Bennetts’ Blog - My Little Chinaman

Words and photos: Adam Bennetts

Reverse Snapper on a Chinese island next to Vietnam? You better believe it. Marc Lacomare in the Hainan Classic. Photo: ASP

A couple of weeks before Christmas, I received an email from one of the event organizers for the inaugural Hainan Island Surfing Festival saying she was in need of water patrol for an upcoming surfing festival which consisted of the ISA China Cup and in particular, a 4 star ASP contest put on by Quiksilver.

After exchanging emails for a few weeks, flights were booked, my bags were packed and I was sitting in Cooly airport waiting to start the first leg of my journey to Hainan Island, a booming tourist destination in South China.

I arrived in Melbourne and met up with my fellow water patrol partner Shane Bevan and webcast commentator Spencer Hargraves.

Hainan island lies roughly around the same latitude as the Hawaii and sits a fair bit closer to the equator than Taiwan, so naturally, you'd expect it to be relatively warm, even though they are in the middle of winter.

We were told that it had been fairly cold, with temperatures of around 16-22C, so I threw in some warm clothes just to be safe. But when we arrived at our first layover in Guangzhou on the mainland of China, it was seriously ridiculous! It was gloomy, overcast and freezing cold. I didn't get the official temperature, but it would have had to have been around 10 degrees celsius - way colder then I have ever been in my life. It was out of control!

Bevo and I looked at each other and were semi-rattled, seeing as though we'd be driving the jet ski's for the next week.

You are what you eat, right? Bennetts started to look a little more local after a few days in China. 

I was busting for the toilet before getting on my flight to Haikou and after walking in circles, I soon realized that I should have followed the  'smoking room' signs as this also doubled as a toilet.

It was so cold in this airport that I almost shoved my hand in front of my piss cause the heat radiating out of the trough felt so, so good. I ended up spending a good 10 minutes in front of the hand dryer to thaw out my hands and then legged it to the gate and jumped on the second last leg of my journey.

Whilst in Guangzhou airport, we ran into the US surf team who were being coached and mentored by none other then Ian Cairns. It was really cool to meet Ian as he was such a big influence on Australian surfing back in the day and I've always wanted to meet him after watching Bustin' Down The Door. The US surf team consisted of a few up and coming groms and also Cory Lopez and Chris Ward, so it was good to catch up with those boys too as I hadn't seem them in ages.

We were hoping that because Hainan Island sat a further 900km south of Guangzhou airport, that we would hop off the plane in Haikou and it world be much warmer. Man were we disappointed. It was slightly warmer but still really cold and possessed the same weather pattern with grey skies, rain and moderate winds.

It was then one leg left in our journey and the outside temperature reading on the bus just ticked over at 16C. The destination was the 21st Century Hotel, where most of the surfing festival competitors and event staff were staying, and after two hours on the highway, we finally made it … almost 26 hours after walking out my front door the day before.

We were greeted by fun 2-3 foot waves and howling offshores, which we soon learned, is what it blows every day here. Bevo, Spenny and I were straight out there!

The air temperature was still relatively cold so we chucked our 3/2 steamers on and did the 500m soft sand run down to the contest site where there was the funnest left-hander breaking over a mellow rock bottom.

No chopsticks required. Dion Atkinson tucking in to some chinese. Photo: ASP

It was good to wash off the travel with a fun little afternoon sleigh and of course, a local beverage or two. Tallies in our hotel were $1.50 so we sorta started doing these two tallie rounds and the table just seemed to expand, and then soon two turned into four tallie rounds, and then six. It was myself, Bevo, Spenny, Pottz, ASP Australasia CEO Dane Jordan and Quiksilver Indo big wigs Tipi Jabrik and Tripper. We had a hell little team and it was good to catch up with everyone and trade stories of our travels since the last time we had seen each other.

