Had a great few days on our most recent surfari. Leanne,Matt, Tyler ( a Californian surfer we have become friends with) and I stayed in two small very basic beach bungalows located right on the beach at Playa de Flores . At high tide the water is just a couple of metres from the front door- very cool !

There are two breaks here one is Los Flores which when the swell is right (which it was) has a pretty heavy wave and was definitely too heavy for me and my 9'8 board. Matt and Tyler however had a great time on day 1 and 2 surfing here. Leanne and I watched and Leanne was able to practice some more in the shore break , she is standing on every wave now so it won`t be long before she will be paddling onto waves out the back.

The other break Punta Mango is accessible only by boat , at 5.00am we along with 3 other guys in our panga and 4 other pangas with about 6 guys in each one made our way through the surf and down the coast to the spot. This is a serious wave and has a fierce reputation for "taking no prisioners" surfers or their boards !
It is difficult to describe how much power this wave has hopefully the photos I have added to the gallery will give you some idea.

At the end of the session the tally was 1 snapped board , I snapped leg rope and two very bruised boards as a result of impact with the rocks that line the shore.

Matt`s first two attempts at getting on the wave resulted in him being walloped in the head by the lip of the wave and him getting rolled around and around under it after it knocked him off his board. He was almost ready to concede but decided after some encouragement and instruction from Tyler to give it one more try. Next attempt he managed a pretty out of control ride but stayed on the board . He was now full of adrenalin and felt he understood what was going on.

For the next hour he charged into the wave and surfed like he had been doing so all his life. Despite loosing his board and having to swim ashore whilst waves pounded him and retrieve his somewhat worse for the experience board . To say he was excited is the understatement of the century. Tyler also was on cloud 9 despite having his new $800 long board snapped in half by the wave we have affectionately named "The Mango Monster" .

From the relative safety of the Panga I was able to get some pretty cool pictures . They are in the photo gallery in the album called " Mango Monster "I hope you enjoy them.