Enchanted Secrets

Very altruistic, but not taking into account a component almost as powerful as those colored dots on a page: surfing word of mouth. Perfect example? Look at Punta Pequena, in Baja California. Although this dreamy desert point had already been surfed by a handful of surfers (Surfline's Sean Collins reportedly rode here as early as 1969, having sailed by with his father during the annual Newport-to-Ensenada race) when Scott Dittrich's surf movie Fluid Drive came out in 1974, featuring J. Riddle and George Trafton racing the impossibly lined-up, sand-bottomed barrels, the Great Baja Land Rush was on-despite the fact that the break was never identified. Nor was it in the summer of 1975 when the first-and only-major magazine feature on what was now being called "Scorpion Bay" appeared in SURFING magazine. And yet by 1979 this remote fishing village in the Mexican desert was a veritable R.V. park of Econoline and V.W. vans, with as many as 50 like-minded surf campers on hand for every decent south swell. Today "Scorpion Bay" actually does have a campground-as well as restaurants, beach rentals and public toilets. All the result of simple word-of-mouth.

"Oh, yeah, the surf grapevine is a major factor," says Naughton. "But the magazine article factor pumps things up, whether you name the break or not."

In regards to the Nicaraguan trip I had written to Quiksilver's Mark Warren in an attempt to explain SURFER's current policy on the naming of newly discovered breaks, a letter that, in retrospect, may have tried a little too hard to make its point.

"So far as identifying surf spots are concerned," I e-mailed. "our policy here at SURFER is simple; place it on a map, but don't necessarily draw a map. This is absolutely necessary to provide some sort of editorial interest and point of reference to travel stories. Another boat trip to Macaronis doesn't have quite the cache as, say, a first-surf trip to the Nicobar Islands. Nor would a feature on Lagundri Bay be as compelling these days as a newly discovered right tube in the Tubuai's. To label this recent trip simply as "Centroamerica" again would rob the story of any real significance. By not saying where it is you cannot write about the country or its people, the culture, the weather, the history, the food, the music, the flora or fauna. By lumping this trip under the single banner "Centroamerica" you also run the risk of fostering an insular, neo-colonial attitude that disregards the rich cultural differences that distinguish all the countries that make up the region. The fact that they all speak Spanish does not mean "it's all Mexico south of the border..."

After almost six hours of driving we arrived in the crossroads town of Chinandega, where at a tiny, brightly lit import-export office we picked up an inscrutable guide who had been retained to take us to the Indies Trader. By now it was twilight; people were everywhere, emerging in the evening's cool, drifting in and out of the darkness bordering the highway like shadowy spirits. Eventually we swerved off the paved road and down a rambling, rutted dirt track that snaked it's way through what by the bouncing headlights looked like a deep forest; broad-topped mahogany trees draping themselves over the path, blocking out the inky sky and stars above. Martin Daly was waiting at the end of this road. Surf was waiting. The naming or not naming of which seemed totally irrelevant at this juncture, considering I had absolutely no idea where here was.

Rattling along in the ebon tropical dark of the Nicaraguan forest, scattering charcoal-dusty pigs and aerobic chickens, bound for our secret rendezvous with Captain Daly and the Trader, I thought back on the pattern of exposure/colonization that established itself in the decades following Naughton/Peterson's journeys. And there has been a pattern: Intrepid surfer (or in many cases surf photographer) discovers exotic new break. Tells friends. Friends tell friends. Generally, two seasons pass. Word of mouth builds, eventually reaching Dana Point. Mag team is dispatched, consisting most often of a tuned-in surf photographer who'd been told of the spot and several pro surfer/models. They return with story, magazine feature appears full of titillating photos but no specific locations. Another season passes. Second season following release of magazine article sees the arrival of the suitably inspired, their presence resented, naturally, by those surfers who'd come due to word-of-mouth. Third season, more surfers, maybe a second magazine feature. Fourth season, Balinese/Sumtaran/Latin American/European/Polynesian locals start renting out hammock space at the break, which is now considered crowded, and subsequently ruined.