so i get a text from Bobby late last night. “MICK GOT ATTACKED!!” i was dazed? attacked? what? by someone? so i turn on the live streaming web for the contest in south africa and watch the action. freaking unbelievable!

to see someone you know and see surfing every year on the north shore, it kind of hits harder than usual.

the shark pretty much attacked him. luckily Mick’s in one piece and it’s unbelievable that he survived it without a scratch.

what do you do after you look death in the eyes? thank god. i’m sure Mick knows how lucky he is. i’m just not sure if he will ever surf Jeffrey’s Bay ever again. i surely wont.

and i give his competitor Julian Wilson credit for paddling over to Mick to try to help him. that’s pretty dam brave of him to do that.

they ended up canceling the contest and splitting the prize money and points between Mick and Julian. good call.
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jtzu9Vgb_zE[/youtube]

OMG!!!!!!!! Jbay contest live!!!! OMG!!!!

went to check out the waves early this morning at Isounora. the surf city of kansai! couldn’t believe how many people were here! full parking lots and lots of surfers at 6am. omg!

the weather was cloudy and raining. the waves were knee high and onshore. but that didn’t stop the thousands of hard core surfers that drove here from osaka.

there were thousands of surfers out! hard to fit every surfer in a photo as this is only one small section of the beach. times this photo and people by 20 and you figure out how many surfers were out. it was crazy!

i’ve been short boarding for my whole life and there is no possible way i could have stood up even on one wave this morning out there. long board yes, short board no. that said, there were about 600 short boarders out.

so instead of hassling with tiny surf and thousands of people, we packed up the minivan and went surfing a secret spot with nobody out and lots of current. such a good workout!

i kind of forced the girls to paddle out with me because i didn’t’ want to surf alone. had no idea the current was ripping like a river. maybe that’s why nobody was out? haha. anyway, thanks Judy-chan and Miwa-san for keeping me company this morning. great workout yeah? your arms will grow by tonight. haha.

best wakayama guide in the world, Kimura-san.

the kind of last minute traveling i do isn’t for everybody. i can’t plan a thing because i don’t even know what’s going to happen. at first, i use to get stressed out, now, i just laugh. it’s the way i chose so can’t complain right? so trying to get out of hawaii to anywhere in japan was hard. narita was all fully booked so my next try was kansai. luckily i got one of the last seats! if not, i would have flown to fukuooka. if not, i would have given up and probably stayed in hawaii. that was that, now is now. i’m here and going to enjoy every moment. everybody asks where i’m going next? that all depends on the waves as i’m going with the flow.

talking about going with the flow. i always wanted to go to europe. my friend that travels the exact way i travel has been stuck at the airport in rome for a week! she’s been sleeping at the airport every night because she can’t get a flight out. that’s crazy! but the cool thing is she’s been texting me everyday with positive words. “Hi Kirby, enjoying another night of our amazing European vacation at the airport. Haha.”