Oregon Day 3 Surfing Day and Special Night of Picnic & Bonfire on the Beach
- Hannah Nietfeld
- Feb 8
- 10 min read
August 18th
Surfing day!! I checked Surfline, a wave watching app, this morning and it had lower waves than normal so I wasn’t as fearful and actually excited to see if I could catch some waves. I knew that it would take me a few tries to get the feel back, but I didn’t want to scare myself out of doing it. Even though I had my reservations to go out there, without a guide, and on a day with such powerful waves, I still wanted to give it my best effort.
I got up early because I wanted to go for a walk on the trails near our airbnb. It brought me back to the ocean, back to the cafe, so I thought I also might as well pick up some coffee and take that on my walk with me. Sadly, Stimulus Coffee was out of both soy and oat milk, so I left feeling defeated with no coffee in hand. It was nice to explore the city through another mode, walking. There was a trail that ran through our backyard, and I saw people every morning walking along it. It looked so peaceful so I wanted to join in on that tranquility. The only wish I had was that someone could have joined me. But, I needed to realize that I was getting much more sleep and drinking much less alcohol than everyone else. So, the waking up early was just a me thing and I came to accept that.
Ben stayed with us all yesterday, but was set to leave this morning. He had weddings things to attend to! We said goodbye to Ben and then slowly everyone got up. I made a cup of coffee, ate my breakfast, and was ready to leave at 10am to head to the surf shop. Soon enough we were checked in, fitted up in wetsuits, and armed with boards. The high school aged boy checking our rentals out at the register was amazed by our group size and cohesiveness and asked how we all knew each other. We said that we were all high school/home town friends, which is so cool if you think about it that we could get 15+ people to go on a trip, and thats not even the entirety of the friend group. I feel so lucky to be a member of this group crew, and without a doubt, it is a special group of people.
I've never worn a wetsuit before so that was a cool first experience. That in addition to catching waves off coastal USA. We all got foam boards to use instead of the actual, but they were smart to hand those to us because I got hit by not only my own board but someone else's while out there. The foam is to cushion the blow if that were to happen, and being beginners, its bound to happen. Case and point.
It took us a minute to gather all our stuff on our carry our bags and boards to the beach. I was getting a little nervous, but there weren’t many people out on the water so it was totally fine in that I had a feeling I wouldn’t get in the way of the experienced surfers. While walking toward the ocean, I was trying to think of the best way to paddle past the break. To find the split in the wave so I could miss the white wash and not get totally pummeled by the waves and washed back even further. I creeped into the water. Not sure how to perfectly attack my paddle out. This is when I wish I had a guide because I struggled to do the little things like this that have a huge impact. Like, I wouldn't even be able to attempt to surf if I couldn't get out far enough.
I was taking some hits, salt water going into my mouth and eyes, of which I couldn’t wipe away because I had the gloves on. It didn’t take more than five minutes of me fighting the waves to fall back to shore and draw up a better plan on how to break through the heavy waves, since the first one obviously failed miserably. The first walk out, I was mixed with our other friends, far to close to each other and we all got mixed up when the waves crashed at us and we uncontrollable were pushed back. So, I knew I just wanted to make some space between me and my other surfer friends, but still close enough that I could watch and cheer as they attempted to get up on the board. I on the other hand, was struggling much more than I thought I would. I lost the muscle memory of catching the wave then pushing to stand. Those lessons in SE Asia were not enough for me to handle these waves.
My new strategy for this go was to not try to paddle out deep, but inside just try to get up and ride the white wash. Obviously, that alone was enough to push me and give me a good ride, so I should be too picky on what I could do given my ability. After a few tries, I did stand up and was riding the wave!! Although, I would lose my balance not far into the ride, so in that sense it felt both successful and not. But, there was something so cool about our 15 friends all out there on boards. None of us could past the break so we were riding the baby waves close to shore, all wobbly and in way follow surf etiquette that I could only imagine what we looked like to the trained eye. But, none of us cared what we looked like, and I was more so proud because at least we are trying and we just want to have fun in the waves. I love this crew of people and that we do stuff like this.
I stayed in the water for maybe an hour to hour and a half, getting super tired that I wanted to go back to shore, lie down and rest a bit, and then get back out there after I regained some strength. I was so far from our campsite of stuff, that I had a long walk back, but thankfully a couple others were going in the same time as I, so we navigated to our bags.
I pulled out my towel to use as a beach blanket, unzipped the top of the wetsuit, and full body collapsed on the sand floor. I was gassed. The sun poured down, warming me up. I rested my eyes. It felt so good to work hard and the feeling of relief to finally get to rest after accomplishing the challenging activity.
