Homer Alaska - Sports

It just feels right.

Every once in awhile, on an unpredictable schedule, a few wetsuit-clad madmen and women gather around Kachemak Bay when the waves are crashing down hard on the beach or reaching up the coastline with foamy white fingers.

Just last weekend, bookended by two days of blizzards, surfers like Brad Conley hit the waves just off the Homer Spit taking advantage of the surf conditions resulting from the storm. Under a bright, sunny sky, a harbor seal watched the action from a few yards away.

So, what is it that compels the likes of Conley and Ty Gates to brave Kachemak Bay and other Alaska waters in winter?

The answer is difficult to package up neatly, and in some cases the reasons are lost in translation.

For Gates, owner of Captain's Coffee, surfing is a kind of therapy. "Getting in the saltwater is just relaxing. It's like I recharge."

But, sometimes on a good day, when the surf is up, it can be difficult to tell when you've had enough.

"When you're feet start fumbling and it gets hard to stay up, you've had enough. It's just hard because you're always out there trying to catch that one last good wave before you head in for the day," said Gates.

Surfing in Alaska is about getting back to the basics of the sport. It's not about fashion or looking cool, and it's not about fighting for turf on an already crowded beach.

It's about a freedom that many who come to Alaska seek, the sort of independence that Gates sought when he hitchhiked up here at the age of 16.

Gates isn't the only one.

When Northwest winds push the waves into Cook Inlet, and the weather is right, surfers have a chain of phone numbers they call to see who's in and who's out.

"We're looking at the weather channel, and checking the Internet, looking for swell height, interval time. Sometimes we can look and see a swell coming a week away," said Gates.

Don "Iceman" McNamara is responsible for pushing Gates to grab his board and hit the waves in Alaska. He's also a kind of Homer godfather for the sport.

McNamara packed his board to Alaska in 1981, and has been surfing here ever since.

Part of the fun for the Iceman has been getting newcomers to head out into the waves, and rekindling the flame for the sport inside surfers who had ventured far north, and away from warmer, more hospitable waters.

"I really just like bringing other people that used to do it back into it. I think there is something there that they really miss," said McNamara. "For me it's the thrill and the adrenaline that does it. I love just catching any wave and sliding through the water."

For those who have never set out on a surfboard before, McNamara urges caution.

"I would say that they should try it somewhere a little warmer first. You're in the water for 15 minutes and then catch a wave for a few seconds and then you're waiting in the cold again. It just kind of wears on you being cold for so long."

With good gear a seasoned surfer can stick to it for a couple of hours at best if the outside air temperature is no cooler than 10 Fahrenheit.

So, when the real cold weather hits it can be hard to take a day and just surf straight through.

With strong tidal activity and constantly changing wave patterns, most sessions will last for an hour or two, making Alaska surfing more of a sprint sport at times, with the track moving from one place to the next with the tide.

That hasn't stopped the steady increase in the sport's popularity over the last few years.

When McNamara first started surfing in Alaska, he was one of just three locals who had any desire to catch a wave in winter. Now, says McNamara, who up until two years ago operated Homer's Surf Shack, after a recent three-hour trip to Seward to find the waves, he found 17 guys already in the ocean with the same plan he had: catching a wave and seeking the thrill.

Gart Curtis is another local surfer who started out as a kid in California, surfing on pieces of Styrofoam boards and air mattresses.

He has been surfing in Homer for about eight years now.

For Curtis, it's all about the fun of getting out and surfing, and the cold and the fickle waves and tides are just a part of it.

Local attitudes are laid back and far more accepting of beginners and newbies, a stark contrast to what one would expect trying to catch a wave down south.

"It's a really fun group of guys. I imagine it's like it was surfing in the '50s. I mean, in some places like in California it can be hard for a new guy to get into it, but here everyone is so friendly," said Curtis.

One piece of advice Curtis, who is the owner and operator of Blue Too Water Taxi, has for any would-be surfer is to choose their profession wisely, pointing out that not everyone can ditch work to grab their board whenever a good swell comes in.

"It's the usual saying about Alaska where there's no bad weather, but there's bad gear and bad attitudes," he said.

Ryan M. Long can be reached at ryan.long.@homernews.com.