Innholdsfortegnelse for No. 556 i Tracks

It’s late July on the North Coast of NSW and there are thousands of people roaming the North Byron Parklands. It’s an eclectic crowd of experimental teenagers, melancholy twenty-somethings, hippies and goths, surfers and suburbanites, mid-life soul searchers and nostalgia-seeking mums and dads. Everybody gets along, united in their pursuit of a good time and live tunes that some have spent a lifetime waiting to hear. Somewhere amongst the Splendour in The Grass Festival melting pot is Mick Fanning. He’s relishing the opportunity to be in a situation where the aim is to tap into the collective consciousness and ride the wave of stoke. It’s a long way from that world where he is focusing intensely on his own mindset, his preparation, his performance – the self-imposed pressure to be…

Built in 2004, this vessel spreads a lengthy 60 feet on the water line. She has a top speed of 18 knots and a cruising speed of 12 knots. She has a highly eco-friendly fuel capacity of 3400L and is propelled by a feisty 1000hp caterpillar. But that’s just the basic rundown. It’s about to get detailed. Very detailed. Some of the more plush features that this beauty comes with include a 55” television on the deck featuring satellite TV, a TV in the saloon and three smaller TVs in the cabins. There are four cameras monitoring security on the vessel, for the trips she takes where loot is involved. There are three cabins aboard. One master, featuring a queen-size bed that stretches the entire width of the boat, one…

I first met Heath Joske 12 years ago some 30,000 feet above Indonesia. We were bound for the mythical Mentawai Islands and shared a keen anticipation for the 10-day surf charter ahead. Heath was a fresh-faced school kid, full of spark and promise, one of Billabong’s elite junior team which included Wade Goodall, Laurie Towner and Ellis Ericson. Although among the youngest aboard the Mangalui Ndulu, he appeared more mature than his years. The son of a surfer/ shaper he knew about boards and waves and their intersections. Heath surfed with an eye-pleasing style, compact power and advanced tube sense. Fireworks were rare. Where others would blow waves attempting the unlikely Heath would joust and gouge and ride out clean. I wondered which approach would prove more successful in pro…

Morocco has been luring travellers in droves since it became the end terminus of the southbound hippy trail in the 60s. The colourful cities of Casablanca, Tangier and Marrakesh with their bustling medinas, exotic souks and cheap hash proved an irresistible magnet for the counterculture tribe. Intrepid surfers stocked up and ventured further south, eventually finding a series of long, reeling right points on the edge of the desert near Agadir. Here world-class leg burners like Anchor Point quickly became popular then world famous. This northern wedge of Africa, though dry and arid, has been an idyllic winter escape for European surfers ever since. The weather is warm, the swell consistent, the offshores reliable and the living cheap. For Australians the road to Morocco often begins in the least exotic…

CHIP SHOT WORDS: LUKE KENNEDY PHOTO: SHIELD Chippa Wilson may be one of the most progressive surfers on the planet but that doesn’t mean he has to miss out on surfing’s renewed love affair with the twinny. Granted, Chippa’s making use of a little back-fin stabilizer for a little extra grip, but this ride definitely belongs to the twin fin family. “I've been loving twins as of late! So fast, makes this slow summer for waves fun again! Totally suitable for jumps, same as a normal board I figure haha,” Chippa told Tracks. Irrespective of the craft beneath his feet, Chippa remains committed to making every air he pulls a kind of work of art. His own explanation of this boned out slob gives an insight into what he’s striving…

"It was good in that it made me stop and look elsewhere and away from surfing." “Once I got to the end of last year I was just empty, I had nothing left in the tank. Last year was obviously a tough one,” says Mick Fanning, slightly underplaying a 12-month period where he was attacked by a great white, went through a marriage break up, lost a second brother and just missed out on a world title. “But for the three previous years before that I had been in world title races and that takes a lot out of you. I felt I just I couldn’t give anymore and I needed a break. I needed to walk away and fill up the tank.” I’m talking to Mick in Norway in…

