Surf Is Where You Find It (Revised and Expanded)

I got a phone call from a woman in New York who said she was from the 60 Minutes TV show and was putting together a program on tow-in surfing. She said she was Lesley Stahl’s assistant and that they wanted to do the show on Maui sometime in the fall. This was in late summer. Braden was her name, and she said she had seen the Laird video and thought there might be a good show for 60 Minutes in it.

She asked if I would be interested. I said maybe after I heard more about exactly what they wanted to do. A month passed before I heard from Braden again, but when she did call she was very excited. Lesley Stahl thought the show was a good idea. She was all for it.

Lesley Stahl is a very well-known TV news correspondent who covered the White House during the Reagan and Carter years for Meet the Press. She has been with CBS and 60 Minutes for as long as I can remember. In addition to her interviews with U.S. presidents, I had watched her interview such world leaders as Margaret Thatcher, Boris Yeltsin, even Yasser Arafat. Now she was going to be interviewing a bunch of surfers. I definitely wanted to be in on this.

So another month went by before Braden called again and said they finally had settled on mid-November for the shoot. I had missed my fall Indo trip but had managed a quick surf trip down to San Jose del Cabo instead. With the start of the fall surf season in Oregon, I had a lot of surfing under my belt and felt in pretty good shape.

Darrick called a few times to tell me that he would have my tow-in board and everything else ready when I got there so I didn’t need to bring anything. I started to look forward to the trip even though the snow had begun to fall and it looked like we might have an early snowboard season. At the same time, I started to have second thoughts. My wife Toni reinforced those thoughts. “If it’s big Jaws, you better just sit in the channel,” she warned.

Being physically in shape may be one thing, but being mentally in shape for big Jaws is something altogether different. I reassured Toni that I would be careful.

For someone who has spent a great deal of time traveling the world, I found the trip to Maui a lot longer than I ever remembered. I found out how out of shape I was for a five-hour plane ride. I shuddered when I thought about the long trip down to Indo, which is five times longer than the short one to Hawai’i.

I finally arrived in Kahului late Thursday night, and as I was wandering through the airport looking for my baggage and rental car, I ran into Sonny Miller, who had just arrived as well. He said Nelson and Janey were outside waiting for him and I should just hook up with them instead of getting a car of my own. Nelson is a good friend who takes care of Laird’s Kaua’i property and was there to drive the camera ski for Sonny.

Janey is Laird and Gabby’s business manager; she put together our side of the whole 60 Minutes deal almost single-handedly. I went outside, jumped into their car, and off we went into the warm Maui night. We ended up at Laird and Gabby’s house while Nelson and Sonny went to stay with Darrick. It felt good to go to sleep with the window open. I can’t do that during the cold winter in the Pacific Northwest.

I woke in the dark to a low, rhythmic throbbing. At first I thought it was jet lag, but as I came awake I realized it was a sound as well as a vibration. My God, I thought, is that surf? To a long-time surfer, it’s an unmistakable sound. Laird’s house is on the mauka, or mountain, side of the highway, at least several miles from the ocean. As I got up and made my way through the dark house toward the kitchen, I noticed the garage light was lit. I went into the garage to find Laird ripping open the packaging on the new tow-in board I had brought over for him.

A huge smile lit up his face as he went back to unpacking the board. “Yeah man,” he answered.

His cackle exposed the glee he was feeling. The winter so far had been a big surf dud, and the boys had spent too much time sitting around twiddling their thumbs. I was already feeling the energy of the booming surf, and now I could feel Laird’s energy like a heat wave.

He peeled away the last bubble packaging from the little peashooter that would be his vehicle on waves that are beyond most people’s imaginations, mine included.

“Well, as near as I could remember, I think that’s what you told me you wanted the last time I saw you,” I told him.

Last time had been when I jetted down to LA to do some narration work on another movie Laird and Janey were putting together called The Ride. That had been a quick trip, and we only had a brief chance to talk about new tow-in boards. I watched him go through the typical surfer new-board checkout and waited for his reaction.

