New Zealand lies at the arse end of the planet and receives no coverage in the bodyboarding media. Why? Probably because its too cold for tropic loving pansies. However for the sturdy, cold water conditioned Brit it's swell. Wearing a 3mm wettie in the middle of winter is not a major pain. 

As a country more famous for it's sheep, volcanoes and rugby team Mr Tim and I were unsure as to what we would find in the way of waves. Raglan was the only spot we knew of and most of the lineup shots I'd seen and the footage on the old mal movie "Endless Summer" made it look like a fat, slow but very long wave. We thought we might as well check it out, could always use some backside dropknee practice. It wasn't long before we discovered we'd been grossly missinformed. 
  

The setup of Raglan features three distinctive breaks. Manu Bay is the closet break to town and is home to a perfectly-foiled boulder point and also a marauding bunch of sandflies who possess the rare ability to drill through sheer metal and enter any Jap camper van they want to. Whale Bay is actually a lava reef setup, not a point at all, its a very bad place to go over the falls. The last of the three breaks is Indicators, another boulder point, so long that it goes through three sections itself. If you connected from Outsides through Indies and then pulled off after the Valley you would have been surfing for well over a minute. Compare that to your local break and that's an intense minute of barreling green wall, not a foamy white water ride. Pretty sick really, espically when you're getting tubed and you can see the barnacle encrusted boulders in the trough. 

Myth has it that on the right swell it is possible to ride from Indies all the way past Whale Bay and end up at Manu Bay! All the locals I talked to said it was cobblers and it had never happened in their lifetimes. 

The constant winter storms brewing in the Tasman sea supply plenty of swell before slamming into the coast. As the storm passes the wind veers offshore again and grooms the swell until a new one arrives. There are also big Antartic swells which are perfectly angled for the West coast of NZ and frequently miss the east coast of OZ. 

Blessed with near constant swell and world class breaks it is not a great surprise that the locals all rip. They 98% resins though, aged from 10 to 50 years old, including three of the country's top pros. The standard of surfing is mind blowing. Sponge wise, there are only a handful of locals, but one of the standouts is Luke McPake, a six foot grommet with a neat line and ars. 

I went for the other option, sitting out past the main peak and waiting for the frequent bi sneaker sets. My companion was Peter Wright, fortynine years old, still rides a short board and pulls in pig-dog when its 8-10ft.Anyway it paid off, Peter and I were trading six foot barrels all morning. Every wave is mechanically similar: take a late drop, make a long drawn out bottom turn around the pack fleeing for the horizon, before hooking and stalling into the green room. It's a simple equation; charge solid waves and give respect to those around you, and in turn the local respect you and let you have amazing waves. 

The other side of the coin a week or so later. Manu was cranking again at 4-6ft, the main difference being it was a Saturday. The mellow weekday vibe was replaced by a "if you don't live here don't surf here" ethic because the normal crowd of 20 guys was swelled by at least 100 others. One of the main problems at Manu Bay is Jump Rock . Get it wrong and you are mincemeat. Time it right and you're outh the back after a few quick strokes. Many people think "great I'm at the front of the queue, I'll take the next set wave", then take offense when a local burns them. This is because they work in a system, the locals work together and get whatever waves they want. Sure you can paddle out, but get to the end of the line chum. 
Of  course if they know you, you can sit with the pack at the peak and get a steaming, thick, six foot barrel, just like the Timmer did. The have the whole lineup hoot as you emerge out of the depths of the beast minus swimfins cause they both got sucked off. Not bad for a fat slow wave. 

Having gorged ourselves on Raglans sweet fruit we spent the next few weeks being tourists. The Mt Ruaepehu volcano had been spewing the whole time we had been there, closing airports and ski lifts and giving us spectacular sunsets. Although it had just stopped vomiting ash just days before we got there, the adjacent thermal areas were just as bizarre; steam, mud and sulfur heated water coming out of the ground wherever it felt like it. The overpowering stench of sulfur was enough to make us head for the coast again in search of waves. Preferably a right hander. 

For the first time on our trip we got lucky. we didn't know where we were going but we needed to stop for the night, so we pulled up at a likely looking little East coast beach. There was a solid swell visible in the headlights, supposedly pretty rare for this side of the Island. The next morning we couldn't believe our eyes, out in front of our van a very lovely blue 4ft right was grinding down a sandbar anchored by a natural rock groin. A mini kirra all to ourselves! The other side of the rocks was a super fast left hander river mouth sand bar. Not having surfed a right for over a month we were out there, no one out, absolute perfection. Just take off, pull in, get tubed, then rocket out int o the light before blasting an air off the inside closeout section. 

