DRIVE THRU update (pat O)

AI before he goes MIA

At least we finally got waves in West Oz. Some rip bowl right, about four to five feet, and no one on it. We must have surfed four or five hours that session.

On these Drive Thru trips, you pretty much have to luck into waves. You can’t exactly do an overnight strike mission with 12 dudes in a motor home. But that’s not what these things are about anyway. So it stings when we hear how good the East Coast has been while we were on the other side of the continent. You get a little twitch of irritation when you hear about a resurrected Kirra and a banner day at Ours. But it doesn’t make or break the trip. Drive Thrus are supposed to be random. We get what we get.

And for the most part, everyone remains in good spirits. Occy’s like a cartoon character, inspiring kids wherever he goes. Shane, Benji, and Donavon all keeping us laughing while Andy made a detour on us for a day and snuck off with Parko somewhere, but I’m sure he’ll return soon, recharged from a surf at some secret spot.- Pat O’Connell

drifter in the sky

Machado taking a quick break from Drifter editing sessions flew to South America with Clay Marzo and Gabriell Villaran for some filming for CASTLES IN THE SKY

Pat O’Connell’s Drive-Thru Update

“Starting to see the first sign of the sun in four days and it can’t come fast enough. I’m the most upbeat person in the world, but I’ve duck-dove 15 times more than bottom turned and that ratio needs to swing around quickly…” says Pat O.

“Yesterday, Occy, Donavon and I surfed small Rabbit Hill and then our crew headed off to the famed West Oz wineries for lunch. Occy is a national hero so wherever we go, we’re first class. When we turned up for lunch, the place was closed but then they saw Occy and in two seconds, bottles of wine were flowing and Occy was in the kitchen cooking up pizzas,” he adds.

“The forecast is looking better for the weekend so let’s pray for surf!”—Pat O

DION ?

Dion pulled this crazy flip yesterday while filming for Modern Collective. The thing was so smooth and tweaked.To find out what Dion thought of this check out moderncollective.tv

50K bam

Congrats to Dusty Payne for sticking this air and walking away with a cool $50K

Dusty reverse from Stab on Vimeo.

DRIVE THRU adds Dorian to the crew

Shane Dorian is added to the already all star Drive thru mix (Andy, Occy, Benji, Donavon, and Pat O). The boys leave on friday for West Oz.

modern collecting

Modern crew rolled into a good little swell. Hopefully Dion can shake off the Bali belly.

MC heading to Indo

Dion Agius on the goldy

Dion, Mitch & one other is heading over to Indo with Kai to film for MODERN COLLECTIVE. more info at moderncollective.tv

Drive Thru about to embark

Andy Irons and crew are getting ready for the next Drive thru. The guys leave in about a week for Oz.

Castles in the Sky (iceland) part 1

It’s ridiculous stuff, I agree. But here we are, trying to surf while the wind and rain turn into hail and snow and so much un-godly natural fury. The photogs and filmers are fighting back tears of frustration and mentally calculating the cost of lost equipment while still trying to focus on the rare session at hand. It ain’t easy. Have you ever tried looking through the lens of a 16mm Bolex camera? Even in the best of conditions it’s hard to see anything. That’s why cinematographer Todd Heater walks around all day with his right eye closed just to account for the light change. But this fog and rain make filming surf virtual guesswork. Meanwhile, out in the water, Timmy Curran, Dane Reynolds and Dan Malloy are braving 40-degree storm surf, suffering frostbite and Shamu-death visions just for a chance to have a couple clips in Taylor’s “art of travel” surf film or Dustin’s “off the beaten track” photo book. And even if it’s still kinda fun, it sure as hell ain’t easy.

The whole operation’s forever on the brink of disaster. But, as a writer, I couldn’t be happier. My job’s never been so easy. Disaster and destruction; that’s great stuff for stories. My problems start when things DON’T go wrong. In fact — and please, don’t tell the guys about this — but if things ever do start going well, I might just have to go out and let the air out of the tires, hide someone’s camera or feed someone’s passport to a stray dog. Whatever I can do to keep it interesting. An anonymous call to the authorities. A midnight fire alarm. The odd Mickey in the drink. All in the name of “adventure” — just don’t tell no one.

Not that I should ever need to sabotage things. Taylor and D.Hump got making my job easy down to a science. Their recipe is simple: travel to places no surfer should ever consider visiting and document them in a such a way that every surfer in the world thinks they probably should visit it. So wonderous you’ll wonder why you went. So exotic you’ll poop your pants. So distant you may never find your way home.

It’s like science fiction writer Ray Bradbury once said: “Half the fun of travel is the aesthetic of lostness.” (Oh we got that look down.)

Or what sarcasm-master Mark Twain said: “Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry and narrow-mindedness, and many people need is sorely on these accounts.” (As punishment!)

I carry these ass-backwards little travel quotes around in a little book just to antagonize people when the van runs outta gas in the middle of the desert, when the camera equipment malfunctions right before the super session, or when a stray llama eats the last PB&J for a thousand miles. “Cheer up, guys,” I tell ‘em, “Remember what Lao Tzu said.”

Perhaps the most amazing part of it all is that Taylor and Dustin still manage to pull it all off — in fact, the final product comes out so blindingly beautiful you’ll fall head-over-heels in love with every off-camera catastrophe it took to get there. And you won’t even know it.

“Those moments when you’re right on the edge of disaster,” says Dustin after narrowly surviving a glacier blizzard to end up scoring a world-class, never-before-surfed slab, “those are the times when I feel most alive.”

Hold on, I may have to put that one in my little book.

story by Nathan Myers