Dingle 8: Surfing Inch Beach....and all chronological blog order has been abandoned

Sunday July 14 Rebecca Wallace-West

Today the class went to Inch Beach, a beautiful four-mile beach stretching into the Dingle Bay. We spent a majority of the time surfing. In the beginning when we arrived we were all predicting that most of our time would be spent getting in and out of our wet suits, because they were so tight. Thankfully that was not the case! 

 

 

        Most of the class has had some experience with a sport similar to surfing such as snowboarding or skateboarding; as for me I have been surfing many times on various family trips. A major factor in today’s success was that the waves were perfect for the people who have never been surfing as well as those who have been many times before. 

 

Our surfing class was made up of around 8 of us and included other small family groups. We started off the lesson with learning the area of the board as well as how to find the best position for balance. Some of us are “regular footed” and some of us are “goofy footed,” meaning that we ride with our left (regular) or right (goofy) foot forward.

 

Once in the water we first spent time catching some waves and riding them as far in as we could on our stomachs, and after about one third of the way through the lesson we went back to shore to learn the three ways of standing on the board when out on the water. When we all got back out on the water the waves started to increase in height by about six inches, so we had more time to ride the wave. 

 

While we were out in the water the second time we had the chance to spot some compass jellyfish. By the second and third wave we all were able to catch our first waves and ride them out. The most important part of this for me was that we all had fun and by the large amount of laughter and smiles we all were having a blast! 

 

As we all rode in our last wave we were all a bunch of happy and sandy surfers of Ireland. We all concluded that the best choice of action for dinner after a long surfing day was to have good old pancakes, bacon, and hash! But halfway through making dinner we realized the soccer finals game was on so we quickly finished dinner to join the locals in cheering on Spain for the victory!