By: Natasha Feduik
It happened during my fourth return trip to Witch’s Rock Surf Camp. After arriving on
Saturday, the 8 of us from New York had acclimated to our temporary life in paradise. Not to say we ever take the beauty of the luscious environment and lifestyle of Costa Rica for granted, but we had seen the incredible sun set for a few days. We had dined at the finest beach side restaurants in town. We had soaked up enough sun, sand, and surf to be able to carry it home with us. And the true feeling of relaxation and happiness was upon us. But then it happened…Thursday came.
The day started early with a 6:00am surf call time, to catch a boat on the beach that was going to whisk us away to some secret surf spot. Six of us piled our sleepy selves into the boat, along with our surfboards and sunscreen, even though the sun was not even up yet. We cruised out of the Tamarindo cove and glided across the beautiful Pacific Ocean, as the sun rose over the mountains of shore, until we came to the most incredible place. A small, black sanded beach of a cover, with the pretties of back drops. Palm trees, a rocked cliff, pelicans swooping down over the waves, and no other people as far as the eye could see. The captain stopped the boat and the instructors yelled, “Okay! We are here! Everybody out!” As we jumped from the boat into the warm water with our surfboards, I felt like I was in a scene of a movie! We surfed some of the best conditions on the planet that day. For hours and hours, until our arms couldn’t paddle into another wave.
On the way back to camp, as everyone on the boat was quiet with exhaustion and content, the captain abruptly stopped the boat and hushed the already silent passengers. There were whales. Two of them. Less than 100 feet from the boat. They were headed in the opposite direction, so the captain gave us the choice. And we decided to follow them. We trailed them quietly and watched in awe as they swam under and around us. Sporadic whale watching trip…sure! Could this day get any better?
After returning to WRSC, we all gathered at Eat at Joe’s to share our experiences of the day. Over a couple of Imperials, we exaggerated our wave tales, and laughed about our epic wipe outs.
Because of the way the day was going, our group, randomly, decided to go on a catamaran cruise for sunset. We walked up the beach, hopped onto a pontoon boat that took us to the luxury craft that would be sailing us around, feeding and entertaining us, for the next several hours. We ate, we drank, we danced. Then the boat stopped and offered us the opportunity to snorkel, take out a kayak, or just swim around. All I remember is my friend Joe, yelling from his kayak, “This is boat number FOUR today!” As we sailed back to Tamarindo, with the sun setting on the horizon, and “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” playing in the background, we cruised past a couple sea turtles, that seemed to bid us good night, as if in a dream. Because that’s what that Thursday was…a dream come true.
