident, Gary Blashcke, the founder, was told he would never surf again and thus was inspired to create the DSA, which "caters to all disabled people wishing to have a go at surfing in a safe, happy environment." One of the most successful foundations for sure is "Life Rolls On." This foundation has been around for over ten years and focused on raising funds and awareness for spinal cord injury research and related programs. "In 1996, on the verge of becoming a professional surfer, Jesse Billauer suffered a spinal cord injury while surfing. While physically rendered a quadriplegic, Jesse's spirit was not broken, and the phrase 'Life Rolls On' was born." They are not alone:

Surfers for Autism

Association of Amputee Surfers

Surfing can be a selfish act in that it is an experience of one person. It is unique to each surfer, but like a writer can take to the page and change the world maybe a surfer can affect change in the way he rides waves. In that, I mean using your gift and giving it to others. Volunteer your time to an organization like the ones above (research organizations in your area). For a day or a week or whatever, take someone surfing who has never had the opportunity. It's not pity. It's humanity. Heck, if we're a surfing tribe, then we owe it to our family of surfers to act as one.

Surfing for Others originally appeared on About.com Surfing / Bodyboarding on Saturday, July 24th, 2010 at 21:47:01.

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Ode to J-Bay
Posted on 18 Jul 2010 at 8:33am

With 10 major events going down at some of the planet's best waves amidst prime swell windows, the ASP tour has the potential to hit some seriously high notes throughout the year, but for me, the zenith of the year is the event at Jeffrey's Bay, South Africa. There is something truly special about that wave in terms of its length and strength and the sheer accessibility to its visual splendor. It's a wave that highlights the flaws in your game and spotlights the timeless qualities of history's great talents. No matter how far surfing progresses, only riders who are powerful and fast and stay close to the wave's source with long deep turns will prevail at J-Bay. The quick "hacks" and "gaffs" and "punts" and air reverses and such that have defined modern surfing are not what win heats at the Bay. Watching Brett Simpson try to reverse his way out of a loss and Owen Wright's machine gun fin slip turns off the top in comparison to Jordy Smith (the eventual victor) and his massive elongated carves and compass-drawn cutties or Kelly Slater's (in the early rounds) full tilt re-directional change roundhouses when the swell was smoking, and you can see the difference between timeless and timely. However, there is no doubt that Wright will be at the top of the heap within the next few years. He showed some brilliant moments but didn't quite apply that goofy foot power that Occy and the Hobgoods have in the past. You can argue that waves like Tahiti and Teahupoo are the true test of a surfer's mettle on tour, but those waves ask for a very specific approach, a provincial line of attack that includes a guts-out drop and a delicate line through a massive barrel. Not easy, but not Jeffrey's. There you need to thread a series of 8, 10, and even more turns on a wave breaking at break-neck speeds. That's where the athletics and the timing are crucial, but there is an artistry as well that requires varying each maneuver, mixing top turns with under-the-lip snaps, cutbacks, and section floaters all the while looking in control. You can quickly see the surfers who are nervous in their choppy lines etched across the perfection of J-Bay. The true artist instead draws long lines with flowing strokes from rail to rail carves. This ain't Trestles and dang sure ain't Brazil. The notoriously progressive Jordy took the whole thing not with rodeo flips but with traditional carving and style. Local knowledge helps too I'm sure. So for me, the tour has hit its high mark and maybe we are looking at the next world champ. The waves got a bit smaller as the event unfolded but that's how it goes. How do the ratings play out as the tour moves forward? The race is open and with 6 more events to go, anything can happen, but for me, I am always a little let down after Jeffrey's. Billabong does a great job with the webcast and the waves are always insane. Next stop, Tahiti.

Ode to J-Bay originally appeared on About.com Surfing / Bodyboarding on Sunday, July 18th, 2010 at 08:33:34.

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Spinning Surfboard Fins Roll into the Future
Posted on 12 Jul 2010 at 12:58pm

As reported, Tom Morey, the brain factory behind removable skeg systems and Boogie Boards, has recently given girth to the MoreyRollo, which is essentially a rolling skeg. It's still in a rough form, but it's pretty radical. Here is the idea. It's a thick rubber wheel that is attached to the tail area of the surfboard and spins with the momentum of the water and the flow of the board itself. When I read the headline, I grappled with the applications and the functioality of such a device, but as always, new ideas take time to gel and closed minds do nothing but hold back innovation and progress. According to Morey, the MoreyRollo could be modified in many ways, seeing as he declined to patent the invention and allow backyard tinkerers and surf tech think tanks to take it to the next level. But why? My closed mind wonders aloud, what's the problem with the surfboard fin as it is? From the early Tom Blake version of the 1930's to George Greenough's thinnier, more flexible fins and all the way through Cheyne Horan's Star Fin and more recent incarnations, fins work. They stabilize and guide but I guess they also cut and slice which has always been a painful drawback , especially for beginners. So there might be a great area of application, but Morey is thinking way farther out of the box. He envisions rolling an SUP to beach and boards rolling over rocks and reef instead of getting caught and snapped.

