New Wave - a 1960s beach revolution

The tide of board riders creeps ever closer to the domain of the lifesavers in this third instalment of Graeme Lay's story.

On New Year's Day 1962, the provincial surf lifesaving championships were held at Kaimara beach. Teams from all over the province descended on the beach, along with holidaymakers, picnickers and families who were staying in the campground. The visitors spread their rugs out on the beach's black sand and the women served them up leftover Christmas ham and cold chicken, accompanied by salads drenched in mayonnaise. The lunch was washed down with tea from Thermos flasks, with orangeade for the youngsters, and the men eased their New Year hangovers with more bottled beer. Children frolicked in the shallows, rode their lilos and made castles out of the sand, complete with moats for the rising tide to flow into.

The first day of 1962 was hot, the tide was high at midday, and there was a fine, even surf in the bay. It seemed the perfect way to start the New Year. Few of the visitors to the beach were aware that, although Kaimara was hosting the lifesaving carnival, the very existence of the Kaimara Surf Club was being threatened by the desire of more and more of its members to become board riders rather than surf lifesavers. This had happened after the arrival at Kaimara beach a few weeks earlier of five dazzlingly talented board riders from Piha, who had shown the local lads not just the exhilaration of surf board-riding, but also an alternative way of life. A seductive existence, free and independent, based on riding beautiful waves wherever they could find them.

On New Year's Day, however, the Kaimara Club appeared committed to the provincial surf carnival. The competition between teams would be intense, so board riding was out of the question on this day for competing members of the Kaimara Club. After all, they had been practising for this championship for weeks.

A roped-off area in the centre of the beach allowed the eight lifesaving teams to compete without interference from the public. Within this sandy arena the teams lined up and selected marbles to decide who would be beltman and who would be reelman and who would pay out the line for the rescue and resuscitation events. A line of buoys had been anchored out in the bay beyond the breakers for the competitors to swim to, and from the beach the buoys bobbed in and out of sight with the rise and fall of the waves.

The picnickers and other visitors showed some interest in the competition, and in case they were confused by what was happening, the Kaimara club coach, Lance Jackson, gave a running commentary through a microphone and loudspeakers which had been set up on the clubhouse roof. Lance's voice boomed out over the beach. "Welcome to Kaimara beach, ladies and gentlemen, and a happy New Year to you all! A great surf lifesaving contests awaits us! The first event of the championship will be the six-man rescue and resuscitation. Each team will draw marbles to decide whether they will be linesmen, reelman, patient or beltman for the contest. Team members, line up now." The spectators moved back, to give the eight competing teams room to assemble and line up for the draw. Dressed in their nylon body costumes, caps tied under their chins, the teams awaited the official command to start.

Only one group of people showed not the slightest interest in the competition - the surfies from Piha. Disregarding their hangovers from last night's New Year revelry, they had headed straight for the water at mid-morning, plunging into the sea to clear their heads, then paddling out into the bay to catch more waves. The Kaimara point break was working well, and the five lads clustered alongside the headland, where they picked up and rode the waves that were wrapping themselves around the south side of the bay. As usual, they rode the waves expertly, and well away from the competing surf lifesavers. Some people, still fascinated by this novel, new sport, wandered over to watch the surfies in action. Among these were a number of teenage girls, who had become almost as interested in the surfies as the lads of the town. Wearing bikinis, they sat on the rocks and watched, spellbound, as the lean and tanned boys from Piha twisted and turned among the waved.

With the competition continuing, the amplified voice of Lance Jackson continued to boom out over the beach. The six-man contest was completed and the surf race was under way. Lance became even more animated. "Ladies and gentlemen, this is one of today's big events. Look at those boys go! They're heading back from the buoys now. And it's looks to me as if Marty Chambers of Kaimara is in the lead. Yes folks, that's big Marty, and here's a wave he should be able to catch!" The massive arms and shoulders of Marty could be seen clearly as he caught the wave and careered down its face. Lance became ecstatic. "There you are ladies and gentlemen, a classic piece of body-surfing. Look at him go!" As more swimmers caught waves and were carried towards the beach, the commentator's elation was sustained. "See that, ladies and gentlemen, that's the way to do it. These boys don't need surfboards ..." - here Lance didn't bother to disguise the sneering tone in his voice ...

"... they just need their bodies, their fitness and the right wave. Look at them go, aren't they great?"

But even as they made their way back to the beach, the minds of several of the Kaimara team members were not really on the championship. Instead they longed to be with the Piha boys out on the other side of the bay, riding their longboards in carefree style on the beautiful point break waves. Stephen Lowe and Barry Jordan in particular, who had previously been stalwart club members, couldn't wait for the competition to be over so that they too could take out the boards they had borrowed from the surfies and ride some waves. But there was no time, there were several more events yet to be held.

