Lines
They’re painting lines on the ground.
On the grass islands between the pandanus and the paperbark they’re painting lines.
In the grounds of the National Park, once traversed free range for hours as grommets, surfing and making fires and fishing and climbing, they’re painting lines.
They’re hammering little wooden site numbers into the ground to corral chaos into order.
The conflation of highway upgrades and urban sprawl and COVID restricted travel options are drowning coastal communities under a deluge of transient visitors which ebb and flow like the tides each weekend and public holiday.
On Friday afternoons they burst from the banks of large population centres and inundate sections of the coastline to saturation point.
They seek the “authentic”, the “real”, the “natural”, the antithesis of the planned lines of their urban homes. They seek landscapes to serve as a social media backdrop; pictures of campfires and sunsets and beaches.
Wannabe weekend Malcolm Douglas’ and Malcolm Doug-lasses espousing Earth Child outdoorsman vibes bedecked in $300 Patagonia puffer jackets and $150 Will and Bear fedora hats from the back of $40,000 white Volkswagen vans or repurposed Land Rovers. Perfectly planned carefreeness.
Steps must be taken to funnel and direct this urban runoff into contained areas, lest the human tide wash over and destroy all that they so desperately crave. The natural of the National Park now not so natural, an ironic dilution of the very thing sought in the first place.
So now there’s lines on the ground, and site numbers on little wooden stakes, and online booking services, and neatly-maintained designated fire pits. The Western ideology of cataloguing, cartographing, categorising, and compartmentalising to bend nature to our will writ large upon the micro scale.
Lines, civility, order, comfort.
It seems wherever we turn now in the surfing world we bump up against the same ideological manifestations. Waves in a wave pool. Book your time, pay your cash, select your wave setting, don the appropriate coloured rashie, then wait in line for your guaranteed 25 waves in the hour.
Lines, civility, order, comfort.
A governing competition body dedicated to the ownership and appropriation of all areas of the surfing experience so that it can be neatly packaged and sold to the masses. Corpo-speak, virtue signalling, walls of positive noise, consumables.
Lines, civility, order, comfort.
Surf lineups infused with egalitarian ideals of entitlement, equity of access, and expectations of fairness.
Lines, civility, order, comfort.
But that’s not the natural experience of surfing. The beauty of surfing, the allure of surfing, the addiction of surfing isn’t the order of perfection but the unpredictability of chaos. The ocean is wild and raw. It’s rips and backwash and wedges and peaks.
It’s hours spent monitoring and analysing and observing and guesstimating to try to put yourself at the right place at the right time amongst all those confluences of swell and tide and winds and sand and crowd to score a single great wave.
Surfers are seekers of novelty, the perfect is boring. Give us the wedges of the Wedge, the ledges of the Island, the wash throughs of Pipe, over the man-made same-same lines of a Slater wave tub.
So I kick at the lines on the ground as I pass, a feeble and farcical attempt to delay the relentless march of civility and order and comfort.
It’s not a matter of convenience or death, just give me chaos instead.
//DAN DOBBIN
(Craig Brokensha)
Comments
Nice read Dan! Keep raging against the machine.
Rage against the Machine indeed!
Also like the Dead Kennedy’s reference in the last line.
Stoked you picked that up!
I get the frustration of seeing the coast crowding up, but can you blame the city folk for wanting a slice of coastal paradise? Sounds like their crime is simply "being there". Hard ask to tell people to fuck off just because there's too many of them.
Hard ask to tell people to fuck off just because there's too many of them.
Would seem an extreme response?? There's no aggression that I can perceive, so why not give voice to frustration and see where it leads.
Yeah good point. Upon re-reading i can see that it was not really the point of the article, and otherwise I think we can all lament the crowding of the coast which benefits no one, especially us surfers.
Perhaps I was a bit sensitive given that I am one of those city folk trying to escape whenever I can! A range rover or Volkswagen van would be nice though...
Yer, totally understand why people flood out of the cities, was more trying to make the point about the unintended consequences of that happening.
To more frustration?
Edit: That was in reply to Boxright.
Maybe.....or maybe even moments of acceptance.
Though it seems like I'm reading more self-reflection into the piece than most.
Nice meditation Dan.
I blame soccer mums.
Good read. Thanks DB.
The world is not a museum exhibit behind a velvet rope. The environment isn’t meant to remain in status representing a single arbitrary moment in time selected by self anointed bureaucrats. Take your rules, your signage and your coppers logs and jam them in your arse.
Good read, Dan.
Nice article ... I think the best thing I ever read on the subject of crowding etc. was by someone in one of these threads. Something like; "don't complain about the crowd - you are the crowd"
Not sayin dandob was complaining, or that the only topic of the article was crowding ... just really liked this earlier comment, thought it was in the same territory and warranted a repeat
That was unreal Dan. Reads like a modern spin on something you'd find in Witzig's short-lived mag Surf International.
nice db.....'in a nut shell' as someone once said ..............
don’t summon the beast simba
say it 3 times like in "Beetlejuice"...
The older demographic whom comment on SW should be grateful for what they had when they had it. I certainly am.
