all suited up & ready to surf..
me, katie, maxium, & kailyn LOVE to surf.

this past weekend a group of about 32 of us went to a surf camp out in the middle of now where. it was unreal and absolutely amazing. i finally conquered my fear of the ocean, and sharks, anddd crossed another thing off my bucket list: i learned to surf!! we were suppose to leave campus at 7:30 on friday but, we didn't end up leaving until around 8:30ish. this was to mark the beginning of a veryyy interesting weekend. because we had too many people. there were to be two buses. however, the second bus, which was driven by the owner of the camp and contained an additional 60 passengers, was wayyy late so we had to wait for him to get there. after we finally set off on our journey, driving for about an hour, we stop at a truck stop to get food. this takes about 45 minutes due to the large number of people. we finally get on the road again and drove for about 2 hours until we arrived at camp. we get settled in our bunks after a long journey.. we were greeted by an "opossum" (not so sure that's what it was) outside our window. it intrigued my roommates and i so much we actually sat still and watched the animal for like 20 minutes. :) the next morning we all head out to our different beaches. our group is lead by joel, rhys, and marty. we were also joined by a camp helper from norway. her name was tuna and she was on holiday from her job at a psych ward (she's passing the time between work & her doctorate.) we drove for about 3o minutes to the beaches and then joel, marty, rhys, and tuna had to check out the waves to make sure there was surf on the beach. the first beach we stopped at didn't have surf but there was a pack of dolphins swimming! too far away to get pictures but i still got to see their fins bobbing in and out of the water :) after that excitement, we drove to our final destination, Elizabeth "Lizzy," beach. it was beyond words beautiful. it was perfect for learning on, i decided. not too heavy of waves. we have a lesson for about 20 minutes about the different parts of the board and how to stand and then, it's off into the water. i conquered my fear! it was so awesome. when i got in the water i was not overcome by fear like i normally am. i was one with the ocean and it was overwhelming. the warm water splashed me in my face, carrying me with the current over a thousand times and i felt what it was like to live in God's greatest masterpeice. i was a helpless jellyfish being thrown on the shore with the whitewash of the waves and i didn't care. i got up, grabbed my board, and went in for it again. i'm no where near amazing but i will definitely be picking this up as a hobbie. i have never been interested in board sports, i hate skateboarding, snowboarding was scary, wakeboarding is not my thing but surfing is AWESOME! when i come back to the states, i just might move to cali! it truly was an amazing experience being in the water and getting lost in the waves. it might sound out there, but it's a feeling you will not understand unless you experience it yourself. it is out-of-this-world, priceless to be one with God's beautiful, frightening creation.
seals rock, nsw