First he hefted the board, feeling its weight and balance. Then, holding both rails, he hoisted it in front of him, at once looking at the nose section and getting a feel for the rails. Next he put it under one arm while running his other hand up and down the rail from midsection to the nose. Finally, he grabbed the one rail with both hands, holding it down by his knees, and checked the rocker and the foil.

“Beautiful … and perfect,” he said to me with a big grin. “This is going to do the job.”

Laird, his ski and boards lashed to the sled, loaded for bear or anything else that the ocean might throw at him. Photo: Tom Servais

I let out a big sigh of relief. As a shaper I never know what to expect when I present a surfer of Laird’s caliber with a new board. This first-encounter bonding ritual is a crucial part in the acceptance cycle. It’s the first step in the mating dance that goes on with every new board because if there is any negative reaction in this initial encounter, it will carry over into the first go-out or, worse, may relegate the board to the back of the garage where it won’t even get a chance in the water.

Laird said, “OK, we need to strap this thing up, rally the boys, and get going. I know we’re going to get some good waves somewhere.”

It was still dark as we piled into Laird’s truck and drove the short distance over to Darrick’s house. DD was already up and running.

“Coffee’s hot in the kitchen,” he called out from the garage where he was getting his equipment ready for the day. “Swell is six to ten degrees out of the northeast; interval is not great but it sounds pretty big to me,” he announced. “GL, your 6’6” is right here; we just need to change the foot straps around to goofy. You want me to get you a cup of herb tea?”

“Yeah that sounds good. I need to rig up Laird’s new shooter—you guys got some Astrodeck?” I answered.

“Oh yeah, we got everything, but let’s take a look at this new stick,” DD replied.

No one is more tuned-in to the equipment side of surfing than Darrick is. It is a pleasure to make boards for him because not only is he very appreciative and makes good use of all of them, but he also constantly gives me feedback on every aspect of each board. One time he and Laird called me on their cell phone from their jet ski in the channel at Jaws after some particularly great rides on a brand-new board.

He went on lovingly fondling the new board. In addition to keeping me informed of his own equipment needs and wants, DD also feeds me, in great detail, relevant info for Laird’s boards as well.

Handling it as gently as he does his newborn daughter, he set the tail down lightly at his feet and pressed the board to himself. “Six foot, two inches, same size as me; this thing is just raring to go.”

We got busy getting it ready to use, putting the Astrodeck down, drilling out the inserts, and screwing in the foot straps. Laird and DD debated over which fins to use and finally settled on some special G10 shapes personally done for them by Curtis Hesselgrave at Future Fin Systems. Soon we were ready to go. Janey came by to say she would go coordinate the 60 Minutes people while we went to get the jet skis from ‘The G-Man,’ their personal super-duper mechanic in Ha’iku.

Kawasaki USA had come through with two brand-new 1200cc, four-stroke models for the boys. Apart from some minor test-running and fine-tuning, they had never been bloodied in action yet. This would be their debut. They looked ready for it all shiny and bright.

G-Man gave us the scoop on the trick tune-up he had done the night before and some last-minute advice on running the new skis. We hooked up the double trailer and were off.

As we drove by Ho’okipa we saw a set that was gigantic. This is the stuff Laird lives for; he couldn’t stop giggling with excitement. I was glad we were headed to the west side where I knew the waves would have to wrap almost ninety degrees and likely would be quite a bit smaller than the monsters we saw between Maliko and Ho’okipa.

Next stop was the gas station in Pa’ia where we ran into some other jet ski teams all headed for the other side, too. As we drove down the cane field road to Ilima’s house at Baldwin to meet Dave Kalama, Laird started to think about his stomach.

