The bad news is the sheer amount of crap, the good news is that people are prepared to do something about it, so well done to all those that turned up on a cold and wet morning at Compton Fields on the Isle of Wight to give up a little of their time and get involved. This is not a one-off, beach cleans have been organised by the surf club, SAS, and eco-island already on the island this winter, and there’s more to come, which is good, because there’s no shortage of rubbish on our coast.

Paul Blackley got the ball rolling on this particular one a few weeks back by posting a few pics of the rubbish that had accumulated over the winter at Compton Fields,  and asking for volunteers to help clear it up, especially appealing to surfers and other local beach users to look after whats on their won doorstep. The Isle Of Wight surf club (in the shape of Matt and Olly) responded positively and chipped in and helped make a facebook event of it, as well as getting the National Trust and Biffa on board to donate resources (bags, gloves and bins).

So here’s a few pics of the beach earlier in the week on a sunnier day, and a few iphone shots from today showing some of the crap everyone collected.

And finally, here’s a shot of what it should look like without all that man made crap in the way!

©2012 Jason Swain, All Rights Reserved
This and the other photos on the site are all ©Jason Swain with All Rights Reserved. The image is not available for use on websites, blogs or other media without the explicit written permission of the photographer. Please contact me via email photo@jasonswain.co.uk if you want to use it in any way or license it for your own project.

The project was started back in January 2010 by Paul Blackley & Jason Swain, and Paul has carried on the research for the last few years, collecting the stories and photos and films and memorabilia that make up the exhibition. And if you can’t make it along to see the show, you can catch up with all the stories on the wight surf history website 

The following from the press release….

The exhibition will show how boards have changed through the decades, from Archie Tricket’s homemade wooden surfboard from the early 1960s, Bilbo longboards, the early shortboards and modern equipment, including surfboards from three-times Women’s English Champion Zoe Sheath and 2010 British Champion Johnny Fryer.

We also show how wetsuits have changed from the early ‘duck tail’ two-piece wetsuits to the warm winter wetsuits of today. Other items on display will include Trophies, leashes, wax, Isle of Wight Surf Club sweatshirts and magazines. The exhibition will also have photographs showing many of the characters who have influenced surfing on the Island over the last 50 years.

In the early 1960s, surfing was something a small number of friends had started to experiment with on the Isle of Wight. Many of these pioneers started out with belly boards, while some took to the water on homemade wooden surfboards.

There were small pockets of surfers scattered around the Island, all experimenting with surfing in their own ways, until Roger Backhouse and friends – Susan Ellis (Backhouse), Kevin Digweed, Geoff ‘Ned’ Gardner, John Ainsworth, Russell Long and Colin Burgess – decided to try and start an Isle of Wight Surf Club. An advert was put in the Isle of Wight County Press and this brought surfers together from around the Island, including Keith Williams, Glyn Kernick, Ben Kelly and Sid Pitman.

The first meetings of the Isle of Wight Surf Club were held in a tent on the cliff tops at Ventnor. They later moved to Mrs Backhouse’s (Roger’s Mum!) Bed & Breakfast in Ventnor. During the summer Pat Morrell and a ‘Woodwork Teacher’ Mike ‘Hutch’ Hutchinson would join them with their homemade wooden boards.

Once some club members had acquired wheels, it wasn’t long before trips to Cornwall were arranged and wages and savings were spent on the new fibreglass surfboards that were available. Rob Ward had come back to the Island after being in the Royal Navy and had learnt to surf in South Africa and South America. Rob’s surfing was more advanced than many of the island surfers, and in the 1970s, he travelled much of the globe in search of waves. Ex-British Surfing Champion Roger Mansfield and author of The Surfing Tribe once said ‘Rob is the most buccaneering, big wave-riding surf export of IOW’.

During the late ‘60s and ‘70s, Tad Ciastula and Roger Cooper had started shaping boards on the Island and both went on to become renowned surfboard shapers. Meanwhile, Derek Thompson started making the famous Cosmic leashes.

In the late ‘70s and early ‘80s, a young Dave Gray had started to dominate the Isle of Wight Surf Competitions and went on to compete in the English Nationals. Many of today’s top Island surfers will say that Dave was a major influence on them and they aspired to be as good as this Island legend. The Isle of Wight Surf Club started its own surf magazine in the late 1970s and many articles joked about other surfers not bothering to enter competitions if Dave turned up, as he only needed to wax down his surfboard to win an event!

In the early ‘90s, Stu Jones took over the mantle of best surfer on the Island, pushing the limits and starting a new generation of surfers who wanted to do aerials and the other latest tricks. In 1994, a young Craig Sharp took the South Coast Champion crown from Stu Jones and was one of many Islanders who took off in search of waves and adventure abroad. At the same time, 10-year-old Johnny Fryer was just making his mark by winning the Under-14 or ‘cadet’ category in the 1994 South Coast Championship.

Johnny dominated the Island surf scene until he moved to Cornwall, and he went on to become British Surfing Champion in 2010.

