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Besides a solid
eight second barrel at eight foot
Pipeline, or Backdoor, or Jeffrey’s,
or Mundaca, or Padang, perhaps a South
Pacific paradise, or a West Australian
gem... whatever, imagine your ultimate
dream.
How about the following the sun around
the tropics of the Pacific on a mission
of fully sponsored surf exploration,
cruising on a thoroughly appointed
75-foot steel ketch adapted specifically
for the task, and having a year to
meander on the mission? You’d
literally be wave hunting surfing reefs
never before scooted by a surfboard, as
well as playing a part in the
preservation of those same reefs. You’d
have to be dreaming unless you were a
Quiksilver “A” team rider.
Instigating a project called “The
Quiksilver Crossing”, the biggest of
the International “Big three” is
giving the ultimate dream the potential
of becoming the ultimate experience. |
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Quiky launched their unrivalled project
at the National Maritime Museum, amidst
the shops and pavillions of Sydney’s
Darling Harbour complex, back in early
March. In a public relations and
publicity exercise that was arguably
more professional than anything surfing
has seen, a large collective gathering
of industry buffs, surfers, and a large
media and press contingent assembled in
the museum’s theatre for the unveiling
of the adventurous mission.
Supported by a short but idyllic video
presentation, Quiksilver International
chairman Bruce Raymond introduced the
project and the surfers and the crew who
will sail off into the wide blue yonder.
The players enrolled obviously come from
Quiksilver’s amazing cache of surfers,
including last year’s dominators Kelly
Slater, Mick Campbell and Daniel Wills
as well as Jake Paterson, Lisa Andersen,
Matt Hoy, Tom Carroll, Renan Rocha, Jeff
Hackman and Wayne Lynch.
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They will be alternately shuffled
through the various legs of the first
stage of the Crossing which will cruise
through Papua New Guinea, the Solomon’s,
Vanuatu and New Caledonia before heading
to Fiji for the Quiksilver Pro at
Tavarua. Their floating home will be the
grand vessel of surf exploration, the MV
Indies Trader. Skippered by renowned
surf explorer Martin Daly, the boat has
been hired by Quiksilver for a full
year. A 75 foot steel hulled ketch built
in Brisbane in 1972, rebuilt in
Singapore in 1992, and then refitted in
Cairns earlier this year specifically
for the Quiksilver mission, she cruises
at 12 knots with a range of 5000
nautical miles, sleeps eight passengers
in air-conditioned comfort and comes
with all the toys from 1200cc jet skis
to state of the art satellite navigation
aids and communications. She also looks
the part after Quiky’s head artist
Webby painted the entire hull in
Tahitian warrior livery. |
What makes the whole mission so unique
is that as well as searching for virgin
reef waves, whatever surfers are on the
boat will also be studying the reefs
themselves as part of the United Nations
“Reef Check” project.
It will obviously be the first surf trip
ever sanctioned by the UN, UNEP and
UNESCO. The Reef Check project is a
global initiative involving 139 nations,
and in depth study of the state of the
reefs and oceans of the world. The
Quiksilver team includes Hawaiian
Professor of Oceanography Ricky Griggs.
A leading authority on the ecology of
our precious coral reefs, Ricky has had
a long and distinguished career in ocean
research and monitoring. His name may be
familiar to surfing history buffs. An
eminent scientist now, Ricky was one of
the first surfers to take on second reef
Pipeline in the late ‘50s and early
‘60s. in 1967 he won the second
International Duke Kahanamoku event
charging 18-foot surf at Sunset Beach.
Back then, the Duke event was considered
the world championship. In a passionate
and entertaining address to the gathered
throngs, Ricky made it clear he was a
surfer at heart.
He underlined the basic charter of the
year long voyage which will meander
between 21 degrees north and 21 degrees
south of the equator. He broke the
parameters into that of “Discovery and
Rediscovery”. The discovery is obvious
enough, of surfing reefs for the first
time, riding waves never before ridden,
and delving into surfing’s frontier.
Ideologically the rediscovery is all
about the basics of surfing and life as
they used to be: the aloha spirit of
surfing, the philosophy from which
surfing was born, that life should be
simple, pure and humble. Ricky’s
philosophy of surfing runs deep within.
He quoted Herman Melville: “People
find their souls in the ocean and where
better than in solitude and in isolation
of remote and romantic islands. It will
be the fulfillment of a dream.” |
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The stereotypical Pacific paradise dream
is of course at risk thanks to global
warming and man’s pollution and
plundering. The past year of 1998 was
the hottest in the last 400. Seventy
percent of the world’s coral reefs
deteriorating and at risk. Ricky will
oversee the scientific mission of the
project and instruct the surfers who
will actually take part in the
ecological study and assessment of the
reefs they surf. As well as gathering
information for the UN reef project, the
Quiksilver findings will be duly given
back to the local indigenous communities
they will encounter along the way, which
will help them to protect and conserve
reefs, recognise economic opportunities
that their reefs offer, and use them
sustainably.
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The project was the initial brainstorm
of creative American photographer Jeff
Hornbaker, who has been exclusively
subcontracted to Quiksilver for the past
three years. What began as Hornbaker’s
suggestion, a loose-ended concept
between he and skipper Martin Daly, an
improbable dream, is now a reality. For
Martin Daly, an avid explorer and wave
hunter since the late ‘70s, the
Quiksilver Crossing is truly the
ultimate dream. Needless to say, he’s
not Robinson Caruso. “It is an
indescribable high to be approaching a
headland in a remote area and to have
absolutely no idea what is around the
point,” shared Daly of his two decades
of searching for waves. “It is an even
greater high, once around that headland,
for your expectations to be met by
pulling up at an unknown world class
surf break, and paddle out for the first
time, not knowing whether to believe
your eyes until you have caught and made
your first wave.” |
We probably haven’t yet discovered 15
percent of the world’s waves. The
waves and the reefs are out there and
waiting.
Let the mission begin and may God,
Hughie and the UN bless the MV Indies
Trader and all who sail and surf in her.
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