Laird got on his phone, called Janey, and asked her to find him something to eat. I was a bundle of nerves by this time and the last thing on my mind was food. We pulled into Ilima’s beachfront yard and there were the remaining members of the team. His son Dave, Sonny, and Nelson were busy hooking up jet ski trailers and tying down equipment and were generally in a white-hot, surf-fever frenzy. The surf was up, the day was young, and we were ready.

Janey arrived shortly thereafter with the 60 Minutes crew in tow. The camera team jumped out to film the preparation action as it happened. Janey also had about twenty pounds of food for Laird from Anthony’s, his everyday breakfast spot in Pa’ia.

We decided the surfers would all go to Honolua Bay first to check it out and figure out what to do from there, while the others would go get the rest of their stuff and meet us somewhere on the west side. Soon we were off and running, a convoy of jet skis, specialized tow-in equipment, and hot-to-trot surfers. Needless to say, the energy level was at a peak high.

We drove through Kahului and headed out toward the west side. As we rounded the bend by Thousand Peaks, I could see whitewater on Olowalu Point. Laird and I wondered if this was south swell and speculated that maybe it was north swell wrapping this far around the island. As we arrived at a vantage point where we could see the Olowalu surf break and Launiupoko Beach Park in the distance, we couldn’t believe how much surf was there. At last we could see the direction.

It was north swell wrapping down a coastline that usually is open only to summer swells from far south. Puamana looked like a pointbreak. We watched a guy get a 200-yard right slide on a well-overhead wave. Cars were parked all along the road, and there were a ton of surfers out in the unusual but outstanding surf conditions.

When a north swell is big enough, it turns the whole west side into a series of pointbreaks as the waves wrap down the coast. Driving past Lahaina toward Honokowai, it’s impossible to see through the trees and bushes as we could earlier on the road. Recent developments blocked the view at the former drive-by surf check spots of Rainbows and Osterizers. The entire Honokowai-Kahana-Napili area is so built up with houses and apartments these days that a person can’t even see the ocean anymore.

Heading up Pineapple Hill I looked back and told Laird I could see lines of whitewater sweeping the coast. Coming over the other side of the hill, we both could see all the way to the outside of Honolua Bay. There was definitely a lot of surf. Maybe too much, a condition neither of us had experienced on this side of the island.

Going by Stables and Slaughterhouse Beach all we could see were waves breaking further out than we had ever seen. Tourists were parked all over the place gawking at the huge surf. Driving down the dirt road above Honolua, we knew the swell was too big for the bay to hold.

The wind was a light northerly trade making the waves a bit sloppy. Not that it mattered; Subs, the outermost break at Honolua Bay, was breaking out in the middle of the Pailolo Channel and the bay looked like the ocean water in Victory at Sea. It was a mess.

Just then Laird’s cell phone rang. The caller was Archie Kalepa, saying that he, Buzzy Kerbox, and Mark Anderson were going out at S-Turns—it was looking like J-Bay at six to eight feet. We turned our caravan around and headed toward Napili.

A local family has a homemade boat ramp next to their property on Napili Bay. Their ramshackle home is a bit incongruous amongst all the high-rise development in the area, but to us it is like a touch of old Hawai’i in the midst of malahinis, or tourists, and concrete. We asked the old man as he sat outside on his plywood deck watching TV whether we could use his boat ramp.

“Go ‘head, but you guys betta watch out, the waves stay only big today,” he replied.

We told him that was why we were there, and he just laughed. He said he would enjoy watching us.

The 60 Minutes camera crew filmed us making last-minute equipment preparations, getting into our surf gear, and launching the jet skis off the sketchy ramp. The tide was coming in and the surge coming up the ramp made the launching a little hairy, but Laird, DD, and Kalama are probably the world’s best, so they made it look easy. Laird and Kalama teamed up while DD and I got on the second ski. Sonny and Nelson got their camera equipment loaded up on the third ski and we were all ready to go.