Interesting... Could this be a moment in the history of the surfboard where things are about to shift like in the use of polyurethane foam or the short board revolution? That is not clear at the moment. But the possiblities of this innovation are intriguing. Want to know more about surfboard fins?

Spinning Surfboard Fins Roll into the Future originally appeared on About.com Surfing / Bodyboarding on Monday, July 12th, 2010 at 12:58:33.

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To Launch or to Punt?
Posted on 9 Jul 2010 at 7:23am

Sitting around after a multiple-day swell, I got to thinking about how the surfing lexicon (the language we use) has changed. Hodads have given way to kooks and barnies, and the green room has become a shack. Cut-backs and slashes are now hacks and gaffs. But as you read the the latest mags, you probably noticed the oft used term "punt" as to mean to launch an air. Why choose a football term to describe a maneuver that is so obviously not related to football? Let's look at the difference between today's aerial tricks as opposed to the days of yore.

To start, today's airs are higher, longer, and full of variations only dreamed of in the 80's. Much like a punted ball, today's aeronautical explorer lifts with a sudden pop of freedom and soars effortlessly over the lip and lands with a sudden grab of the fins. It's all very punt-like if you think about it. Surfers are gifted with a talent for slanging and creating vivid images with words. Terms like "re-entry", "floater", and "snap" pack both visual and sonic juice.

Watching modern pro surfers like Parko who regularly hack and punt to victory, you may notice lots of "foam climbing" as well which it seems is very different from a floater (although the concept is the same) in its visual presentation. In a foam climb, surfers come from behind the whitewater and glide up and over it to gain a better position for the next section. However, a floater is a move in which a surfer glides across the foamy or hollow section. In essence, a foam climb is vertical and a floater is horizontal.

Now, what do we do with stalefish, indie grabs, the Superman, shrink wraps, and a rodeo flip? The surf language is ever changing and always fresh!

In pro news, Kelly Slater is number one in the world for the moment. Can he hang on for a 10th title? As a kid, I figured Mark Richards's record of 4 tour victories was literally unbeatable. I thought the unique talent of MR was one that comes along once in a lifetime. The question is how long will Slater's record stand? Is there some little kid waxing up on a random beach about to blow the roof off Kelly's house? Who knows, but it's gonna be fun watching.

To Launch or to Punt? originally appeared on About.com Surfing / Bodyboarding on Friday, July 9th, 2010 at 07:23:55.

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Surfing Community Love and Contest Strategies
Posted on 28 Jun 2010 at 9:43am

As the surf just went flat in my part of the world, I'm sure it is building somewhere else. Maybe you are about to get a giant swell tomorrow. Let's hear about it. As surfers, we are always raving about something. Maybe you just got in from the session of your life or just saw a big shark in the lineup or maybe you want to vent because some big kook dropped in on you this morning or maybe you stood up for the first time or are suffering from some gnarly stomach rash or you found that magic board that works perfectly. Maybe you want to know how to pick that magic board or need some advice on where to take your fist surf trip or even if you can't quite pull of that roundhouse cutback...You can find it ALL right here. Post a question or comment below or slide over to the forums to post your question or share a session or idea. Heck, even chime in on the issue of mass produced surfboards or decide who's the best surfer in the world.

Send photos and stories and I'll post them for your buddies to enjoy. You can send them to surfing.guide@about.com and maybe become famous. So grab a cup of Joe and join the community. But don't lose your priorities...go surfing first and then log on.

How about this? Being part of the amateuer surf scene means pitching in every so often to judge a few heats. To do it well, there are some easy tips and strategies that will make your judging performance a little more consistent and accurate. Oooooh...I have another idea. It might even help to know how the judges are assessing your surfing as a competitor too. In fact, check out this helpful little article that explains how to surf smarter and more successfully in a contest heat. Have fun.

Surfing Community Love and Contest Strategies originally appeared on About.com Surfing / Bodyboarding on Monday, June 28th, 2010 at 09:43:07.

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"Surfing" the Internet? Let's think again
Posted on 19 Jun 2010 at 9:23pm

My anger sparked in college. Sitting in a UH history class around 11AM having ridden Sunset bombs all morning, relaxed and ready to get my learning on, when the teaching assistant uttered something about a homework assignment that included the following statement, "Tonight, go home and surf around the Internet..."

