I booked a few days at the Surfski center in Tarifa, one of the most famous places in the world for surfski. The attention to safety eased my concerns of huge wind and waves in the Strait of Gibraltar. The experience turned out to be very rewarding with excellent tuition and much learnt! Many photos courtesy of Boyan (Surfski Center), with some extracts from my videos.

NB: Many of the pictures are zoomed in and make us look a lot closer to the huge shipping and Africa than we really were.

On the first day we had a short morning paddle in benign conditions to loosen up. In the afternoon it was a completely different story at Valdevaqueros Cove; ins and outs into the wind through considerable surf and once beyond the surf zone the swell was up to a genuine two metres in places.

The next day the Poniente wind (from the west) indicated a downwind run from Tarifa to Playa de Getares, a beach just to the south of Algeciras. This is the famous Strait of Gibraltar section and along this stretch of coast one is committed with no easy get outs. It’s about 24k and 2½ hours paddling to then be collected for the shuttle back to Tarifa. Getting clearance from the port authority was necessary as ferries from Africa arrive and depart from the harbour. Additionally the rescue rib was to accompany us for an additional level of security.

Heading out from the harbour the route goes ESE past the cardinal marker to get into the right position to start the downwind run. The sea state here was a bit lumpy due to the tide and flow past Tarifa island. Starting downwind the waves were long wavelength and almost impossible to catch, but this would change later. As we progressed down the coastline about a mile offshore, I did catch a few waves but I couldn’t match the others for speed. Not so much a problem as periodically the others would wait to regroup. We had walkie talkies attached to our PFDs and TracTrac GPS trackers in our PFDs, that pinged our individual locations to the TracTrac system (TracTrac Surfski Center) so anyone could see where we were and watch or playback our positions.

South Cardinal buoy

Rescue Rib

That was hard work, muscles ached!

A typical day at the Surfski Center: Classroom session, Water session 1, Lunch break, Water session 2.

There was little wind in the morning so we had an extended classroom session and lunch break. The afternoon wind was forecast to be a bit stronger than the day before and the Rescue Rib was to accompany us. Also since I had been slow the day before, it was arranged for me to get a ride in the Rib to about a third of the way along, to be fresh for the livelier sections of the route.

I had recovered well from the previous day, the wind and waves were better and I had quite a few rides. One issue is that towards the end, the route turns from paddling NE to NW and into the wind that we'd enjoyed on the downwind. One needs to have some reserve fuel in the tank for this last stretch of about 5k.

Africa in the background (zoomed in, not really that close)

Filming with the GoPro bite mount

Gibraltar

He's in !

Remount

Against the wind on the home stretch

In the morning we had blue skies and no wind. Good practice launching the skis quickly and efficiently and handling them in the small surf, which was in complete contrast to a few days before. We then set off from Valdevaqueros Cove SE towards Tarifa. Soon a force 3 wind and small irregular waves came with us from WSW. It wasn’t far along this stretch but a little frustrating with few rides. Landing on the main beach at Tarifa was through small surf with the occasional bigger waves, so it was important to get the timing right.

Valdevaqueros beach

Foot brake

Grab footstrap

In the afternoon we were doing the Strait of Gibraltar run again but this time I was to go in the double behind Boyan. The wind and waves seemed better again than the day before, and we had many rides. He gave indications as to when to paddle at basic speed, pulling hard to catch waves and bracing when surfing. We were easily quicker than the other guys in the singles but often waited to regroup. From everyone’s faces it was obvious that we were loving it. For me this was the highlight of the trip.

Tarifa harbour with Africa in the background

Heading out to the Cardinal buoy

Flying along

Waiting to regroup

Going

Gone

Come on in the water's lovely!

Yeeha !

Playa de Getares

Gibraltar in the background

(video on YouTube)

I was experimenting with the GoPro 9 modes, to begin with using Wide mode then changing to Linear+. I was hoping to get a wider angle view with Wide mode but it looks like the stabilisation (‘on’) was not as good as Linear+ and as the camera angle moves up and down the fisheye effect changes dramatically. In Linear+ the horizon levelling worked perfectly when there was just sea in the view but when there were the cliffs and the sea in view it seemed to do some sort of average and the sea wasn’t level. And the stabilisation was better than Wide mode. Wide mode was used on the first two downwinds, Linear+ on the last two sessions. Some of the pictures in this blog were from either mode, other pictures were from Boyan's camera.

I flew from Manchester to Gibraltar, the nearest airport to Tarifa. Outbound the timing was good to walk across to La Línea de la Concepción and catch two buses, the first to Algeciras the second onwards to Tarifa. They were efficient and good value. However, on the return the flight was too early to use the bus system on the Sunday so I travelled by bus the afternoon before and spent one night in an AirBandb in Gibraltar close to the airport.

I have an Epic V9 at home and had chosen to paddle the Epic V8 on this trip, a wise decision as I felt totally comfortable in the conditions with no worries over stability. I would highly recommend a visit to the Surfski Center, there’s a lot to learn and Boyan is a superb coach, even the paddlers a lot more experienced than myself were learning downwind skills.