The carnival events over, the presentations were made. The veterans of the Kaimara Surf Lifesaving Club, dressed in their club blazers and long grey slacks, handed out the trophies in front of the clubhouse. Kaimara was runner-up in both the four and six-man rescue, Marty Chambers was first in the surf race and Stephen Lowe third, and the Kaimara team won the march past. These results were encouraging, and augured well for the national championships in February. But as soon as the presentations were over, Stephen and Barry made straight for the bach the Piha boys were renting, next to the campground on the level land at the back of the beach.

They were lying about on the grass in front of the bach, alongside the former hearse that they travelled in. Exhausted after hours of wave riding, Dave, Pete and Gremmie were curled up like koalas, wrapped in old army blankets, asleep on the grass. Twenty-two-year-old Rob Taylor, the acknowledged leader of the group, was kneeling beside a very long board, rubbing wax onto it, his shoulder muscles rippling as he did so. Blondie, his peroxide hair stiff with dried sea water, nose smothered in white zinc ointment, was sucking on a can of beer. Rob grinned at Stephen and Barry.

"Gidday fellas. How was the contest?" After they told him, Blondie handed Stephen and Barry a can of beer each, which they accepted gratefully. "We could see you guys from out the back," Rob said. "Your team was excellent." Blondie nodded keenly. "Yeah, you guys did real good." Although Stephen and Barry nodded, acknowledging the compliment, they both knew that Rob and Blondie were just being kind. They knew that the Piha boys knew that they would much rather have been board riding than swimming in a canvas harness and marching around on the sand.

Rob tossed the stick of wax aside, then stood his board up against the hearse. "Are you going out again?" Stephen asked him. Rob shook his head. "Not today. Too chopped up now." Then, looking towards the sea, he squinted into the sinking sun. "But I just heard the weather forecast on my transistor." Grinning, he stretched his powerful arms widely. "There's a big low pressure system heading this way. A south-westerly. More good waves tomorrow, maybe."

The storm struck at just after nine o'clock that night. Blasting in from the Tasman Sea, the wind swept over the beach, the campground and the town. Loaded with drenching rain, the wind assaulted the baches, tents and caravans at the beach and the shops and houses of the town. The rain was hurled against the window panes so hard it sounded like gravel, the thunder claps were deafening, the lightning bolts lit up the sky like neon. People in the town and at the beach slept poorly that night. By four in the morning the rain had stopped, but the wind continued to howl around the town like a tormented creature. There hadn't been a summer storm like it since the one that struck in'52, the old folks said, next day.

Stephen, Barry and Marty went to the cliff-top the next morning. The air was now still, the sky overcast, the sun struggling to penetrate the clouds. Below, in the campground, people were pegging their wet bedding out on guy ropes and rolling up the sodden walls of their tents. The doors and windows of the baches were thrown open, to let in the watery sun. But Stephen, Barry and Marty only glanced at these mopping-up scenes, their eyes were mainly on the bay, which was filled with huge waves. Rearing, then roiling in from the distant reef, they were ten to twelve feet high, fearsome, moving mountains of water, carrying all before them, then surging up the beach to the very steps of the Kaimara surf clubhouse.

"Those waves are monsters," said Stephen, "the biggest ever."

"I reckon," said Barry. "What a difference after yesterday."

"Yeah. No swimming today, that's for sure," added Marty.

Awed into silence by the ferocity of the sea, they sat for some minutes, staring at the scene below them: the boiling, khaki-coloured water, the giant waves, the spray which was rising over the headlands.

Then Stephen jumped up and pointed towards the beach.

"Hey, look ..."

A figure in swimming shorts was carrying a longboard down to the water's edge.

It was the tall, fair-haired figure of Rob Taylor.

The others stared in disbelief.

"Shit, he's not going out in that sea, is he?" said Marty.

Board under his arm, Rob waded into the boiling water.

"Oh my God," said Stephen. "He is."

The waves were too powerful to push through by kneeling on his board, so Rob instead paddled up to each one as it rose in front of him, then flipped his board over and dived underneath it, at the same time gripping the board's rails, vanishing under the collapsed wave, then emerging seconds later in the boiling white water on the other side. Once there he clambered back onto his board and paddled steadily seaward, towards the next incoming wave.

In this manner Rob, a tiny figure amid the boiling sea, gradually made his way out through the giant waves towards his goal, the distant reef. While on the cliff-top Stephen, Barry and Marty watched, and wondered at his courage. But was it courage, they also wondered, or sheer recklessness?

(To be concluded next week)