What it was like for you, as a photographer? This trip in particular was a pretty big gamble. We didn’t really know what to expect, and the only thing I knew was that we were going to be on a boat for two weeks. Where we ended up is known for some of the craziest seas in the world – now, I’m pretty comfortable on boats and on big seas, but I had to admit that I was pretty worried when I saw some big blobs on the charts. Turns out we got lucky and ended up with some of the best swell and wind conditions available. It made for a really pleasant trip, as far as boats go. Name your most memorable moment… Ah, there were so many. The…

Jordan Rodin has spent a year of his life pursuing the difficult art of riding finless surfboards. Since accidentally discovering the joys of wave sliding at his inauspicious home break, Mullaz Point in Perth, Jordan has become a devotee of fins free. He’s already travelled to J-Bay with mentor, Derek Hynd, and favours riding the intricately designed craft that Derek makes, although Jordan can’t tell you too much about those because Derek likes to keep the details a secret. Jordan is so respectful of Derek’s wishes that in J-bay, Jordan wouldn’t even allow Mick Fanning to see the bottom of his board. (Check out the break out story on his J-Bay trip) These days Jordan is based around Margaret River, but regularly takes his wave-sliding quiver on the road. Below…

It’s December, and I find myself preparing for another whirlwind Christmas. I’m thinking about when I’ll fit a surf in, as I ping-pong from one meal to another, from Dad’s place to Mum’s, to Dad in-law’s place to Mum in-law’s (Christmas is never simple these days, not since divorce became acceptable). No doubt I’ll find time to get in the water though. You always do. For some of us it’s the only tradition we uphold: Christmas Day surf with the old man. Time is a funny thing. These days I always feel like it’s getting away from me. Each year hurtles by quicker than the last, and before you know it, it’s high time to list a new set of resolutions, even though you’ve got no idea what last year’s…

Current Global CEO of Firewire, Mark Price, doesn’t deny he wants to see his brand dominate the surfboard market, but he also insists that his commercial ambitions are complemented by a very well defined environmental creed. “We want to sell as many surfboards as we can while remaining true to our principles of high-performance, increased durability, reduced toxicity, premium price points and very selective distribution,” suggests Price. From recycling materials, minimising waste and using less toxic materials in the production process, Firewire has taken a number of specific steps to minimise its environmental impact. All of their models qualify for the Sustainable Surf Ecoboard certification and in 2015 the company also gave 5% of its net earnings before tax to various environmental and humanitarian organisations. In the interview below, Price,…

DILLON PERILLO   It’s 5am on an unusually cool morning sometime in late May. Ry Craike stretches his legs from beneath the captain’s helm of an unnamed vessel. He stands up and opens the door to the starboard deck and looks out to sea, seeing nothing but reflective pink-and-blue ocean ahead as the sun rises from behind. They’ve been heading north for four days now in this remote and vast landscape of nothingness, and this is just the beginning. This is, The Search. “It was the captain’s idea to drive north,” says Dillon Perillo, who occupied the boat alongside Ry, Jacob Willcox and the crew. “The original plan was to head to a chain of islands pretty near where we had embarked, but by the time we were ready to…

FINDING A WAY IN ON A 5'9" TWIN. Prior to this trip I was hanging with Marlon Gerber in Bali. We’d been on a bit of a surf rampage, surfing all these mysto spots, out of Bali and around Bali; we were on one of those runs where everywhere we went it was on. This swell we weren’t even looking to surf this wave. I was in the area kinda cruising on my buddy’s boat when we we’re all ‘let’s go have a look’. Cos we came in from the back it didn’t look so big. I had my little 5’9” twin, then these flipping nudges start marching in; hectic ones with no entry. Nothing huge-huge, but just a super-hard, slabby take-off on some of them, and there were zero…

It's a cold and dark day here in Perth. As I look at the sea I watch the roaring forties rip apart the ocean, shifting sand dunes and making new sand banks. Seems like every time it’s onshore here I know where the wind has come from and it reminds me of South Africa. This feeling came to me six months ago as I was about to fly out to Jeffery's Bay for what would be the surf trip of a lifetime. But perhaps first I should explain how I came to set my sights on a trip to Africa. A few days before leaving I received a message from Derek Hynd saying, "Jordan, your board is ready, you can either pick it up here or freight it out." Instantly…