STEVE THORP’S HOLY GRAIL - THURSO EAST

STEVE THORP’S HOLY GRAIL – THURSO EAST

“The peak was starting to rear up in front of me, sucking truckloads of water off the reef. The wind rushing up the face and accelerating as the burgeoning lip forced it skyward. The two opposing forces fighting each other, standing, the lip taller and taller as it gathered weight. My line was set. If timed right, my board would meet the throwing lip in the split second before it exploded back down into the flats, my clew would just scrape above the danger line – and I’d be fired out the front and into glory.

“A split second too late and I’d be in a reef-liquid lorry sandwich – an arctic artic – picking bits of carbon boom out my teeth and praying my legs weren’t about to be ripped off with one easy twist.

Story & Photos Steve Thorpe & Geoff Hautman

(This feature originally appeared in the August 2014 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!)

WILL IT? WON’T IT?

“The lip was looming above me, the sun went in. I already had flashing visions of it racing off down the line leaving me obliterated in its wake. Oh no was I too late? Vice grip on the boom and gritted teeth waiting for impact, my eyes blasted with spray just before my brain could calculate my fate …

“Whoosh! I was going up, everything weightless, Jesus! Eyes clamped shut, but going through the flight controls as usual – not too much back hand, legs tucked under. Finally opening my eyes just in time to touch down surprisingly far out in the flats and out of danger of the freight train behind me – at least for a moment. Wow what a ride!”

I’ve been up to Thurso quite a few times now, I love the place. The ideal windsurfing forecast is always a big westerly swell driven on by gale-force westerly winds – an outlook that should light up all the epic spots you usually see in the windsurfing and surfing magazines. Occasionally the wind will let us down with the quick-moving lows, give us a respite from the howling wind and we’ll get to ride the greatest wave of them all, Thurso East itself.

TOO GOOD?

Make no mistake! Thurso East is a world-class wave. A huge slab of perfectly positioned flagstone that can mould giant arctic swells into reeling, thick, Indo-style barrels peeling for 100 metres. It is without doubt, one of the best breaks in Europe. An amazing wave for surfing – and almost ‘too good’ for windsurfing. TOO good you say? Well, yes. The problem with this spot – and one other I know in the UK – is that even when it’s seriously big and seriously windy, it still has the precise bathymetry to throw a perfect, very surf-able barrel.

Windsurfing Thurso East is something of a Holy Grail for UK windsurfers. It’s a right-hander, so requires wind from the East, but faces NW, so needs a swell from pretty much the opposite direction. Rarely do the two combine, at least with any real force. I’m not sure anyone has windsurfed Thor’s River (its other name and a clue to the water temperature!) when it’s truly been working, if at all. I’ve had my eye on the necessary forecast for years and it hints at it on an almost weekly basis through the winter, but then fizzles out before it ever happens. It might blow Easterly, but only for half a day (10 hours driving each way for half a days forecast, mmm I’ll pass!) and it might blow easterly, but be accompanied by impossible temperatures, even for someone who doesn’t mind a good dose of hot aches. It’s the most elusive forecast out there and maybe early 2014’s endless epic days were the reason the odds tipped in our favour. I’d heard it mentioned that some of the chargers in Maui were watching this forecast along with the more obvious Cape Verde. Seriously guys, forget it ever happening!

“ MAKE NO MISTAKE! THURSO EAST IS A WORLD-CLASS WAVE ”

SNOW AND STRESS

And so there I was wondering what to do with my weekend. A van needing a new head gasket, too skint to consider hitting Ireland for the massive swell they were receiving and some pretty limp looking charts for Cornwall. Maybe I’d stay put? Saturday morning came around too quickly and I was still at home. Then the usual Thurso forecast, which had been teasingly close to possible, suddenly dropped into ‘maybe’ territory – big swell, but SSE wind only good for surfing, flicking occasionally to E, then flicking back with the next update. Sunday was looking Epic for surfing with a bolt-offshore wind and huge swell. Monday was a little smaller, but could be windsurfing gold!

It’s a long way to go on your own! Not just the cost of the diesel, but a hell of a boring drive on your lonesome (with a blown head gasket, no engine cooling, and no driver heating). Would anyone be up for it so last minute? And hardly the usual three days straight of ‘howling wind and jeepers that swells looking a bit much’. A very real skunking on the cards, they’d need to be able to surf! Enter Geoff Hautman. I’m not quite sure when and how Geoff appeared in my life, but his ‘can do’, ‘let’s go’ attitude has been very welcome! With very little hesitation, Geoff was in.

The alarm woke me up at 3 a.m. after a whopping three hours sleep. I drove (with my coat on) from Leicester to Geoffs in Chester to switch vans. It must’ve been 5 a.m. -we were off! Off very slowly. Geoff, in his excitement perhaps, had forgotten to mention he’d been having a spot of bother with his gearbox. We were now having a lot of bother! Changing gear was an aggressive two-handed effort, usually taking a couple of goes. All we had to do was get up to 6th and not stop until we got to Thurso car park, then we could ring the AA to bring us home on Monday night! Ha! A simple plan – what could possibly go wrong?

“Wow, was that snow on the windscreen or just light rain?”

“Definitely snow”.

