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Art Exhibit: Hope in the Shadows(event)(1 day)
ZY Qigong Class for Energy Healers & TCM Practitioners(event)(2 days)
Enhancing your Fat Burning Potential(event)(2 days)
OPEN HOUSE at Access Natural Healing (event)(3 days)
CONSCIOUS VIBRATIONAL ALIGNMENT WORKSHOP(event)(4 days)
SHAMANIC DRUMMING & DREAMING CIRCLE:(event)(4 days)

The New Baywatch

Beach boys (and girls) unite to give our oceans a break

by GRANT SHILLING

It’s been a weird week. I’m up in Tofino to catch a few waves… and a dead sperm whale rolls onto the beach. Next, I notice that a 55-metre construction crane—taller than the totem pole whose many faces stare across the water from Opitsat—occupies the spot where the BC Packers fish plant once stood. The crane, the first ever in Tofino, is part of the ongoing construction of million-dollar condos by the sea. The better to view dead sperm whales from, presumably.

Later, warming up around the woodstove at a friend’s cabin, the radio tells us about Garbage Island, an enormous flotilla of plastic trash twice the size of Texas, floating in the Pacific Ocean. If this weren’t enough, there’s also news of the planned sale of thousands of acres of prime forest bordering surfing territory on the south coast of Vancouver Island, courtesy of the B.C. government.

What’s a poor surfer to do? Well, surf, of course.

My friend Ralph and I get up the next morning to check the waves and forget our cares. But on the path to Chesterman Beach, we discover a recently poured concrete pad. Ralph, a salty former crab fisherman and elder statesman of longboarding, looks at the pad dubiously. Just what is this? One more intrusion into the natural domain? Haven’t we had enough of this already?

There are no waves at Chesterman, so we carry on to Long Beach. It’s just the two of us out there—a rare treat! Plus one lone sea lion catching waves and tumbling towards ecstasy. Still, the pad sits like a concrete Buddha in my mind.

So I ask myself, “What would Surfrider do?” A non-profit organization dedicated to protecting and preserving our oceans and beaches, the Surfrider Foundation was formed based on a simple premise: nobody is in a better position to measure the quality of the marine environment than a surfer. In surfing there is the aloha spirit: friendly, hospitable, and welcoming, and guided by love and affection. The goal of Surfrider is to appeal to that spirit. So Surfrider is, if you will, the “green” soul of surfing.

The organization was founded in California in 1984, but its roots run deeper. Environmental awareness had been growing within the surfing community since the late Honolulu surfer John Kelly created Save Our Surf to protect the beaches of Waikiki from development in 1961—a problem the south coast of Vancouver Island faces today.

Surfrider was brought to Vancouver by Adrian Nelson, a Vancouver-based graphic designer. Adrian, now 29, would travel to Oregon and Washington to surf, but slowly started getting involved in beach clean-up contests, including the Surfrider Foundation Clean Water Classic held in Westport, Wash., a popular destination for mainland B.C. surfers.

“I just fell in love with their philosophy,” recalls Adrian, who estimates he spends 40 volunteer hours a week as chair of the Vancouver chapter, working on upcoming events and coordinating their outreach programs. “It’s the only environmental organization that includes the word ‘enjoyment’ in their mission statement.”

There was already a Surfrider chapter set up in Tofino, but the transient population there made it difficult for the organization to gain a foothold. Realizing the Tofino chapter needed support from other areas, Adrian launched the Vancouver chapter in ’05. He estimates there are 200 members and activists in the Vancouver branch alone. A third chapter operates out of Victoria.

With the exception of a few windswept days per year, there are no chances for surfing on the mainland. However, Vancouver has no shortage of windsurfers, kayakers, dragon-boaters, and sailors. “The name ‘Surfrider’ is a bit misleading,” Adrian explains. “You don’t have to surf to be a member or take part; you just have to have a passion for the ocean and beaches.”

Surfrider Vancouver programs include Respect the Beach, an award-winning educational program for schoolchildren that lets the kids get their hands dirty on beachcombing field trips. Surfrider is also involved in a water quality program aimed at more effective methods of measuring pollution levels in the waters surrounding the mainland.

Meanwhile, the Victoria chapter is keeping an anxious eye on the planned development of the south coast of Vancouver Island. Last fall, B.C.’s Ministry of Forests and Range allowed Western Forest Products to remove a titanic 28,000 hectares of land from the Tree Farm Licence system, and sell it for real estate development. It’s some of the last heavily forested oceanfront land in the province, and includes the popular surf destination Jordan River. What’s more, the deal was sealed without any public consultation.

Malcolm Johnson, the editor of SBC Surf magazine and a member of Surfrider Victoria, is more than a little concerned about development plans for the south coast. “Preventing sprawl is key,” he stresses. “The idea of surfing in front of subdivisions doesn’t appeal to me. I’d rather be looking back at hillsides covered in trees. And I don’t think that’s a solely aesthetic opinion... being able to go out there and be in the midst of an intact and functioning ecosystem is such a rare thing in this day and age. The value of that experience is so much more than money. It’s priceless.”

To date, Surfrider Victoria has been actively endeavouring to have bylaws passed that will up-zone the areas, meaning any developer who buys property will have to go through public process and consultation before any changes take place. “Ideally,” says Claire MacDonald, chair of the Victoria chapter, “we would like to see the beachfront at Jordan River made into a park, and we will continue to watchdog the situation.”
On a cheerier note, Vancouver Surfrider is gearing up for the International Surf Day Paddle Out on June 21. The event, held at English Bay, gives surfers of all skill levels (and with all types of water vessels) the chance to get wet and celebrate the sport of surfing. Information booths will be set up on the beach to help raise awareness of the need to protect the planet’s coastal environments.

Meanwhile, back in Tofino, Ralph and I head back to Chesterman Beach for an evening session of surfing. The cement pad we noticed earlier has been transformed. It now hosts a bike rack—courtesy of Surfrider Tofino—for the numerous surfers who pedal to the beach with their boards. It’s a welcome—and blessedly small—development.

Grant Shilling is the author of The Cedar Surf: An Informal History of Surfing in British Columbia (cedarsurf.com). He dreams of becoming the province’s most sustainable surf bum.