Into the Noughties, and young Zoe Sheath, daughter of Gail (an early member of the Isle of Wight Surf club, who started surfing in the ‘70s), began to shine. Zoe went on to become English Women’s Surfing Champion in 2007.

Many others have made a big contribution to Island surfing, including Barney Barnes, Ceri Williams, Keith and Steve Williams, Clive Richardson, Dave Phillips, Rog Powley, Xav Baker, Joe Truman and many, many more.

More recently, with the help of the Island-based Rapanui clothing company, the IOW Surf Club has been reborn, with Matt Harwood taking the helm alongside Oliver Harvey, as they successfully ran the Frost Bite Series of competitions in 2011 as well as the South Coast Surfing Championships.

Only had time for a really quick surf at lunchtime, and no photos either, but i did get back in the evening to shoot a few SUP’s enjoying some low tide sunset action, and Paul has also shared a few more from sunday so i though i’d do a part two for this blog!

So, first of all, a few more of me from sunday..

Date: Sunday 25th March
Location: Compton Bay, Isle of Wight
Surfer: Me (Jason Swain)
Photographer: Paul Blackley

Then a few more taken by me of the Monday…

Date: Monday 26th March
Location: Compton Bay, Isle of Wight
Surfers: Paul Blackley, Dave and Elliot Gray
Photographer: Me (Jason Swain)

Although unfortunately i didn’t get any photos myself, as I was too busy surfing on the Sunday. I was lucky that my good friend and excellent photographer Paul Blackley was there with his big lens to catch a few for me. And I was able to return the favour the next day by shooting a few of him nabbing a few fun sized ones on the Monday

Date: Sunday 25th March
Location: Compton Bay, Isle of Wight
Surfer: Me (Jason Swain)
Photographer: Paul Blackley

Date: Monday 26th March
Location: Compton Bay, Isle of Wight
Surfers: Paul Blackley, Dave and Elliot Gray
Photographer: Me (Jason Swain)

Returning to a familiar theme for this blog, and probably for most people who ever done a bit of Isle of Wight surfing too, the old ‘you should have been here yesterday’ routine.

Over the last 20 years I’ve built my life next to the sea and the West Wight in particular, with the simple (and now not so secret) aim of leading a quiet life and surfing whenever possible,  as well as trying to avoid hearing that dreaded sentence so often heard in Isle of Wight surfing circles ’you should have been here yesterday’ as much as possible too.

But sometimes life has other plans for you, and after a few weeks of niggling broadband complications and lots of support calls and emails (involving a long boring story of telephone exchanges being upgraded to ADSL+, a ten year old router not being able to keep up with the change, and then a mystery line fault that pretty much seemed to me to have lots to do with a very windy and rainy night)  i couldn’t really be out when the engineer was finally scheduled to come and test the line and put me out of my misery.  I wanted to but couldn’t really hang a ‘gone surfing‘ note on the door and hope he would come back later (why don’t BT introduce that as an option when you sign up?)

Of course the only time-slot available on the morning of Friday 16th December, coincided with the biggest swell in weeks, and of course it was also the only day the wind blew offshore after endless days of howling onshores.

So, the day after triple overhead clean sets were reported as being ridden at my local break (from reliable local sources, who wouldn’t exaggerate the conditions) Saturday morning found me at Freshwater bay bright and early, full of hope and excitement for what i might find. Inevitably the classic conditions from the day before were long gone, and to be honest what was left looked pretty unappealing out there with the wind now blowing cross-shore and the swell not really doing it with the sets barely head high.

BUT… remembering my last blog and how i ended up kicking myself for passing up what turned out to be the last waves for a few weeks, this time i didn’t hang around in two minds and encouraged by a couple of hungover locals, pacey & sam, who turned up for a look too, decided to get in there and blow away a few cobwebs anyway.

The good news is that the swell picked up a bit and although it certainly wasn’t anything like the classic conditions of the day before, we had a few overhead sets, and a few bumpy but fun rides, and of course, its always better to have been in than sat around thinking about it.

After a quick surf and to make the most of the morning, i grabbed my camera and headed up onto the cliffs and got a few shots from a different point of view (away from my old favourites of the cabbage patch or right in front of the albion hotel) Whilst Andrew Court, Matt Harwood, Ian Pacey and James Ranson made the most of what was left before it really did get a bit windy. Even managed to get a few shots of some local birds and a random fishing boat in the line-up to complete this little episode of Isle of Wight surfing.

My reasons seemed sound enough at the time, I’d surfed some amazing waves the night before (so only about 12 hours previously) and for most of the previous week (November was an epic month for surf this year on the South Coast), and as the swell had dropped off so much, i didn’t want to erase and replace the great waves i still had in my mind, with the little tiddlers on offer in front of me.

In my defence, i didn’t completely waste my time, at least i took a few photos, managing to catch a few rare photos of Paul Blackley surfing, the even more rare sight of Pacey on a longboard, the quite common sight of chris court falling off a SUP and  few nice ones of a puppy playing fetch on the beach, but looking back at the pics now…. just stop thinking about it and get wet and have some fun, you never know when the winds gonna turn, and its been blowing onshore pretty much ever since.