After such a mild winter, it was quite a surprise to see some snow. I hadn’t even considered it. So much time spent looking at the forecasts but never even a thought to check the ‘actual weather’. A bit daft, as twice before in the past the snow has caused us major headaches on road trips. It was getting darker. The snow was turning into a blizzard. Single carriageway and the lorries were dropping down to 20 mph., gear changes were needed and Geoff was looking stressed. I was trying not to be stressed, but definitely starting to panic a bit. We needed petrol. We also needed to keep doing 20 mph. and stay sat in the tracks of the bus in front. A quick check of Twitter to see the road situation updates and there it was: ‘Scotland expecting huge dump of snow and the ski season about to get underway this weekend’.

BEST SEATS IN THE HOUSE

It was with great relief and huge excitement that we finally rolled into Thurso. We’d decided that, due to only two hours left of daylight, we’d just jump in for a surf and not waste time looking for windsurfable options (The East coast may well have been going off with a big SE swell and wind). Thurso East was as good as I’d ever seen it – double-overhead-plus and peeling mechanically with a little man slotted in the barrel on every wave. I couldn’t get in quick enough.

With so much wind this year I have to admit my surfing has suffered. I don’t mind getting a good pasting, but I did feel a bit out my depth and hate nothing more than kooking up a good wave with a face plant in front of those waiting their turn. The level seemed ridiculously high. Whilst scratching towards the horizon with every ounce of strength in my body to get under an approaching and seemingly house-sized rogue set, which I was sure I wasn’t going to get under, the guy next to me on my inside, deeper than me, turned and paddled at the last split second under the lip and was gone. As the spray faded I looked back over my shoulder expecting to see a tombstoning board. But no, he was totally gone. He flicked out 10 seconds later a 100 metres down the line. Gob smacked!

Another level. It turns out some of Britain and Ireland’s best surfers were out – including Oli Adams and Fergal Smith – and I was getting more than a front-row seat. A couple of closeout barrels and squeaking out of another meant I left the water pretty stoked after a stressful but classic day. The bigger set waves had been staying wide open. Maybe some pics from the day will surface from the numerous photographers on shore, we forgot to take any!

Geoff was clearly wiped out by the emotions of it all and, after a swift pint, was in bed by 8 p.m. I walked the dog, rang [my wife] Trudie and checked the forecast half a dozen more times. Sleeping wasn’t going to be easy anyway! It was still on, still looking all-time for ‘Big Monday’.

We were up with the sun to try and squeeze every last hour of daylight, but, come ten, we were still driving round. The wind was blowing but looked to be really offshore. The swell was there, but seemed to not be wrapping in anywhere at all. Some of the usual spots were flat (which I couldn’t get my head round with a 17-sec. period of west swell), so finding a sailable place was proving impossible. At least Geoff was getting a guided tour of beautiful Caithness. Of course we wanted to sail Thurso East, but maybe we almost didn’t believe it could happen?

As time ticked on we knew it was now or never. It still looked really offshore and not that big with the dropping tide. It was windy though. I rigged a 4.3 and headed out to join the handful of surfers. A game of tentative politeness ensued where I would catch a wave, bottom turn wide around the pack, around the throwing lip and turn on the still-very-shapely end section. I’d sail straight out the back again in 10 seconds flat, then sit on my kit for 10 minutes before repeating. It was a happy medium, if slightly frustrating, but meant that the surfers got their waves and I got mine without being dropped in on. Most importantly it was very sailable, actually not too offshore and at times and I was pretty stacked on the 4.3. Phew.

CAMERA BLUNDERS

Geoff had been on camera duty, so we had some evidence of Thurso East windsurfing in-the-can and now it was Geoffs turn to head out. I’d neatly stitched him up with sailing at low tide when the waves are smallest – and he’d neatly stitched me up by setting the camera to ‘bulb’. After my story of the last person drowning my camera, he’d kindly used the rain guard and spun all the dials on the top of the camera as he pulled it over. Program ‘Bulb’, aperture ‘20’ and not much light doesn’t make for discernible pics it seems …

Geoff had the place almost to himself for a couple of hours, screaming along the lovely Thurso East walls, before I decided I just had to head back out. It was now really starting to turn on. The tide was pushing in, the 10-ft. at 17-seconds swell was really starting to show itself. The wind was perfectly east and 30 mph., there were logo-high, logo-wide barrels – and the surfers were also heading back out. Pointing your board at the lip of a barreling nearly-mast-high wave, trying to backdoor it for an air with an approach speed of 35 mph. is perhaps one of the hardest things we as windsurfers ever have to do? I can tell you [from my motorbike experience] that taking a corner at 120 mph. on the edge of your tyres, within feet of other peoples’ elbows and your knee on the grass, really isn’t that trick. But, lining up moving, heavy lips with surfers bobbing about in the mix is really more than my brain can compute. Which brings us back to the beginning of my tale. My one and only hit on the heaviest part of the wave and the 10 seconds that truly made the whole 48 hrs. worthwhile – even if I did have my eyes closed!

As ever, my first thought is ‘when will it ever happen again?’ Imagine if it was bigger, less surfers, more wind? It’s such a fantastic wave, I’ll be checking the forecast daily and crossing my fingers for a long time to come.