I didn't hear anything after that. I had been quietly seething for a few years since the world began channel "surfing" (the term was first born officially in 1988), but this was taking it too far. What more did the world want from us? This is my life's meaning, my religion, my sport that was being further pillaged by this new medium. I was becoming increasingly wary the Internet and all this talk of email and firewalls and downloads. How did this happen? Why pick on surfing? Why not "channel sliding" or "shooting the net" or more realistically "channel wrestling?" Webster's defines channel surfing is "the action or practice of surfing through television programs usually by use of a remote control." What? First of all, you can't define a word with the same word. Those are the rules. I didn't make them up. But why use the word "surf" at all? I'll even give you "shooting the boob tube" but not surfing. I wondered albeit aloud how this all came about.

Radical librarian Jean Armour Polly is given the lion's share of the credit for coining the phrase in an exhaustive article that delves into the primeval days of the Internet aptly entitled "Surfing the Internet." Published in 1992, the article overflows with great information about the budding electronic space we now inhabit, but doesn't mention surfing at all. Polly explains her creation thusly,

"At that time I was using a mouse pad from the Apple Library in Cupertino, CA, famous for inventing and appropriating pithy sayings and printing them on sportswear and mouse pads (e.g. "A month in the Lab can save you an hour in the Library.") The one I had pictured a surfer on a big wave. "Information Surfer" it said. "Eureka," I said, and had my metaphor."

She adds that "surfing refers to the feeling you get when you jump from page to page, similar to jumping from wave to wave while surfing in the ocean." That's a pretty big jump Ms. Polly. How about "clicking the net" or "mousing the void of informational space?"I like this most accurate phrase: "searching the web"

To be fair, Ms. Polly disagrees with my description of her as "radical" and goes on to explain:

"I used to get complaints from surfers from time to time until I mentioned in a usenet interview that in 1995 I had paid my respects to the Duke Kahanamoku statue on Waikiki Beach as a sort of penance. He forgives me and that is all that matters."

Okay, so maybe she has made the effort to develop substantial surf cred, but still the word surfing does nothing to convey the experience of watching TV or browsing websites. There is no correlation. It's no better than "web kayaking" or "web rafting" or "web skiing." The good folks over at Webster's write that surfing is "the sport of riding the surf especially on a surfboard." Even though this definition is lacking, I must ask, how is this similar to sitting sedentary in front of a glowing screen absorbing pics and vids and pixels? Not to mention, the term surfing was first recognized by the dictionary in 1926. That's more than sixty years before our royal sport's moniker was out sourced, soured and soiled by techies. Is the irony lost on me that I write this diatribe on an Internet blog post? No, I am not attacking progress or the technological wave that has engulfed us. Oops! That was a poor choice of words. What's another word for wave?

My point...let's come up with a better term and leave surfing out of it all together.

"Surfing" the Internet? Let's think again originally appeared on About.com Surfing / Bodyboarding on Saturday, June 19th, 2010 at 21:23:30.

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International Surfing Day is Coming
Posted on 11 Jun 2010 at 10:35pm

Something worth checking out will be going down at Huntington Beach Pier this upcoming international Surfing Day (June 20th). Didn't know it was Surfing Day? Well, let me tell you, all around the planet folks will be grabbing their boards and hitting the surf. But none harder than the competitors at the SURF 24 Surf-A-Thon. Here's the deal: 16 teams of maximum 22 competitors per team will be competing over 24 hours straight, beginning noon on Saturday June 19th and ending on Sunday June 20th at noon. Within the mayhen, there will be a celebrity hour during which stars from stage, screen, and surf will compete. There will be SUP and paddle contests, girls and guys on longboards and shortboards. Surfers will comptete during a "graveyard shift" in the middle of the night wearing glowing writbands under floodlightsfrom the pier. It sounds like insanity. There will be live music, and Peter "PT" Townend and Shaun Tomson will be kicking around since they are helping to organize the event. Teams will pay $2400 ($100 per hour) to compete, but the best thing: proceeds go to the Surfrider Foundation, Heal The Bay, and Inside the Outdoors Foundation. So let's review. Live music, celebs, 24-hour surfing, Shaun and PT, and the profits go to charity. Can you think of a better way to spend Surfing Day?

International Surfing Day is Coming originally appeared on About.com Surfing / Bodyboarding on Friday, June 11th, 2010 at 22:35:57.

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Is Surfing Unique?
Posted on 7 Jun 2010 at 11:02am

During a recent and decidedly friendly discussion about sports, I made the unequivocal statement that surfing was unlike other sports and shouldn't be included in the same category. I was met with fervent disagreement. One self described basketball fiend argued that his sport of choice inspires the same passion and same devotion, creates that same feeling of euphoria and release as surfing. After a few retorts in which I cited that surfing is more an art and a lifestyle than a sport and that basketball relied on a team mentality, I relented, but I carried my thoughts home. Are they really that different? I started thinking about paddling out at sunrise by myself and the joy of riding a wave just for the feeling, the experience, the speed, the sensation of freedom. Can you get that on the basketball court? Without a game or competitor, isn't basketball just practice? Surfing is never just practice. It's always the moment. It's always magical. Even a mediocre session will make the rest of the world disappear. However, my buddy claims that if you ask any kid playing ball by himself at the park how shooting hoops alone makes him feel, he'll give you the same answer a surfer would when describing a solo session.