As we motored out through the faint channel we saw that the sets were relentless. Getting out through the surfline would require precise timing and a little luck. DD and Laird expertly picked a brief lull, jetted out through the impact zone, and before I had time to worry, we were safely outside the lineup.

S-Turns is a pretty obvious but seldom-ridden surf break. Windsurfers like it when the north wind and north swell are up, but today the surf was too big and the wind too light for them.

I took a deep breath and unpacked my board from the rescue sled while he got out the towrope and attached it to the back of the ski. Laird and Kalama were nearby, but Laird wanted to try out his foil board and they were getting that toy ready.

He looped around me with the ski, presenting me with the towrope handle. I took another deep breath as he idled out to the end of the rope and gave him the nod. With a big smile on his face, he gassed it, and I was up and riding. We rolled over a few waves and then saw a pretty good-sized one coming our way. DD lined up the ski, looked back at me as he ran down the swell, and, when he gauged the timing was right, turned back out to sea, whipping me at full speed into the long, lined-up wave.

I flew into the wave, zipping along so fast that my board was skipping like a stone above the wave’s surface. The first thing I noticed was that this wave was not six to eight feet; as the thick swell slowed, steepened, and began to grow in height, I glanced down the face and saw that this wave was an easy fifteen feet. And it wasn’t even starting to break yet. I took an even deeper breath and planned my attack. I figured I would just stay near the top of the wave since it was lined up far ahead.

The 6’6” board felt small on a wave this size, especially going this fast. I stayed in the top third of the wave, pumping and weaving to maintain speed. I thought I must be covering a lot of ground going so fast, but there was no end to the wave. I kept going and it kept forming ahead. Finally it looked like a section too long to make so I eased out over the top. DD was right behind and swooped quickly around me as I glided to a stop. Just before I started to sink, I grabbed the handle and yelled go.

Again we were off. As we turned back in the direction from which we had come I looked shoreward and saw that we had traveled a long way down the reef. The hotel we had caught the wave in front of seemed a long distance back from where we were now. Funny how that is—it seemed like just a brief moment on the wave, but it must have taken some time to ride so far.

We motored back up north and DD looked back at me, pointing out another wave, several waves behind the one we were going over. I gave him the thumbs up, and he swooped into position for another nice launch into a choice wave. The wind was a little out of the north, making the waves a tad bumpy, but at least it was downwind in the direction we were riding.

This wave was slightly smaller and I began to loosen up. I faded down the face, turning hard and deep at the bottom, and snapping turns off the top. I was riding a 6’6” by 16” board on a twelve-foot-plus wave, so the board felt as slippery as a bar of soap. When I pulled out, DD was right there for another quick pickup and we zoomed back to the lineup. There was a momentary lull and I needed to tighten my foot straps, so once we got outside I gave Darrick the stop signal and let go of the rope.

“Oh, they saw that first wave you got and decided to forget the foil board, they went in to get their tow-in boards,” he answered, “They’ll be back any second.”

As if to emphasize the point, we watched a ski whip Laird into a wave way up the line. On his new 6’2” he was making these enormous leaps off the chop on the wave’s face and flying twenty feet before landing, and then launching off another bump for another twenty feet down the line. By the time he got even with us, he had probably been in the air 80 percent of the time and on the wave only 20 percent. He gave us a huge grin and a big hoot as he flew by. My foot straps were repaired and ready, so we got up again as another huge wave loomed.

My strategy is always to catch the biggest wave in the set. That way, I figure, there isn’t a bigger wave behind the one I’m riding to catch me inside. Starting off standing up gives a surfer a big advantage in spotting the waves coming in. When I gave Darrick the go-ahead, it was on what looked to me the biggest wave of the set. He slung me into it, and I took off down the line.

Far away in the distance I saw Dave still following Laird’s wave. Laird had to have been riding that wave for at least a mile. He also must have been going a whole lot faster than I was. He made that long section, where I figured to exit the wave because it didn’t look makeable to me.

