More Surf Injuries

Two days ago I went back into the surf and had a good moring down at Broken Head. The Lergie has lifted and I was back in good spirits again. The other day on impluse Evelyn and I decided to grab a nice motel room for the night. Living out of a tent for weeks at a time manages to get at you after a while. It was nice to have a big double bed, clean shower, television and be relatively warm at night. However the money we spent on the room was saved by having a cheap dinner of a bottle of wine and a bag of cheesy corn chips.

The surf though has not been kind to Evelyn. Two days ago she was back in the surf, doing really well, standing up almost everytime and generally ripping up the white water. Unfortunately yesterday things went really wrong. My back was sore and feeling not in the mood for surfing I donned my wet suit and watched Evelyn from the shallow water doing her stuff. After a time I became bored and went and lay on the beach, still keeping a lazy eye on her. A decent size wave came up behind her and picked her up. For a moment it appeared she was going to keep it together, get to her feet and ride triumphantly into the beach, into the adoring arms of her boyfriend. However the nose of the board dug deep into the water and she slid helplessly down the deck to be driven face first into the shallow water. The surfboard flew high in the air, recoiled off the leg rope and crashed straight on top of her.

At first she seemed ok as she immediately jumped back on the board and tried to paddle in. However her face displayed an agonised and wounded look which sprung me to my feet and caused me to run, forgetting my sore back, out into the water to help her. Upon arrival it was obvious her ankle had a very nasty cut where a fin had slashed her. Lots of blood was pumping out and she was muttering that the tendon had been cut. I wanted to get her to the beach quickly so I undid her leg rope, cast the board away and carried her into the shore. A quick (unprofessional) assesment certified that while very nasty no major structural damage had been done., All tendons seemed to be there and still solid. Everybody on the beach in the near vicinity was very quick to offer help. A girl went and rescued Evelyn's surfboard and carried it along the beach for us as a brilliant volunteer called Russels took turns with me carrying Evelyn the 500 meters or so up the beach and back to the car.

After quickly packing everything including a bleeding but very good spirited Evelyn into the car we drove off to Byron hospital and into the Emergency room. The doctors and nurses there were very good. Obviously they had seen so many surfboard injuries during their careers that the whole episode was almost amusing. They were also keen to share their own war wound stories and encourage that a nasty cut should never be an excuse for not going surfing again. The wound took about 8 stitches to sew up and I was very impressed that I was able to watch the whole bit of surgery without getting too faint.

So it will be a little while before Evelyn is back in the surf scaring the locals with her impressive aerial maneuvers.

So till next time. Cheerio

Brad