The next in our series marking the 50th anniversary of the partnership between BP and Surf Life Saving New Zealand.
He was just a young kid kicking around the beach over summer like thousands of others – but it was to shape his destiny.
The kid, Ian Ferguson, was so entranced watching the surf lifeguards that day more than 50 years ago, he decided then and there he wanted to be one too.
It proved to be a momentous decision; in a short time he was taking part in surf lifesaving patrols, winning bucketloads of junior then senior national surf lifesaving titles – and taking the first steps on a journey that would have him write one of New Zealand's greatest sporting stories.
Ferguson, now 65 and on the verge of retirement, became the first and so far only Kiwi to win three gold medals at a single Olympics (he won three canoeing golds at the 1984 Los Angeles games), added a fourth four years later in Seoul and was named New Zealand's Sportsman of the Year after his Los Angeles exploits.
He is New Zealand's most successful Olympian – five medals in all – yet believes none of it might have happened if it weren't for surf lifesaving.
He describes it as his first base in sport: "I got bitten by the surf lifesaving bug very early on," he says. "Without it I might not have done any other sports but, after I started winning lifesaving events, I knew I could win at other sports too."
His story comes as Surf Life Saving New Zealand is celebrating the 50th anniversary of its partnership with BP - believed to be the longest unbroken corporate sponsorship of any kind in New Zealand.
Ferguson remembers clearly that day back in the 1960s when, as a 14-year-old, he ventured down to the surf at Himatangi, a west coast beach about 30km out from Palmerston North, where he lived at the time.
"Our family had a bach at Himatangi and I went down to the beach and noticed the surf lifeguards out in the water paddling surf skis. They seemed big and burly and I thought, 'Wow, I want to do that too'. I signed up with the club (Palmerston North Surf Life Saving Club) and quickly got involved."
Soon Ferguson became one of the club's top performers and, throughout a 30-year-competitive career, won swags of national titles including four victories in the prestigious national surf lifesaving Ironman event.
"I had done a little bit of swimming but lifesaving got me involved in sport in a big way for the first time; I enjoyed training hard, it was fun competing and being at the beach," he says. "I loved the camaraderie and, once you are involved in lifesaving, you are involved for life."
Surf lifesaving was also indirectly responsible for getting him involved in canoeing – the sport in which he would achieve his greatest successes, much of it in tandem with fellow gold medallist Paul MacDonald.
"We had a group of kayakers join the club as part of their training," he says. "They invited me to go with them to the kayak nationals and I decided to give it a go. I was a natural and when I found out the guys were training for the Olympics, I figured I could do that too."
Throughout this time Ferguson continued his involvement in lifesaving, regularly joining weekend patrols at Himatangi and taking part in dozens of rescues.
"I remember one occasion I was at the beach training when I noticed two young girls in trouble about 75m out," he says. "It was not a nice day, there was no patrol on duty and the girls - they were aged around 10 or 12 - had got caught in a rip and were close to going under.
"I managed to get to the first one, gave her a rescue tube and swam like hell to help the second girl before getting them both back to safety."
Ferguson's involvement in surf lifesaving became, like many others in the sport, a family affair. His two sons, Steven and Alan, have both been heavily involved (Steven today is a coach at Piha) and between them have won so many titles the family has lost count.
"I would have won 20, maybe 30, lifesaving titles," says Ferguson. "Steven would be in double figures and Alan has won six or eight." (Steven also followed his father to the Olympics, competing as a swimmer in Sydney in 2000 and as a canoeist in Athens (2004), Beijing (2008) and London (2012).
Steven was also assistant coach of the national surf lifesaving team, now known as the Black Fins, who won the lifesaving world championships for the third consecutive time in 2016.
Ferguson, like BP, has reached a half century of involvement in surf lifesaving (he is a life member at Palmerston North and last year Surf Life Saving New Zealand presented him with a 50-year service award). Surf lifesaving refuses to leave his blood.
Having run Ferg's Kayaks since 1990, he is planning to retire soon to Sandy Bay on Northland's Tutukaka coast, a beach with some of the best surf breaks in the region. Although it has no patrol, Ferguson cannot help but keep watch.
"I've been close to doing rescues a couple of times," he says. "I like to keep an eye on things when I'm there."
He is also keeping an eye on the next generation of Fergusons – a granddaughter and three grandsons aged between four and seven.
"They're not involved in surf lifesaving yet, but the boys will be joining nippers at some stage," he says. "They love swimming, they can all stand up on a surfboard and my goal is to get them in the ocean because Sandy Bay has such great surf they'll always want to come up and see me."
To celebrate their 50-year partnership with Surf Life Saving New Zealand (SLSNZ), BP are making a donation to SLSNZ for every litre of fuel purchased at BP retail stores until February 18 – Every Litre Counts.