Things are never going to be that way again although the astute and keen amongst us can still capture a glimpse of the way things used to be.
You say that surfers aren't seeking perfection. I disagree.
When the ocean presents you with the perfect wave and you have the perfect position and you then draw the perfect line is what all surfers [me at least] are seeking.
Actually the wave doesn't even have to be perfect. Bonus if it is.
Nice writing Dandob but it's like pissing into the wind thinking it will stop. It's here to stay unfortunately.
Once again, the legacy of too many humans on the planet.
As someone earlier said, be thankful if you were born a fairly long time ago and got to enjoy & experience the things we love before they were over run and ruined.
I certainly am.
"They seek the “authentic”, the “real”, the “natural”, the antithesis of the planned lines of their urban homes. They seek landscapes to serve as a social media backdrop; pictures of campfires and sunsets and beaches."
-have you considered the electronic people might be NPCs?
Good to see that the absurd irony of it all isn't lost on you, Dandob.
Dan , thanks for poetically stating what is obvious and unavoidable . Don't despair , just figure where the 'cool-aid clones' are heading and go somewhere else . Works for me most of the time .
fuckn exactly.
At some point entropy will prevail and chaos will return to line ups and camping grounds.
hear hear
Virtual reality will save us.
Well written Danbob.
Noticeable increase... bling on the forby zing with the 10 grand super thing...
Nailed it mate.Plenty of crew out there on the same line,pun intended, but without the writing skills to express it and that includes me.I just had a good feed.You will never eat rendang better than that cooked by a Sumatran. Tabo hian ,lissoi ...Horas
Seeing as though there is no stopping progress, wouldn't our time be better spent educating the new surfing masses on how to treat the beach/ocean/each other?
In my opinion we are all to blame for not educating the beginners enough on the importance of Ocean-etiquette/safety.
The attitude of surfers out in the water is the biggest issue, NOT the amount of people. Take pipeline for example. Insanely crowded yet it "Works" due to the strict enforcement of Ocean "Laws"
I have had plenty of great crowded surfs where everyone was playing nicely and I've also had plenty of ridicules situations with only 2-3 people out and them being total Fu*kwits .
I feel our best defense is to help inform others of how the ocean is not a bloody free-for-all, and that we need to play by the rules!
I also found the best way to approach this is to use the "Safety" aspect. The majority find it hard to argue with that. Remind them these rules are in place for everyone's safety, and if you cross them, you are putting everyone's life in danger. Look them in the eye as you finish with "Do you really want to seriously injure or kill someone over a wave?"
This is the truth anyway as I've almost had my life snuffed out countless times by Dickheads doing really dumb shit and I'll call those idiots out every time, as we all should.
Lilas, I completely agree. I see a lot of absurd behaviour in the water for no good reason other than ignorance.
I know we all get the blinkers on from time to time, which makes it hard to set a perfect example, but I'm finding the Danger Mice so prevalent that I'm now taking the time to have a quiet word where I can when it's obvious they haven't a clue. I'll also call out blatant drop-ins if I can, as half the time they not only nearly land on the poor bugger already surfing but cause near-collisions etc.
I think all experienced surfers have a bit of an obligation to have a word with both ignorant and intentional kooks, and if some one has the guts to do it then the pack should back them up.
40 K is more than enough to explore a rhumb line or two.
Keep writing Dan.
Aa hui hou.
Small coastal towns like the one I live in are feeling the pressure immensely. Crowds are through the roof. What would be the time of year we get our beaches back is well and truly gone. When borders reopen well get some respite but it sucks at the moment. You can’t Blame people for getting out of cities but fuck a little bit of normalization would be nice. Anyway nice read!
Thx for taking the time to create this piece for us, loved both form and content.
Regarding content, I like the non-judgemental approaches, they help progress, they give (me) the envy to reduce my impact much more that any locals only , no kook, no Brazzo, no foil, no 4wd, no kids réthorique .
So sad to see the little shacks replaced by 2-storey concrete lookalikes which remain empty most of the year... only surfers should be allowed to live on the shorefront... the 2 storey people can overlook from a few streets back. The character of a place dies once the monied move in.
The house next door to a fella I know was demolished recently, in order to make way for a towering monstrosity with an all glass yoga room and a lap pool. The lap pool and yoga room are literally 50 metres from an ocean lap pool, the ocean and a wide expanse of park adjoining the perfect-for-yoga beach.
It’s a holiday house owned by crew from Sydney who never introduced themselves to their neighbours and who installed security cameras which cover the next door neighbour’s yard.
Scum.
Whew thats bad. Seeing all the song references... "firestarter"... just saying, not promoting... but gee sometimes I wonder. Anyways those concrete blocks are impervious... made to survive the nuclear holocaust.
B > people like that really piss me off too. Their assumption about theft, AKA install CCTV - is because - IMO - they're whole lives are about theft - one way or another. So they wedge up on records, possession, force and ultimately the courtrooms of life..as you say...scum..to which I add "low rent" > RR
true that RR.A shrink once told me it's usually the theives, the guilty ones, who have all the surveillance gear on every corner of their abodes.
I was gonna point the finger at real estate agents too.