As we got out tired and stoked a few surfers turned up to tackle the rivermouth. An hour later the paramedics also arrived. Some sorry buger got pitched and landed back first on his board, snapping two fins off with his spin. That's gotta hurt.  

Safe in the knowledge that we'd surfed good waves, made some good friends and not picked up any new infections, we bailed back to Auckland that night in time to drop off the rental death box.

Feel like a hardcore surf trip? Try New Zealand. According to Eppo and friends. It's packed with uncrowded pits. Just don't expect to get a suntan. 

Aussies Eppo, Vicki Gleeson and brother Pete leap the Pacific with their American friends Jay Reale, Jacob Reeve and Nelz Vellocido for a chance at New Zealand's famed cold-water tubes. 

Sure enough it's pouring on arrival into Auckland. Our Kiwi connection, Gavin (Murdoch), and two of his buddies Simon and Mike, were keen to hit the road. Nelz came with me to get the campervan. When we got to Maui (the car rental place) depot and checked out the van we suddenly realised that there was no way in hell seven of us would pull off living in one camper for 10 days with all our gear, so Jackie at Maui hooked us up with two vans for a good deal, and off we went to pick up the crew. After a few near prangs we made it and loaded the family trucksters. 
These motorhomes were delux, complete with microwave, stove, fridge, shower and toilet. Vicki and Eppo both had to christen the toilets, and after we realised we'd have to empty the sticky mixture at the end of the trip, no one else was keen to use the things. We camped a t Piha Beach that night. It was windy and rainy, and we couldn't see the surf,  but we tried to keep an open mind. 

Unfortunately, when we awoke, the open mind shut pretty quickly as the westerly gales howled into the solid overhead, closing out, cold beachbreak. This was definitely not what we had come here for, and Nelz was already wondering whether to head back to Oz and cut our losses. It wasn't going to be that way, so we hit the road. Our destination was an area of reefs called the Taranaki region. Gavin spun yarns of 20 different spots within an hours drive, and that held us over for the arse-busting eight hour drive. When we finally got there, our hopes of offshore cove or reef swirled down the dunny as gusty onshores, big swell and dirty water sent us into mild depression. We set up camp at a spot that Gavin assured would be protected from the wind at tomorrow's midday high tide. 

How do you get two van-loads of invading bodyboarders it someone else's spots without pissing anyone off? With great difficulty. But surprisingly we found everyone to be more than welcoming. The local bodyboarders helped us to pick spots, and were generally stoked to see us everywhere we went. I wish I could say the same for the stand-ups. 
"I hate bodyboarders. I hunt them down and kill them." This was the reception that greeted Jacob after we rocked up at one spot we called Uppers. We'd had it all to ourselves the day before, no one out and solid double overhead rights reeling down this cobblestone point. We stayed there that night, and somehow the word had slipped out overnight, and the place was crawling with cranky and unstable surfers the very next day. 

The next morning we were greeted with a fun, peaky beach break right outside our window, and Nelz was first on it. Some local Maori bodyboarders joined us, and ended up becoming our buddies. Nelz, being of Polynesian decent, was our ambassador and they took us to their lunch spot and did interviews with Strothy, and we exchanged bodyboarding stories. When the sun popped out, we hit it back to the beachie for the afternoon sesh. It was still clean and fun and we took full advantage of every air section, barrel and reform, enjoying the whole atmosphere of getting to surf in a foreign country with friendly locals. 
 

 

At last. Our 10th day dawned offshore, blazing sun and pumping ....... at least from what we could tell 5 kms into Raglan bay. We weren't in the right spot, so after the daily squat in the weeds we groped our way out to the point. There's actually three different points with the inside one being the most crowded (Manu Bay). We checked the middle (Whale Bay) and the outside (Indicators) points and headed out. It wasn't exactly an epic day for Raglan, but it wasn't crowded, and at one stage Vicki and a girl surfer actually dominated the peak at Indicators. 300 -yard-long lefts swept across the bay offering the chance to gouge high-speed turns all over the place. If only it had been hollow..... (it is hollow at low tide -Ed). 

New Zealand is not the surf trip for your pampered pussy-wussy sponsor type. But if you dig your surfing, don't mind cold, hardship, or travel, and are mellow enough to make friends with the locals, you could have the best time of your life. Just make sure you time it right - or you are better off taking a snowboard.  - Jay Reale.