With Perth experiencing its coldest winter for at least two decades in 2016, the wild men of Western Australia based brand Severne knew it was time to round up the horses and head to sunnier climes for some warm water wave rides and R&R / R&D in the Indian Ocean waters of Mauritius. Along for the ride with the posse, was our very own ‘gun for hire’, John ‘Shooter’ Carter and his trusty Canons, primed to capture the Cowboys on tour. Long serving Severne rider Scotty McKercher tells the tale of their adventure and shares his memories of an epic trip. !

Words  Scott McKercher // Photos  John Carter

(This feature originally appeared in the January February issue of Windsurf Magazine. To read more features like this first, Print and Digital subscriptions are available. Prices include delivery globally for 10 x issues a year!)

THE CALL
This is the second time this has happened to me. Whatever I was doing at the time was abruptly halted by Ben Severne lobbing the Mauritius card at me! ‘Whatcha doing? Wanna go to Mauritius? Carter and ‘Hoops’ are coming!’ (Hoops aka James Hooper, Severne board shaper) and Carter who needs no introduction! A real crew of Cowboys! It was a tough one to pass up, no matter how busy I was at the time (I was stacked with work!); but once the seed was planted, the thought was imbedded in my mind there was only one answer. “Sure. When we going.” Gun for hire Carter, or otherwise known as ‘The great Carzini’, is the perpetual travelling workhorse and also never says no to a trip. And if I was honest, the fact he was going was one of the reasons I couldn’t say no. Along with the fact that I hadn’t been wave sailing for way too long.

 

“ Ben Severne is a clever bugger, and one of the few who’s maintained the delicate blend of work and passion ”

 

THE WORD SPREAD
Since Polakow’s first article and Fred Gravoiles infamous ‘Trilogy tour’ visit in the late ’90s, (where localism got a little bit out of hand), Mauritius has been well and truly on the map. There’s not that many perfectly clean, consistently windy down the line surf breaks around the world! As a result, it was inevitable word was to spread about One Eye, particularly with an abundance of hotels lining the foreshore and the natural beauty of the Le Morne landscape and its incredible flat water lagoon. On arrival at the airport, I was greeted by a couple of pickups and we were whisked across the mountains, which takes about an hour. I slept the entire way (shattered from flying Thailand to Perth and then directly to Mauritius), only waking as we pulled into La Gaulette, which is a small town just before Le Morne and the larger hotel accommodations. At least I had time for a shower though. Ben flew in from China, had his flight diverted to Adelaide because of fog and only just made it in time, literally sprinting to the check-in counter in order to make the flight.

LE MORNE
Austrian wave sailor and ex PWA competitor Tom Hartmann lives part of the year in Mauritius and has also set up a company (SION) which sorts out all your logistics once on the island. We were put up in a very comfortable apartment with splendid views over the lagoon and majestic Le Morne. It’s situated in a town where the atmosphere feels a little more real than the contrived surroundings of a hotel, and you get to meet colourful characters like the fella who runs the American café. By the paraphernalia on the walls, he was a bit of a golf nut and within a few words, after I mentioned I played golf, he was inviting us for a round! Unfortunately not taken up due to it being windy all the time, which Carter must have been thankful for so as not to endure any more humiliation in our history of sporting encounters!

BEAUTY AND THE BEAST
I’ve made the sojourn to Mauritius a few times now and straight away had to stop myself from taking the beauty of this island for granted. It’s insanely picturesque and rates up there with anywhere on Earth I reckon. Especially as you drive around the impressive mountain of Le Morne and even more so when you pull into the shaded parking lot and the wave comes into view. The first words I heard spoken of this wave was from an animated Josh Angulo as he revered about the wave, its speed, how gnarly it was at low tide and the rip current when the swell gets big. And experience has taught me, it’s all true! At over 6 feet, I’ve sped mid face down the line at warp speed and still not been able to make the section, having to straighten out and grind my fin over the reef. They were single fin days of course, now it is a bit easier with quads! Also during the infamous Trilogy, Ricky Van de Toorn launched into a massive air, tried to avoid the cameraman, landed flat, snapped his tibia and fibula and then proceeded to get smashed even more in the line-up. Horrible! I’ve been stuck in a rip barely able to swim. Once I’d already made it back into the lagoon but was starting to get sucked back out again through the rip in the channel. My hand has never being happier to touch the side of a rescue boat! Both of these scenarios probably would have been fatal without the assistance of having a boat out there. Safety is a necessity, especially when One Eye is maxed out! Our week however, had not one iota of drama to report. The swells were moderate at head to logo high, the trades were perfect 5.0. My absolute perfect recipe for wave sailing enjoyment. Having not sailed for a while, I was reminded how energy consuming long wave-rides were, with my first few waves leaving me gasping for air and forearms burning. My body’s cells slowly remembered, finding rhythm and flow, slowly finding myself again.

Mr Ben Severne
As always, Ben was totally killing it. His sailing just gets better and better as he gets older and more in tune with his gear. Driven vert gouges, Goiters, 360’s, he does it all, and is one of my geriatric mates that’s still pushing hard with the froth of a grommet disguised as someone who’s developing and testing gear. Every part of his rig componentry is renowned for being head of the class and his board act looks like following suit. To be honest I was a little sceptical about his and James Hooper’s new stealthy looking project, ( The ‘Nano’) as I never really got on with their Nuevo, but the Nano pretty much blew me away, setting the bar pretty high for how good my new quads I’m trying to develop have got to be. The truth is Ben Severne is a clever bugger, and one of the few who’s maintained the delicate blend of work and passion, with not having or wanting kids being a big part of his plan. Thankfully also perfectly fine with his wife, Mrs Emma Severne. Who’s also a pretty understanding soul with Ben forever on some mission somewhere for either going sailing or sorting out some part of his product at the factory in China. He’s a little bit ‘schizo’, in that he comes across as super mellow and laid back, presenting his range at the dealer meeting whilst drinking a ‘tinny’ for example, but the truth is he’s intensely driven and a perfectionist. You could call him a paradox. But to simplify a complex character, as he puts it, he just likes to make ‘cool shit’ to make windsurfing ‘more fun’, and usually sails till one part of his body fails.

