I always knew I had a love for the ocean, but it was only after spending three years, miles away from it in Alberta Canada that I decided to change my life and head to the craggy coast lines, surf culture and waves of South Africa!
Pack up and change it around!
I had been working as a sales rep for a bamboo homeware company, stationed indoors from 9am-9pm 6 days a week. I was craving the outdoors, adventure and freedom. I found myself watching hours of surf footage in the background of my long shifts at work, dreaming of ways to make that my reality.
Everything changed when my Aunt extended an invite to come live with her in her TreeHouse in the coastal crags of Plettenberg Bay, South Africa. I immediately began packing up my life in canada...leaving behind everything I had built there for the last 3 years….my dog, my partner of almost 6 years, my friends, my career….All of it! In pursuit of the OCEAN! I felt it calling to me, I could do nothing else but imagine my new life.
I remember sitting in the first plane from Calgary to London heathrow….balling my eyes out. I had started crying at the airport. My partner and I had spent the last month, selling all my stuff and tenderly saying goodby...but nothing had prepared me for the gut wrenching pain of actually saying goodbye. I stood on the other side of security, facing him….standing 20meters away, separated by the big scanning machines. I was unable to control my sobs, as I stared at him. We stood like this for what felt like hours….before I turned and almost jogged away...crying loudly now! That was the last time I saw him in the flesh! My partner of 6 years...my best friend.
A change of spirit
The next few weeks whizzed by in a blur of treehouse times with my aunt, long walks on the beach, scary nights alone in the dark forest….wishing for and missing my canadian security. It waa on one of these long dark nights when I was revised by the flashes of surfers I had watched for hours on my computer. I was now right in Surfer land….so why was I stuck in a treehouse, with no friends. I needed friends! I was lonely. So I found my way to a small coastal town Called Jeffreys Bay….famously known in the surf world as Jbay (I didn't know this yet). I got myself a job at a backpackers….and found a local dude to teach me to surf/introduce me to south african surf culture life!
I was hooked the second I was pushed into my first green wave! Surfing had become my biggest love, my greatest challenge, my favourite topic to chat endlessly about (to anyone who will listen).... I had found a sport that was so intensely personal and social all in one. I was hooked. I have since left South Africa...but am forever in pursuit of a lifestyle that allows me to surf, work, live, serve and love every single day. I don't believe in compromising on these core passions of mine any more....and I make decisions every single day that make this dream a reality.
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