Day 326! Today was a fun day! I got to go surfing in the morning on a beautiful bright sun shining day. I worked a bit and then hung out with some new friends. Will was back in town and as he has been known to do, introduced me to his very nice friends! But… this unfortunately turned into a very late night.

I didn’t have work till noon today, but I was up well before that! I got up to my alarm at 7:30am and quickly hopped out of bed for my morning surf. I’ve waited years and years to be able to do this and I’m finally getting to (even if it’s just glorified boogie boarding at this point)!

I got my bike ready, strapped my surfboard precariously to its holder, and took off towards Turners Beach.

The surf report this morning said there was low winds that were offshore, which generally means good surfing conditions. On top of that the sun was finally coming out, making an absolutely beautiful morning. So I had a feeling it might be a busy day at the beach.

And busy it was! Not only were there about 50 surfers out trying to catch some of the big waves forming, there were tons of people already up and relaxing on the beach as well.

I waxed up my board, put my rash guard on, and made my way into the ocean.

The surf today was much better than the past couple of days! And I was definitely not the only beginner out in the waters today, so that was a nice change. I didn’t interact with any of them, but I also wasn’t the only chasing the smaller waves.

There was everyone from surf lessons to very experienced surfers in the waters and when I was waiting for my waves, I had a fun time watching them catch waves and dissecting what they were doing.

I spent around 30 minutes catching some small waves, getting knocked around by others, and then I made my way back to my things for a water break.

But I wasn’t done yet! I used this as a chance to try a different part of the beach and went at it for another 30 minutes, my longest session yet. It’s much easier to keep going when the ocean is more kind.

I’m slowly figuring this surfing thing out… but I still have a long way to go. But I’m enjoying (almost) every second of it! Even when I’m getting dunked by the waves. Can’t really make progress without falling a lot!

Instead of going home right away, I spent the next 20 minutes or so sitting on the beach, listening to music. It was too gorgeous of a morning to just head home and sit inside.

I eventually did head home and there were lots of people out and about in the town. Thankfully biking home was fine and my surfboard stayed on the rack, but I’m very much looking forward to my new surfboard rack and I hope it works much better.

I ate breakfast after I got home and then sat on my bed to read more before heading to work. Not a bad way to start my morning!

My shift today was 12-3pm. It was an okay one, much busier than my last couple of day shifts but still nearly as busy as I’d hoped. The busier it is the more there is to do and the less time there is to stand around and make myself look busy.

But today had a nice trickle of people, so the time didn’t move as slowly as it could’ve.

As I reached the end of my shift, my manager told me there’s a chance he’d need me tonight. But I’ll spoil that one, there wasn’t.

One of my coworkers ordered chicken wings and didn’t want them all. So he gave them to me and I took them home to eat for lunch. I also snacked on some hummus and crackers as well. I haven’t had chicken wings in a while, even though they’re one of my favorite foods to eat. These ones were okay! Nothing compared to the ones from Kansas City though.

I didn’t have much else to do for the afternoon and I was pretty tired… surfing in the morning has been tiring me out. So I took a quick power nap, woke up and read more of the book I’m reading, and waited for a text from my manager.

The text never came, but I did get a text from my friend Will. He told me he was meeting some friends at the pizza place below where I live, and invited me to come down and hang out with them. So I scarfed down a couple PB&Js and a clementine, and then went down to meet them.

The crew tonight wasn’t anyone I’d met before. They turned out to be Will’s friends from primary school! Isaac, Liam, Flyn, and one other guy (I can’t remember his name) and I all hung out and chatted. As most people in Yamba, they welcomed me in quickly and just inserted me into the conversation. A couple of them were in town from the weekend, some moved back to Yamba recently, and a couple hadn’t left Yamba.

They were all nice guys and we had some interesting conversations and mini debates about random topics from finance to travel to random societal norms. One of the topics of societal norms came from two people that joined us later on.

Sarah and Sam from Sydney were in town for the week. I’d served both of them drinks at the hotel, so I had interacted with them before. But I guess they had met Liam yesterday and decided to come hang out with us after seeing us at drift.

So we all moved to a bar called El Ocaso, which I had never been to but had been wanting to check out.

Now, the social norm in question was, “if you order food with a group and your food is in front of you, do you wait to eat or do you start right away?” Apparently, my response of I’m not waiting, you can watch me eat and I’ll watch you eat because I don’t want my food to get cold… was an unpopular opinion. But I wasn’t surprised, it usually is.

We had many other discussions throughout the night. But small town Yamba struck again and two of the guys working at the bar were also frequenters up at the hotel. One specifically is Davide, from Italy, who I just found out was the head chef at this bar. He came out to do rounds and chat with the patrons and was excited to see me and also the group I was with because he knew them all well too.

After El Ocaso, we headed up the hill to the bar I work at, because it’s the only place open late in town. And, unsurprisingly, it wasn’t that busy.

But it was fun to be on the “other side of the bar,” as some regulars said to me. We spent the rest of the night chatting and new people came in and out of the group. One in specific is my friend Paddy, not the one I’d been jamming with but I work with. He’s a super nice guy and I’ve been meaning to find a time to hang, since we haven’t since the day of the Melbourne Cup.

It ended up being a fun night of hanging out with people my age. But the night was far from done. We ended up going to Will’s house to hang out a bit more, and ended up staying up till about 2am when I finally called it quits and headed home.

Will and I have plans to go surfing in the later morning before his work shift, hopefully that still happens! I don’t have work till 4pm, so I’ll be good to go and I’m hoping it will be a busy shift.

But as always… we’ll see!

– Elie