WA from Rhys

I was out at a reef in Bali when an ozzie guy told me about a mad little place in WA with incredible waves. Just before we left Perth to travel north, Pips boss gave her a surfing book, and he marked in it where we had to go to get there....

About 1500 kms north of Perth is the turn off onto the dirt track, where an ominous sign greets you reminding you not to mess with the ocean on this stretch of coast.

We drove down the track for 100kms (took us ages in our old wagon!) alongside vertical cliffs meeting the power of the Indian Ocean, definatly tiger shark territory.

After hours of driving we came to a promising sign telling us to turn off.

We set up our camp just as the sun was setting behind the point. A guy on a motorbike met us and said we might be lucky as a new swell was arriving the next day.... oh yes!

I woke up before the sun had come up over the hills and walked the long way down the point. It was low tide, and there were perfect little hollow waves breaking for hundreds of metres off the point. Although it was breaking almost on dry shelf, the tide was coming in, so i went back to the camp to get my board.

Walking back to the point, the swell started to look a bit bigger, which promted the butterflies in my stomach. I decided to give it a go anyway, and went to jump off the side of the point for the paddle round.

Just before my leap, i looked to my left and saw one hell of a wave hit the point and barrel the whole way down the line, making thunderous noise. Something in the back of my mind told me that my level of surfing wasn't quite where these waves were and i turned around and walked back to safety, with my tale between my legs.

We spent the rest of the day watching the 5 or 6 residentsts of this crazy part of Oz go nuts in these awesome waves.

The next day the swell dropped of by about half, which was fine by me! I jumped off the point, and got out the back. The waves were still a massive challenge. They start to break onto a dry ledge, and the takeoff spot is only about 10 metres down the line from that! Its a barrel from start to finish, and the wave is the longest wave i have ever seen in my life. I saw a dugong (rare dolphin) while out surfing which topped off the experience nicely.

Out of the water the place itself is wicked aswell. It feels like a commune, and there are chicks walking around with about 7 or 8 kids in tow, all playing in the surf and having a wicked time. The beach is lovely, and when the swell is huge the shorebreak is deadly, but wicked fun when it washes you up the beach!!

A great stay on our big journey up the Wild West.

Rhys x

And just in case you were wondering...yes, this is Rhys on that left after it dropped in size!