The next morning, we all met for breakfast and everyone seemed to be asking the same question "How was your bed?" It ended up turning into a massive joke because the hotel we were staying at seemed to have setup each room with a bed ensemble but forgot to put the mattresses on top, so we were all stuck with the hard base of the ensemble as a bed. It was hilarious and also very hard on the old back.

The opening ceremony was the main thing on the agenda this day and it was one thing that I will remember for the rest of my life. If you can picture the Chinese Olympic opening ceremony, well it was similar to this, but just in a scaled down way. They had sandcastles sculpted to represent each nation, a massive stage which later turned into the craziest dance performance and some of the best Chinese food I've ever had!

Taylor Steel's next movie Castles On The Sand?

The Surfing Festival kicked off with the ISA China Cup, which was a country based teams competition. Australia was in dominating form. Heath Joske took out the Open men's, Australia placed second in the tag-team and most importantly, they won the overall teams trophy.

The Hainan Classic 4 star ASP contest was the next event in the schedule and with a forecast in swell midweek, the boys were getting pretty excited.

Highlights from the final day of the Hainan Open presented by Quiksilver.

As soon as the swell kicked on Wednesday, the whole bay was transformed. The contest site actually started pumping with 200m+ rides, multiple sections for turns and even the odd barrel.

Blake Thornton, Dion Atkinson and Heath Joske all came in from their dawn patrol session on Thursday and we could have taped a bucket to their chins to catch the froth. They ventured up around the point to this left sandbank that was what Blake described as 'the best left I've ever surfed'.

Bevo, naturally like all goofies and their lefts, was intrigued to see what all the fuss was about, so he jumped on the ski and dropped Dion back out there. Not to long after he left the beach, he called me up on our water patrol two way. 'Fuck Bennetts, it's freight training like nothing else out here. It's like behind the rock at Snapper after a fresh layer of sand, but in reverse. I'm losing it!'

Later that arvo Costs Rican photog, Augustine, hit me up to go shoot the contest off the ski and as soon as we got out there, we pinned it for the point. As we pulled up Lincoln Taylor dropped into this below-sea-level thing. A couple of pumps and he was on the foam ball of this sandy, square barrel thing and rode it out, and the few crew on the rocks erupted with cheers. The boys traded waves for a good hour, just getting shacked off their heads. I was losing it because I was stuck on the ski in my water patrol gear and couldn't get out there until the contest finished for the day.

Goofy-footed Marc Lacomare made the most of Riyue Bay's perfect left during the Hainan Classic. Photo: ASP.

The following morning, Bevo and I were up at the crack of dawn to make the most of the reverse Snapper, and we surfed our brains out, making up for the time we lost having to man the skis. I’d go back in a heart beat just to surf that uncrowded wave again.

China is a pretty tweaked place and you will definitely see some weird things. But it's amazing how good the waves are in Riyue Bay. It's offshore for six months of the year and I'm told that it's pretty consistent with at least waist high waves every day. We only really explored this one area of Hainan Island but China has 9,000 miles of coastline so I can't even imagine what is out there.

Hopefully I get a call up again next year because I would love to come back and visit my little Chinaman!

Cheers,

Bennetts

For full results, photos, videos and heats on demand from the Hainan Classic, click here.

Welcome to China!

...but don't do anything wrong or our Red Guards will arrest your capitalist hide!

Camels in sub-tropical China? Really? Where's Ghengis Khan hiding?

This guy wasn't doing a roaring trade. Maybe it was the presence of the scary soldiers that frightened all the customers away?

I hope this isn't how your teeth end up after eating the local street cuisine?

I don't think the locals quite got what the jet skis are actually used for.

With the locals sitting on his ski Bennetts could take up an alternate spot in the Hainan Classic.

Heath Joske was pumped to take home the Open Men's China Cup win for Team Oz.

Team Oz atop the podium for the ISA China Cup. Photo: ASP

Ireland's Glenn "Micro" Hall defeated Saffa Royden Bryson in the final of the ASP Hainan Classic.