As I came over the top of my wave, I saw there was a bigger one behind and it was already breaking. This was going to be tight. Darrick came flying in and put the rope where I could grab it. I didn’t even wait for the handle when I saw the look of concern on his face. I knew he was looking at the wave behind me. I grabbed the rope short and told him to hit it. I didn’t dare turn around and look, I needed all my concentration to not blow the pickup.

Once I was up and planing, I let the rope slide through my fingers until I got a good grip on the handle. Only then did I turn around and look behind. The biggest wave we had seen so far was right on the tail of my board. I held on a little tighter. We were going through choppy water from the wave in front and I didn’t want to fall off here. I held on with a death grip while Darrick gassed it straight in and we pulled away from the wave. Now we were inside the surfline, but at least we were safe.

Darrick pulled me around inside while we waited for a lull to get back out. Pulling someone over whitewater is a tricky maneuver but DD had it down. He positioned the ski so both ski and rider went over the wave at the same time. If the ski goes straight out, the towrope drags in the wave and pulls the rider down.

We soon got our lull and were back in the lineup. I had already gotten about ten waves, so I signaled Darrick that he should go. We stopped out where Dave and Laird were changing riders too. They paused when I dropped off the rope next to them.

“Eh brah, we thought you were toast, did you see how big that wave was behind you? You did good on that pickup, that was close … real close. The last thing we saw when we went over the wave was you waiting for the rope and then we couldn’t see anymore and didn’t know if you made it or not. But guess you did,” they were both as happy as I was that I hadn’t taken a beating.

So with DD and Kalama on the towropes, we swung back into action. Darrick was riding the new 6’0” pintail I had made for him and Dave was on a little 5’6” Timpone shooter. It didn’t seem like the sets were as big as when we were first out, but there were still plenty of great waves and the sets were plenty big for the boys on their tiny boards.

After a few medium ones, I pulled Darrick into a pretty good-sized wave and nosed up to the back of it trying to watch his track from behind to get an idea of where he was and what he was doing. He blazed down the line going very fast. I was almost at full throttle trying to keep up. I could see his track as a faint line on the back of the lip and Darrick just kept wailing down the wall. And then the wave sectioned and I couldn’t see his track anymore. I slowed down wondering why he would straighten out instead of kicking out. I thought maybe he had enough speed to go around under the section. By then I could see the wave was closed out and still no sign of Darrick.

I slowed down even more, looking back up the line to see if I had missed him. No Darrick that way. I rubbernecked to the left and the right but he was nowhere to be seen. Finally near total exasperation, I saw Laird and Dave pulling back out and they were both pointing in to what I assumed was Darrick’s position. I started heading in, and finally saw him inside and farther down the line than I expected. But I had delayed too long.

The next wave was breathing down my neck, and I could see that there wouldn’t be time to grab him. I could go in front of the wave but would miss him, have to go all the way inside and work my way back out over the waves behind. It would be a while before I would get to him. The alternative was to try to get over this wave bearing down on me. Darrick would have to eat one more wave, but then I could get to him.

I decided to try to get over the wave behind. I raced down the line, pegging the throttle on that big 1200cc four-stroke. I was looking for an opening on the wave face that wasn’t too steep so I could ease up over the top without catching too much air. It didn’t look good, the wave was starting to section down the line, and once it broke, my chance to get over it would be gone.

I saw a small section where I thought I could slip over, but it was closing down fast so I had to act fast. I was hauling ass going parallel to the wave, and when I got to the open section, I turned the ski up the face and made my move. I was going way too fast, everything worked like I planned until I hit the top of the wave. Even with the throttle backed off, my momentum was enough to launch me a long distance in the air.

I guess I thought I was on one of the older, smaller, and lighter skis and that I could correct my angle once I was in the air. But that 1200 was a hog and I came down the same way I went up … sideways. Landing on the port rail didn’t allow the jet to propel me out of the splash like I had hoped. I was pitched forward and jammed the end of the left handlebar straight into my groin—oof!