MAURITIUS CUISINE
When you have sailed to exhaustion, as we did each day, it’s a bit of a tack back to the beach and on most days, there was a pretty hefty wait at the food van. There were a couple of vans working the beach, but they seemed to work on roster, so your baguette or curries were always well appreciated by the time you got them. (Because it took bloody ages!) The food in Mauritius reflects the multi cultured layers of influence that exist between Indian / African and French / European tastes, quite often with a bit of fusion flair. There were quite a few restaurants around La Gaulette, but every night we kept gravitating back to Enso’s, as it seemed most people did. This was a local eatery owned and run by another windsurf ‘frother’, Rok Flanders. ‘Rok’ is a Slovenian who moved to Mauritius after using it as an off-season base from winning snowboard world cups and world championships. He’s come up with the right combination of bar, slash restaurant, which serves up the fresh fish available on the island along with a menu from someone who’s obviously travelled a lot and enjoys good food. He treated us to some entrees and desserts that were truly out of this world! Severne was always falling asleep every night from having sailed too much, but Carter and Hoops always egged each other on, having the one or two extra beers that we didn’t quite need. Typical Carter! Myself on the other hand opted for a vanilla infused flavoured rum that is quite typical of the island to finish off a night. Far more civilized!

 

“ All the other days pale into insignificance compared to these, with memories so much crisper as a result of the clarity of water, sky, waves, sun and wind ”

 

‘HOOPS’
Hoops has been a mate of Ben from when they both used to live in South Australia. And like many, came to Western Australia to windsurf and never went back. James was building his own boards for a long time before he developed the Nuevo boards for Starboard, under his own label Nude. A highly competent wave sailor in his own right, this was his first visit to Mauritius. He got to learn the set up of how things work the hard way, which is when you get caught behind the section it invariably means a trip over the reef, then the big tack up in the lagoon to come back around, or if there’s enough wind and it’s not too big, you can skizzle out through the channel. A channel is being generous in definition though, as it’s just a very small gap in the reef where all the water surges back out from the lagoon. You figure that one out pretty quickly after a couple of laps. James got it sussed though and got to savour the delights of warm water perfect reeling wave sailing perfection, but with a little bit more caution than the breaks at home. Made all the sweeter while winter in West Oz was at its dreariest.

JUMPING SESSION
This is where our ages became obvious, as we had to get airborne for JC for some jumping shots at little reef, which is basically straight out off the beach across the lagoon. Hoops was throwing down some old school cheese rolls, while I hoicked out a couple of ‘Grandpa’ style table tops, which must have been the first I’ve done for at least 5 years. Basically I rarely jump these days, unless there’s a primo ‘backie’ ramp which I can’t say no to. My titanium hip and shonky meniscus in my knee just doesn’t handle the stress. This may well have been the last tabletop I ever throw down. ‘Ya’ never know! But it’s funny how you don’t seem to forget how to do one, even after having not done them for so long. Ben still jumps a lot and he’s pretty darn good at it, but I don’t know why. He’s had more foot and ankle problems of anyone I know, but still does all kind of loops and contorted moves like Goiters when he is wave riding. Not so smart for a smart fella! But that’s the Beauty of Le Morne. You can mix it up with different types of sailing. There’s also the other wave out from little reef called Manawa, but I’m still to catch that any good.  Every time I’ve gone there I’ve had a couple and thought bugger this, I’m going back over to One Eye.

FREERIDE SESSION
Obviously on the windiest day, Severne proclaims we have to do some freeride shots. Again something I wasn’t that keen on, as the last time I did that my hips didn’t handle the jarring of the flat rockers on chop that well. Severne assured me that his boards were super smooth riding due to the tonne of “V” in them and that they were a “cushion ride”. There was also the other concern I had of blasting around the lagoon at low tide, as the last time I was here I launched off the beach, hit a rock, got launched again, landed on another rock and cracked a rib. My fears were unfounded however as there was plenty of water and it was actually quite pleasant blasting around the bay.

GOING OFF WITH A BANG
Another memory from previous trips was the presence of fireworks and crackers in shops. Scott Carvill and myself finding it quite funny when he placed a rather large one (bomb pretty much) underneath a fellow Trilogy competitor’s Mini Moke. I’ve grown up a lot since then, but when I saw the fireworks for sale in the supermarket, my inner child couldn’t help but grab a packet to mark the end of a glorious week of wave sailing. These were artillery shells, as it said on the packet, and didn’t disappoint. Each launch was like a space shuttle and it whistled off, blasting into nothingness like a mini universe. Truly amazing you could buy such items off of the shelf in a supermarket. And just as surprising was the next-door neighbour who didn’t even lift his head from reading his newspaper. But this was the last image I savoured as Carter and I were whisked away back to the airport.

OVER AND OUT
Short, fast, loud. We came, we rode in and rode out of town for only five days, such a short stint for having come so far, but so worthwhile. Because all the other days pale into insignificance compared to these, with memories so much crisper as a result of the clarity of water, sky, waves, sun and wind; a trip like this truly lets you remember why you became a windsurfer. Giddy up!

FACT BOX
Best time to visit – June to November

Travel Agents
www.sportif.travel
www.planetwindsurfholidays.com

Gear rental
www.ion-club.net
www.si-on.com

Accommodation
Hotel Riu (4*) and St Regis (5*)

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