It's hard for me to connect since I throw like a girl (actually more like a girl who can't throw very well) and even into my adult life was the last picked for softball ever since that lobbing pop fly flopped right out of my glove. Take me to the beach please. Skateboarding...snowboarding...even figure skating, I get it: Expression and art and beauty and style. There it is. What about style? A carve across a wave is like a broad stroke of a brush. A spirit's fingerprint sprayed upon a canvas like graffiti lasting just an instant. However, I must admit that each ball player has a unique style as well. I recognize a Kobe or Jordan shot from a mile away. So I guess a comparison can be made. In essence, they are both sports for sure since surfing has contests and judges and jerseys and such. Sports Illustrated even listed surfing number 23 on its list of toughest "sports." So I guess that's official. Is surfing really different from basketball? Both are sports and both inspire religious-like devotion.

Slater said, "Surfing is like the mafia. Once you're in. You never get out." But Jordan once stated, "Even when I'm old and gray, I won't be able to play it, but I'll still love the game." The implications are similar here in that one is a member for life. Even at 90, one will long for a long tube or a perfect 3-point swish from out back. Further, both sports have different sensibilities. There are freestylers and competitors. For no money or trophies, ballers shred the blacktop doing street tricks like skateboarders busting airs over trash cans. Watching these guys isn't unlike catching Jamie Obrien rodeo flipping a section at Off The Wall or Dion Agius going stalefish over a grubby sandbar. Or even better, check this. It's pure creative expression. On the other side, there's the win-at-all-costs competitive mind set in which athletes use both strategy and skill to outscore an opponent. Are we unique as surfers? It sure feels like it.

But maybe that's just what we want...to be different, to be the only ones in on it. After all, "only a surfer knows the feeling." But maybe, "only a curler knows the feeling." "Only a singer knows the feeling." It's the feeling that is the same. That connection to something pure where blood and brain and spirit somehow tune in and out at the same time. Nothing else matters in the tube, on the court, on the mountain, on the stage. I don't know. I still think surfing is different, but why? It's a mystery. Maybe that's what makes us different. It's the mystery.

Is Surfing Unique? originally appeared on About.com Surfing / Bodyboarding on Monday, June 7th, 2010 at 11:02:25.

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Let's Get Meta-physical
Posted on 7 Jun 2010 at 8:13am

A few years back Garrett Lisi raised the eyebrows of physics scholars with a purported "theory of everything." The basis of this is what's called the E8 pattern. Lisi explains his idea is "simply" that this E8 pattern "describes an
exceptionally complex, high dimensional, smooth shape, implying that
each elementary particle corresponds to a different way this shape can
move over the fabric of our space-time."

If you're scratching your head, thinking I don't understand...and what does this have to do with surfing? Well, Lisi, as it turns out, is not just stoked on galactic worm holes, spiraling double helix vortices, and the curvature of the space-time continuum (I'm not sure what I just wrote and I don't know if he even cares about that stuff but it was a lot of fun to write). Instead, he spends most of his time surfing perfect Maui reefs and getting barreled all winter. I got a chance to talk with Garrett and ask him how the "Theory of Everything" connects to surfing and whether or not it can help me navigate the tube. Read the interview...

Let's Get Meta-physical originally appeared on About.com Surfing / Bodyboarding on Monday, June 7th, 2010 at 08:13:51.

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Finding "God" in the Lineup
Posted on 1 Jun 2010 at 1:34pm

Here is a re-post below that has generated lots of feedback. It came to my mind as I watched Jaimal Yogis' video about his book Saltwater Buddha: a surfer's quest to find Zen on the sea. It made me think of the great stories that surfers experience in a life of riding waves and what motivates them. Is it a higher power, a noble cause, or a selfish pleasure? Maybe all of them...

This article is quite insane (in a good way). It falls into the surf philosophy, psychology, and spirituality realm. An adventurer journalist/surfer finds his spiritual compass after falling to chronic Lyme Disease. He speaks lucidly and convincingly on religious connections to surfing and how we get the benefits and lessons of the world's faith in the unknown by paddling out into the very real lineup. He hits on some cool issues. Let me know what you think in the comment link below. Is surfing a religious experience? Do we experience God in the ocean? Is it just a physical reaction to the physical world?

Finding "God" in the Lineup originally appeared on About.com Surfing / Bodyboarding on Tuesday, June 1st, 2010 at 13:34:26.

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Accent on Surfing in Australia!

The Surfing Capital Of Australia

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