The ski bounced up and landed back on the starboard side this time. Again I was thrown forward into the other side of the handlebar. Somehow I held on, a little sore and out of breath but safely behind the wave and ready to swing in to pickup Darrick. I reached for the throttle lever but was shocked to find it wasn’t there.

What the hell—I could see the next wave was big and bearing down on me. I glanced down at the throttle assembly and saw that the entire throttle lever was gone, sheared off at the base. The broken piece was lying down in the gunwale near my foot. I reached into the assembly with my fingernails, tearing them in the process, but somehow got enough of the throttle cable to pull on to make the throttle work. Moving again, I dashed in to get Darrick. I got the rope to him and pulled him up before the next wave could get us. Farther inside where it was safe, I slowed, dropping DD into the water, then circled back to him.

Showing him the broken throttle lever, I told him we were done for the day. I thought he would be angry since he only got a couple of waves, but he was more concerned if I was OK. My right hand felt like I had broken something, but it was only the unbreakable ABS plastic throttle lever that broke. My index knuckle was only bruised and sore.

I told DD about taking the handlebar in the groin, and, always the lifeguard, he said we should check for damage right now. So trying to keep our balance on the bobbing ski, he unzipped my wetsuit, and I peeled it down to take a look. It was already black and blue, but except for being a little sore, it looked pretty minor. Six inches lower and I probably would have been singing soprano. Except for taking the ski out of action for the day, I had gotten off light.

We motored in and beached the ski. There was a huge crowd of people along the road watching the action and traffic was backed up. My brother Victor was there with his tow-in board looking for a ride, but I said our ski was broken. He said there were about six skis out there. I remembered seeing some other skis off in the distance when we were out there but, except for Laird and Dave, had never gotten close to any of them. We figured they would be coming in to gas up sooner or later and someone would give him a tow.

A guy across the street offered his outside hot shower, which I gladly accepted. Nothing could have felt so good to my bruised and battered body. The 60 Minutes crew had a room on the sixth floor of the Napili Shores Hotel to film from. I decided to go down there to watch the action and lick my wounds.

Laird and Kalama outclassed the rest of the field by a large margin, not only in their wave riding but in their entry and pickup techniques as well. It was obvious they were in a league of their own. From the vantage point above, I could see the action of both surfer and ski and watched Dave running the ski at full speed behind the wave while Laird on the wave appeared to be going even faster and would pull away. I know those Kawasakis are capable of fifty miles per hour in flat water, maybe a bit slower in these surf conditions, but Laird had to be going somewhere in the neighborhood of fifty. It was a sight to behold. Victor got out with Mark Anderson and had a good time speeding down the long-riding waves.

Finally, the sun got lower and the day began to come to an end. It seemed like it went by in a hurry, but time has a way of doing that when everyone is having fun. We loaded up the jet skis, said adios to all the people, and headed back to the other side of the island. It was dark when we got back and everyone was pooped. Laird and I dropped the skis back off at G-Man’s. He chuckled about breaking the unbreakable throttle lever but said he would have everything ready to go again the next morning. We limped home, ate a quick dinner, and hit the hay.

Morning came quickly, and while the booming surf was not as loud as the day before, it was still there. A little weary, sore, and bruised, I dragged myself out of bed and into a wake-up shower. I knew we had a big day ahead. Lesley Stahl was going to be on location today. It would be my job to hang with her and explain what was going on while the other guys were out in the water. I shaved, combed my hair, and brushed and flossed my teeth, thinking I better look my best for one of the most famous news commentators in the world. Laird, his dad Billy, who had just arrived the night before, and I rallied DD, Nelson, and Sonny, gathered the equipment, and headed back to the west side.

The surf wasn’t quite as big as the day before. Arriving at Honolua Bay, we could see that it had tamed down and was very surfable. We went back down to Napili and launched the skis at the old man’s place. He was sitting in the same place, watching TV; he thanked us for the beer we had given him the day before. I drove back up to Honolua with Matt George, who also had come in the night before.

