Skimboarding 2008 - Session #06 - Chigasaki

I wanted to return to skimboarding at Chigasaki beach this past Saturday for various reasons.  It is the beach I have skimboarded on the most in Japan, by far, and is actually the 3rd most skimmed beach of any in my 21 years of skimboarding.  The other reason was Aya.  I wanted to propose to her, and I wanted to do it at the most familiar, most special place to me in the Tokyo area.  Even though Chigasaki beach is little more than an ash tray next to the ocean, it is still special to me and it is still capable of producing some magic, and it did not fail me this Saturday evening.

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Skimboarding 2008 - Session #05 - Hiratsuka

 I was stoked as usual for this past Saturday’s skimboarding session, but the waves were just not there for any kind of even modest session.  Walking to the beach I saw a few skimboarders leaving and from afar could see a few still down on the beach.  I quickly realized why there was almost no one out there, though, despite the beautiful day—the strong wind was just making all the waves way too sloppy.

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Skimboarding 2008 - Session #04 - Hiratsuka

When Aya and I first arrived at Hiratsuka Beach stoked for our 4th skimboarding session of the year, we were immediately met with a crowd of “beach football” players who were having a huge tournament.  I had never even heard of the sport before.  We saw a lot of skimboarders walking away from the beach, though, up on the main sidewalk.  I thought there might also be a skimboarding tournament, but I guess since we were arriving at the beach itself just after 12:30pm, that’s the end of the morning session for most Japanese skimmers.

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Skimboarding 2008 - Session #03 - Hiratsuka

The waves were significantly bigger this time at Hiratsuka, which always makes for more fun for the skimboarder, as well as the chance for bigger wipeouts!  But here’s a secret—big wipeouts are fun.  They may look like they hurt, but most of the time you are falling into deep water so it’s just a matter of keeping your mouth closed so as not to drink in any water.

Besides the larger waves, the biggest conditions difference was that the sand was a bit softer, no doubt because of the larger waves crashing on the shore and carrying sand all over the place.  This meant I ran a step slower than in the previous week’s session.  It also meant that my ears ended up being full of black sand!  Usually I get a little, but this time the amount of sand coming out was a bit disconcerting.  Aya hadn’t experienced this before, so I had to reassure that this was normal for skimboarding Shonan area beaches.

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Skimboarding 2008 - Session #02 - Hiratsuka debut!

Skimboarding session #002 for the year was rather special.  For the first time in 6 summers of skimboarding at the Shonan area of Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan, I sought out a new skimboarding beach.  Having found Chigasaki Beach in summer 2003, it was love at first sight, despite it’s flaws, and though I heard of this other beach nearby that was possibly a skimboarder’s haven, I stayed at Chigasaki.  For at Chigasaki there used to be other skimboarders, but over the past few years I’ve seen maybe three or four total.  Then after the typhoon last September disturbed the ocean floor reducing the size of waves greatly, I knew I may need to find a new skimboarding beach for 2008.

(video after the break)

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Skimboarding 2008 session 01 — with Aya! [video] [photos]

It was a very late start to the skimboarding season this year, but I finally made it out to Chigasaki for my first skimming session of 2008.  Usually I start in early to mid-May.  However, cyclo-camping became the new rage this spring, thus a late skimboarding season start.

It was Aya’s very first time to skimboard!  She is a surfer and snowboarder, so she got the basics down impressively fast.

video after the break [Read more]

20th Anniversary Skimboarding Season: Final Session

A week delayed due to a typhoon, I closed my 20th Anniversary Skimboarding season the latest into November that I can remember. I had to don my wetsuit from the get go.

…As always I went to Chigasaki with much enthusiasm and believing conditions would be great, and as I am most of the times, I was let down by what I beheld. But first I walked one more time from my apartment to Shinjuku station, nay, strided, untouchable, thinking that for one more year, those bastards could not stop me. As always, they tried hard, but yet again one more year that could not stop me from walking with board under arm to the Sea. Fueled as always by Weezer’s first album and especially the song “Surf Wax America,” the best song about surfing not written by The Beach Boys, I blew into the station ready to make the hour’s train ride.