My grandfather bought land in a small coastal town for $900.
My parents paid $9000
Now? $900K ??
All those homy little weatherboard houses are long gone.
They gotta keep churning the market and selling the lifestyle.
I remember a lot more trees up and down the coastline thirty years ago.
I'll pull myself up on this rant now...
That was some beautiful writing danbob
Perhaps the worst aspect of the situation is when my mate lodged a complaint with council about the proposed monstrosity next door and the fact it blocked his sunlight due to the discrepancies in height between the two buildings , the council overturned it on the grounds that his cottage must itself by up for knock down sooner or later because…….because it isn’t a McMansion. True story. That’s the mentality of the council. Pretty sure my mate’s place has been there a hundred years or so. It’s a beautiful old miners cottage.
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Dunno if you've ever read this cartoon, can't recall if I've linked to it on Swellnet or not.
It's pertinent to this conversation, and I think you might recognise the coast:
https://www.patgrantart.com/vanishcoast/vc.html
Yep. You’ve put it up before, it’s excellent. We’ve started documenting some of the old places and untouched sections of land around here which you know will be under the dozer before too long. It’s sad.
Never saw that cartoon...
Damn Stu, now I'm late for work and I feel like I'm gonna cry...
Kind of strange to realise that pre gentrification, a lot of the most ridiculously localised spots were surrounded by housing commission neighbourhoods. The crew who were often most brutal and violent in defence of their claimed patch only existed there due to the good grace and charity of the broader community.
Nicely done Dan. A poetic observation. .............
Crowds of people always bring with them "the bad", manners, disrespect, greed; but they also bring patronage and require some sort of services and spend money that keeps the local cogs turning.
Unfortunately "no man is an island apart alone but every man is a part of the continent a part of the main". (John Done) As much as I would like this not to be true.
Nice Dan. Well written. Bring on the chaos.
Don’t despair Dan, 2nd law of Thermodynamics says that all order will disappear in time.
All lines will fade
All buildings degrade
All civilisations disappear
All species to become extinct
Everything is temporary except change
Told yers there's nothin to worry about.
I cannot tell you how much this makes me appreciate living on a street without kerbs or fences that leads to a beach without patrols or signs that warn against every other thing.
Yeah, they sold postcards of the hanging too.
From my understanding the human population in the developed world is supposed to plateau and possibly decrease in the not too distant future. (As is already happening in places like Japan) This means that if you move somewhere cold and isolated (or hot and isolated!) then you should be relatively free from crowds for the foreseeable future.
As for the controls placed on the already crowded areas, well you only need to go to a county where no such controls are in place to see how incredibly fucked up it can get when anarchy reigns. A lot worse. I'm all for the rules and regulations. I've actually always been impressed with how things work in Australia. On the whole the coastline is pretty well preserved when you consider the number of people that live there. I'm thinking about Northern NSW in particular. Here in NZ we've only just started grappling with the damage that over-tourism can cause if it's not controlled properly. Australia is a couple of decades ahead of us in this respect. Covid has been a good opportunity for us to have a rethink about the whole thing.
Sorry for the rambling post. Slow evening here.
Spuddups this assumes the developing world doesn't import many people to offset this plateau - to keep up economic growth. Stuff like Treasury running immigration numbers. The situation you might better prepare for is an increasing population and increasing pressures on environment.
That's a good point. I think my plan now is to bury my head in the sand and hope for the best.
Hans Rolling, (PFS) A little perspective for you blokes thank can think beyond yourself.
Have a mate who has been on an atoll or other since the late Seventies, the only lines he worries about are all in the ocean.
https://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_global_population_growth_box_by_…
Aloha
At least a few population scientists would say the carrying capacity of the earth for humans is about 11 billion, at which point, if everyone is in agreement everyone gets a tennis court size bit of land to exist on. BTW this scenario requires everyone to be vegetarian.
Carrying capacity is a conversation I think we will all be having more often. How we act personally is what we can do to respond. My world has shrunk dramatically like most people's but I am finding contentment in my "backyard"
A disturbing read for linesman with OCD. Need to snort a few lines and draw a line in the sand.
Ode to chaos. Lovely.
Last surf I drove to the remotest part of greater metropolitan area of Sydney, being restricted in my movements, as the local was its usual ridiculousness. Just 4 other guys out on basically the only peak working on the beach. All casual and mellow, older guys like me, seemed like the other guys knew each other. Got blatantly dropped in on twice by the same bloke. Yep, even in a crowd of five.
Couldn’t have been ‘locals’ ‘cause there are no locals there. Funny. Think I know where they were from.
Still have our place up the coast as one of only two fibro shacks left there. It’ll stay that way, until we go, if we do. Most cantankerous person on the coast is, you guessed it, the guy who just moved in there. Next door, of course.
Wonder when I’ll be allowed to go back there. I reckon a month, maybe more, a fortnight is looking a bit hopeful.
Something to look forward to from the most recent Intergenerational Report - 'The 2015 report projected Australia's population would hit 40 million by 2054-55. Today's report predicts it will reach 38.8 million by 2060-61 instead'. Enjoy today while you can.