There was quite a crowd gathered on the point watching the action. Four skis were already in the lineup and the waves looked fun. The wind was still light northerly and the sets were an easy ten to twelve feet, but every once in a while a much bigger set would roll through. Laird, Dave, Darrick, Victor, Nelson, and Sonny finally arrived and they immediately went into action.

From the cliff there on the point, the view is about as good as it gets. Matt and I sat back and enjoyed the show while we waited for Lesley. The film crew showed up first, and I helped them find a good location from which to shoot. Finally Lesley, Braden, and the main group pulled up and got out of their cars. Lesley Stahl, who has interviewed world leaders, was completely stunned by the whole scene.

The vantage point from the cliff was similar to the best seats in any athletic stadium. Lesley didn’t completely understand the game or know the players, but the action was undeniably spectacular. Like the pro she is, Lesley didn’t waste a moment. She moved us into position in front of the cameras, where we could talk about what was happening out in the ocean, and her crew got it all on film.

The show was basically going to be about Laird. As if on cue, every wave for the next fifteen minutes came right to him. Everyone else must have been resting because for that time while Lesley and I stood on the cliff, Laird got all the waves. Ride after ride thrilled Lesley to no end. She had never seen anything quite like this, but then again neither had most of the crowd there on the cliff.

Tow-in surfing at Honolua Bay is something very rare. Usually the most crowded surf spot on the whole island, that day the waves were too big for the paddle surfers, so the jet ski teams got to have it by default. I was completely jazzed watching the action. Having surfed there hundreds of times, occasionally in similar conditions, I knew what an advantage it was to tow-in instead of paddle. I couldn’t wait for my own chance. Finally, Lesley figured we had enough of this, and I was free to go surf. She would go up in a helicopter and follow along up above as Laird surfed.

I got on the two-way radio and told Victor and DD that I wanted to surf. They would meet me down at the old boat ramp inside the bay. In the old days at Honolua, everyone used to park down there and paddle out. Over the years the road has deteriorated and a locked gate was put up, but a person can still walk down the old road. It’s an old creek bed and the trees are big and shady. The cliff has a great view, but it’s up in the pineapple field. Up there the terrain is windy, dusty, dirty, and offers no shade. Down at the old ramp, it’s cool and quiet.

I let all the feelings of the early days at Honolua wash over me as I walked down to meet Victor and Darrick. The west side is hot, uncomfortably so, but I felt cool as could be walking down that old road with my surfboard under my arm. The only sounds were the wind whistling through the trees and the birds singing. Victor was waiting at the ramp by himself. He said Darrick swam in at the point since that was where the car was. I jumped on the ski and we motored out to the waves.

Victor and I have surfed Honolua every time it’s good for the past twenty-five to thirty years. We know the place intimately. The main break on a good north by northwest swell is called the Cave. This is the site pictured in most of the photographs seen of Honolua Bay. It’s also so crowded on a good day that many surfers will take one look at the mob scene and not even paddle out.

Just out from the Cave is the Point, which is also a good wave but usually smaller and not as hollow as the Cave. Further out from there is the Coconut Grove or just Coconuts, which is good when the Cave is good and can be very hollow as well. The farthest outside spot is called Subs, named after a huge rock that looks like a submarine surfacing right inside the takeoff zone. On the north to northeast swell direction like that day, Subs is the place the swell hits best and biggest.

Victor and I love Subs because it will hold a big swell and always is the least crowded. To get to tow-in at the place is a treat beyond description. Victor had a great session with Darrick while I was up on the cliff, and he was stoked to get me into some good waves.

The teams who were there earlier must have run low on fuel because by the time we got to the lineup only Laird and Kalama were riding. They pulled up while we were getting ready and said they had to zip back to Napili to do some pickup shots. They said it shouldn’t take long and they would be back as soon as they could.