…After glancing over at the hole that was the former great restaurant Very, Very Strawberry, I saw the Sea unfold before me for the last time this year. It was calm. Not a single surfer anywhere up or down the coastline. And on the shore there was almost no flat to skim on. Yet, being the veteran skimmer I am, I worked the waves for what I could, and managed to get a decent, albeit “calm,” 1 hour and 20 minute session in. Not exactly the hardcore skimming I prefer or would have liked to of finished the season on, but it did end up feeling kind of appropriate. I gently glided across and over harmless waves, sometimes leaning back and just feeling my board carve into the smooth surface of the Sea. Skimboarding is, after all, an elegant sport, for a more civilized age.

…The sun sets at about 4:48pm at this time of year in Tokyo. And before the sun got too low in the sky, I made one last sprint along the shore, leapt upon my board, and glided back to the shore. I bade farewell by touch to the Sea, as is my custom, and thus ended my 20th skimboarding season, and my 5th summer skimboarding at Chigasaki beach.

20th Anniversary Skimboarding Season: Session #10

A somewhat below average afternoon at Chigasaki. The waves weren’t really there, but I tried to make the most of it. Had a very rare jump off a wave getting the board clean out of the water, a move that used to be my signature ride when I skimmed in high school and early college, but not one I do often at Chigasaki as conditions don’t lend themselves to it. Still, the weather was great on this day, perhaps the last warm day to be had this year out at Chigasaki.

20th Anniversary Skimboarding Season: Sessions #08 & #09

This is quite a coincidence. The two trips I took to Shimoda, Izu in 2007 were on the exact same dates I took two trips to Shimoda, Izu on in 2006. I guess as the 2006 trips were based on holidays, it’s not such a coincidence that I ended up going on the exact same holidays in 2007.

Anyway, session #08 was a great one as most sessions are in Shimoda. It was late afternoon and the waves were rolling in nice and big and the sand as always was nicely packed and golden. Lots of big wave skimming to be had, with of course the usual amount of people getting in the way, but nothing too annoying. I skimmed hard for over an hour, producing some nice floaters mostly. I was surprised to find out I was on the water for that long, which is a good thing.

Session #09 on the morning of the next day was plagued with people constantly in my way. It was bordering on ludicrous actually. Of course I had a spot all to myself, and well established. I wasn’t barging in on anyone. As always, people barged in on me when there was ample space everywhere else on the beach. This was very unfortunate as the waves were pretty good. It was a frustrating nearly hour and a half session. Not a good way for my last Shimoda session of the year to end.

20th Anniversary Skimboarding Season: Session #07

I totally didn’t consider what condition the beach would be in just days after a typhoon had hit Tokyo. The typhoon wasn’t strong enough to cause serious damage to buildings, but it did cause the Tama River to overflow and some damage as I soon saw to coastal areas. I first realized things were wrong as I walked along the cliffside sidewalk to the area of Chigasaki I skim on. … Of course I ignored the ropes as I saw no apparent problem and didn’t want to go out of my way. Then up ahead I saw huge chunks of concrete split and cracked. … Then I did have to go out to the street and circumnavigate the damaged area to reach the beach proper.

…Then I beheld the beach, and it was a wasteland. … I should have just turned around and went back home, but the wave conditions were decent. I saw some Aussie surfer I had seen before on my way in (he was just riding by on his bike) and he said the water was filthy and he wouldn’t go in it, though a handful of surfers were out braving it. … So as I stepped over and around a motorcycle helmet, cans of every kind, plastic bottles of every kind, and even the top of a toilet, it still didn’t occur to me that this could actually be dangerous for me to skim on.

…Then boom, while running on an approach to a wave, felt a pain in my left foot, like an imbecile I kept running another few steps, but then the pain became too great and I just dropped my skimboard and fell down to get off my foot asap. A small piece of bamboo about 5cm long and 1cm wide was stuck in my left foot in the area just under my 4th toe. … The sharp tip was covered in my blood and there was a good sized hole under my toe. For some reason, however, it hardly bled, which I was thankful for. A kindly ojisan asked me if I was alright, and wanting to be brave, I of course said I was even though I was really starting to feel squeamish.

So now I had a hole in my foot and the next big Izu skimboarding trip coming up next weekend. Have to do a lot of healing in a week’s time.

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