good morning. 5:30am here in shikoku. going out for a surf before heading for the airport. i’ve been here for 2 weeks and haven’t surfed yet so i’m looking forward to getting into the ice cold water. yeah, river mouth baby…. have a nice day….

nao omura has a bright future ahead of her. she’s only 15 year old and traveled to more places than most adults. she came to hawaii last winter and surfed the north shore pretty dam good. i seen her surfing improve day by day. nao’s really sweet and has so much talent. i got the chance to sit down with her at kugenuma mcdonalds last week and shot this uncut interview. i talked her into speaking english so my friends back in hawaii could understand. she did a great job!!

imagine coming from kugenuma, one of the most packed spot in the world and looking at perfect v-land with only a few surfers out? this is normal for me but i was wondering what nao was thinking….
anyway, check out nao omura’s interview…..

good evening. gosh, after such a beautiful day yesterday, today was terrible. rain, cold, and dark. i’ve been in japan for 10 days and i didn’t surf yet. i got new boards waxed up and everything ready to go. but no waves to ride it on. i hope we can get a session in before we head back to osaka tomorrow. tony and seth are heading home. lucky them… i miss the warm weather, surf, and sun…. tony told me that micah is complaining about waist high kewalo’s today. gosh, if he only knew….. i’m glad seth knows how it is and he can go home and talk some sense into him…. have a great evening. good night….

all the boys except for seth left shikoku this morning. all of a sudden, it’s so quiet around here. i rather have it loud. these kids are all good kids. their surfing really impressed me and their futures are so bright. i can’t wait to see them all develop into men. what ever path they choose to take, they will all succeed…. strong minds succeed….

after i came in from stand up paddling, i walked on the beach and saw seth’s name drawn into the sand. i thought that was pretty cool….

surfing is fun but after a while, the kids were starting to get bored. so they grabbed the longboard and fooled around. i could hear them screaming and yelling in the water from the beach. it was classic….

shikoku has the best japanese pizza shop in the entire japan. it’s on a side street and you won’t be able to find it unless some local takes you there. it’s called “nonami” and i love it there….

after a night of drinking, ramen is the closer. especially when it’s so dam cold like how it’s been. this is a ramen shop in osaka we went to after the barrels party. i’m really glad i ate it because it put me to sleep. and with 7 guys piled in a van for a 5 hour drive, sleeping is the best thing to do….

wouldn’t you want to sleep after something as ono as this???? lights out…. i’m a ramen lover. i drive hours and hours to eat ramen in japan. there is no place in hawaii that even comes close to the ramen here. if you want real ramen, you have to come to japan…..

good morning from shikoku. gosh, what an awesome day it was yesterday. the waves were small but the surfing level was up for the tssc contest at ikumi. and it was supposed to rain but it was sunny and perfect. i took out my camera yesterday morning to take some video and my battery light was flashing. shit, i was bummed. took some video but not as much as i wanted to. but i got about 10 minutes of great stuff. going to work on putting it up later tonight or tomorrow. anyway, got so many things to do this morning so i’d better go. but first, check out these photos from the other night at the barrels renewal party….

the new barrels water sports shop in osaka is awesome. ishino-san did a great job. walking by, how could you now resist going inside to take a look.

got a good feeling in the store with a lot of space….

pretty cool yeah? everything in there is top quality stuff. including the staff.

then it was off to the party. first it’s yasu, yasu is a designer that makes pretty cool stuff. also a surfer, skater, and diver. then it’s yusuke. gosh, standing next to yusuke makes me feel small. yusuke is the guy that a few people emailed me to ask about. a few girls. yusuke is single so go charge. haha. then we have masaki-san from RSM or real west side movement. masaki surfs, skates, and dives too. i went diving with him a few times and we have an awesome time. can’t wait till the water gets a little warmer so we can go grab some lobsters, abalone, and fish. then barbecue after…

this is barrels owner ishino-san. i’ve known ishino-san for a long time and he’s always has been super nice to me. he’s my surf shop sponsor and i’m super happy riding for barrels….

these two girls are customers of barrels. they are in this club called “paddling girls”. i’ve been to busy to search for their website but they told me that if i search “paddling girls” in yahoo, they will be on top. i’ll have to check that out later….

then we have kenji, matsuo, and yoneda. 3 guys i’ve known for a long time…. super good friends….

then it’s ishino-san in the middle, tssc shaper tsukurimichi-san on the right, and on the left, i forgot his name but he use to camp out at kaifu back in the days. hard core soul surfer…..
**anyway, gotta get going. too many things to do in so little time. have a beautiful day….