Many of us know about surfing from movies like “Soul Surfer”, “Point Break” (1991) … or places like Hawaii or Indonesia where the surfers don’t stop surprising with their maneuvers to the fans or the impression that generates the power to observe images and videos of the biggest wave of the world surfed in Nazaré, a village of Portugal. But you have to ask yourself if it’s really worth surfing and if it’s necessary to go to those places to practice it.
First of all, surfing is a technical and individual sport since it depends on yourself and above all on nature, which makes it very special since many sports do not come in constant contact with nature. You never know what can happened to you. This sport can be so addictive that it can become a lifestyle. Kelly Slater, a professional surfer and one of the best of all time, even said in an interview: “I’m not religious but surfing would be my religion if I had one”.
For surfers, a wave can be resembled as a melody in which the notes are transformed into a series of waves and in which the surfer becomes the music director, choosing from all the waves the best ones to be able to perform his turns and tricks with his board. This would be added to the tuned music that is produced when, suddenly, a wave breaks, leaving an intense smell of saltpeter. A natural phenomenon well worth seeing if you’re lucky to witness it and even more if you’re in the water. Once a wave is caught, a sensation runs through your body that one cannot even describe is simply AMAZING.
There are many factors that takes part in the quality of the wave and that condition it: the direction of the swell (waves that form due to atmospheric disturbances, such as wind or storms, often very far from the coast), the wind, the tide or the period between waves…
Surfing also requires sacrifice for the person on the board who will be rewarded by seeing a wave on the horizon and in just 10 miscounted seconds, trying to take advantage of the wave’s potential. In other words, the beauty of LIFE.
In this sport it is very important to control the body’s center of gravity on the board or throw your arms forward to gain more speed and once you have mastered this it will allow you to move more easily to a more advanced level.
Thanks to surfing, skateboarding emerged in the 1950s as a substitute for practicing on asphalt when there are no waves. Therefore, both sports are closely related because both are complemented by allowing the skate to improve the technique of surfing, as well as to perfect certain maneuvers. Surf skate is a skate that can be made tighter turns than a normal board obtaining a similar sensation as when you slide on a surfboard over a wave.
Finally, surfing serves as an escape from the problems that life can bring, due to the fact that being in contact with the water produces a feeling of strength in the hardest moments, as well as allowing the creation of bonds with the people in the water, bonds that will last throughout the years and that both will not disappear as the years go by.
Therefore, one could say that it is necessary to practice it to live an unparalleled feeling but that it is not necessary to go so far to practice it. In Spain, the beaches of the Cantabrian Sea are ideal for this sport and among these we can highlight San Lorenzo located in a beautiful port city called Gijón where Lucia Martiño, Spanish champion of the first league Iberdrola FEsurfing, began to practice it since her adolescence.
It appears in this place, Gijón Surf Hostel valued by Hostelworld as one of the ten best accommodations in the world. Álvaro and Alex, some people addicted to surfing and who have found a way to shape their life to surf, will not only give you surfing lessons, but they will also allow you to obtain material so that you can individually practice both surfboards and skateboards with which you can improve the technique. You will find all this just three minutes away from the nearest beach with the only aim of enjoying the whole time of your stay to the fullest. Moreover, through the hostel you will be able to create bonds and meet people from different places and even from other countries, where after surfing you will be able to enjoy drinking some cold beers on a terrace in good company while admiring the beautiful sunset that can be seen from Gijón.
In addition to this Gijón Surf Hostel is carrying out a project through its RIP (Rest In Paradise SurfCo) platform for environmental conservation. This platform offers sustainable alternatives to products related to surfing, art and fashion. With respect to surfing, its lines of ecological boards stand out for their lightness, durability and, best of all, you can personalize them.