Now Victor and I had the whole bay to ourselves. Nelson had let Sonny off and now had Billy Hamilton on his ski, but they were just watching from the channel. It was a beautiful day with beautiful waves. There were hundreds of people on the cliff watching us, but the water was empty. Victor saw a set approaching and told me to get ready. We motored out to pick up the biggest wave. The thing about towing-in at a familiar spot is that I feel very comfortable, I know the lineup, I know the wave, I know where I should be and what I should do. This makes the whole process smoother and easier.

Victor knew which wave he thought was best, but he looked back at me to get a final confirmation. I gave him the nod and he gassed the ski into position. Usually whenever we had paddle-surfed out here when it was big, the takeoff positioning was ultracritical; more often than not we would be in the wrong spot and would have to let the wave go by or, worse, be a little too far inside and have to deal with the anxiety of being trapped.

With the jet ski, it was the easiest thing in the world. Victor would flick me into the swell way outside of where it would actually start breaking, but I had so much speed that I could just swoop and glide into any position I wanted. The wave here going into the bay was much smoother than the waves yesterday out at S-Turns. It was like riding warm butter, slicing around, going anywhere I wanted to on the wave face.

My board felt solid and fast and, with each wave, I grew more and more confident and daring. A few times I turned up high and had the wave explode on my back blasting me into the air and back down the wave. With my feet secured in foot straps I could just ride it out. Without foot straps, I would have been knocked off by the exploding whitewater. Sections loomed ahead and started to break, but I had enough speed to go down and around them. Every time I finished a wave, a little out of breath, I asked Victor if he wanted to go in my place.

On one particularly big wave I rode through Coconuts and into the Point where I had to pump the board a little to stay in the wave as it turned the corner. Before I knew it, I was backdooring the Cave section and still riding. Might as well go the whole way I thought and kept milking it right to the end of the Keiki Bowl. I pulled out of the wave almost at the boat ramp when Victor swung in to pick me up.

A look of surprise and joy beamed from his face. I climbed on the sled instead of grabbing the rope for the long ride back out, and we talked about how great the waves were the whole way.

By the time we got back to the lineup, Laird and Kalama were back and ready to go. All afternoon we traded waves. Bigger sets began to show up, maybe a result of the lower tide. The rides were long. At one point, we all pulled over to catch our breath, and Kalama said that because it took four minutes going at least fifteen miles per hour to get back out to lineup, he figured we were getting mile-long rides.

Don Shearer showed up in his hotshot helicopter with Lesley Stahl hanging out the passenger window and zoomed around following Laird as he rode waves so she could get a sensation of the speeds we were riding. Then they were gone, and all of a sudden, we realized that the sun was about to go down. After one last wave each, we packed it up and giddy from the experience, headed back toward Napili under a radiant West Maui sunset. Leaving the sky a psychedelic red-and-orange light show, the sun sank into the sea between Lana’i and Moloka’i as we pulled into Napili Bay.

We got all the skis loaded up and headed out on the road home. It was hard to remember all that had happened that day, all the waves we rode, all the fun we had. Tomorrow would be another day and who could say what that would bring, but the thought of it was far from our minds at that moment. Flashes of waves or rides would flit through our minds and bodies like electric pulses, and we would talk about it, but mostly we would just savor those moments in silence, quiet little smiles on our faces.

The TV show had time constraints that prevented them from showing much more than the interviews with Laird, Gabby, and Billy. Most of us got left on the cutting room floor. But that was fine; the memories of what we had could never be cut from the film reels of our minds. I would go back to Oregon and a great winter of snow; the boys would do a lot more waiting for surf but finally in early January would get an epic day at Jaws.

Life goes on and the surf and snow continue to come on a schedule entirely their own and almost impossible to predict. Surf is where you find it, but it’s always there, if not in the ocean or the mountain on a particular day then always in the mind and spirit. Ride the glide and let the spirit soar.