Once I was dry enough, I reapplied sunscreen to stay safe after learning yesterday's lesson. I ate my pb&j, not even because I was that awfully hungry, but it just sounded so good and I thought I deserved the reward. Plus, I can’t everyone else was eating so I willingly joined in. I forgot my water bottle on the counter in the airbnb. I did this yesterday too, not sure how I didn't learn that lesson. But, thankfully Alyna packed some extra water bottles so I gladly downed one of those.
Throughout the afternoon, everyone slowly made their way in from the ocean. In waves, people went up to the surf shop food stand to get lunch. Others suited back up to go out for another run. Or a few did as I, staying in my laying position. I was thinking if I could rest up real well, I could do a longer second session before calling it a day. I had a lara bar which was delicious, put on a third layer of suncreen, before finally deciding it would be now or never. So, I joined Lauren A, and Matt to go back out and surf. I, however, was not mentally prepared the second time. to be beaten up once again by the waves, I naively imagined that the second time out, having vast experience of the way of the water from the first go around would warrant no such future, but I was wrong. Not five minutes of trying to paddle out to catch just one more wave, I through in the towel after being utterly unsuccessful, I walked my sorry self back to shore, dropped the board, and officially called it for the day. I was exhausted and the waves ousted me this time.
I joined Colton in taking off my wetsuit and retiring for the day. We should have returned our stuff then, but we thought we could wait until the end of the day. To fill the rest of our afternoon, we played some football. And it was so fun. We made a field and broke into two teams. I though my team was pretty solid but we got absolutely destroyed. Call Alayna Justin freaking Jefferson, she was the most goated WR. No joke, she was diving for catches and caught the attention of our beach neighbors, who praised her MVP execution.
I was loving the football, writing routes, and getting in some more exercise, as if yesterdays wasn’t enough. Soon, more of our friends joined our game, but our game was was interrupted when we found out the surf shop was closing soon and we had to return our stuff ASAP. Declared halftime, we grabbed all our surf equipment, washed off as much sand off as we could, and then returned them to the surf shop. I was started to get sun fatigued and was super excited for our plans tonight, so I retired at the half and went back in the first shift with Alayna, Rena, and Jordy. We stopped at the market on our way back to pick up beverages for our fun night we planned.
As you know, I celebrated my birthday in Maui, which was amazing, and because of that, I didn't really do any celebrations with my friends back home. But, Ryan still reached out to me, asking if there was anything I wanted to do for it and. he would help get people together. Knowing this trip was coming up, I thought best if we instead did a mini celebration there while we were all going to be together anyways! And I even had my request in mind. Stemming from my lovely time in London, one of my favorite memories was the picnic at Clapham Common, and in attempts to recreate a similar experience, my ask was to have a picnic at the beach. It came together so well too because our beach was open to the public all night, and many people stay late to watch the sunset and make a bonfire on the beach. It beautifully came together and was one of my favorite nights of the entire summer. More to come of what made it so special.
Upon our return. I immediately took a shower to clean up so I could be ready to help coordinate and organize the night. We ordered pizza, packed the beach wagon, and left to go pick up the food. Everyone was ready soon thereafter and met us at our scoped out beach spot. I was so hungry after only having the pb&j that I dove into my pizza as soon as I could. Ryan was also very hungry so we both sat down and started eating while everyone was slowly trickling in. The slight delay from others was for their stop at the market for the wine for presentation later in the night. To go with the pizza and bonfire was a wine tasting, where each person picked out a wine, had to give a little spiel about why they chose it, and then go around and fill everyones cup up to try it.
As we finished eating the sun slowly began to set and the colors started to shoot out from the horizon. A couple of us went to shore to get a better look, and then eventually everyone was out there admiring the sunset and getting photos with it in the background. It was so beautiful and we got some great photos, one being with the big group. Another moment that folded into the amazing night.
We headed back to our campsite and Lauren G. started building the fire while the very end of the sunset conclude behind her. She did a great job at setting up the bonfire, using the discarded pizza boxes as dwindle, along with the fire starter that we got. Also, some people picked up the color changing flame packets. So, when they threw them in the fire, the flames turned an insane shade of blue and green and I was so mesmerized by it.
We started straightaway with the wine tasting which made sense because there were 16 people to go around. I was grateful that people let me have a little sip to taste even though I didn’t buy a full bottle. Interestingly enough, I did not like most of them, maybe due to the lack of exposure from the last 5 years of not drinking that I've become accustom to no longer even enjoying the taste anymore. To me, the best sips were Lauren Gs and my sisters choice. Best speech hands down goes to Katie, who said that this wine was the one thing helping her fall asleep to Sean's snoring haha.
As the night progressed, I was having more and more fun. Looking around the bonfire and there being 15 happy people, gathered together, laughing and having fun made my heart swell in a way I couldn't imagine. How lucky am I to be part of this group, invited on a trip like this. I felt this special aura that night that I could only describe as the definition of happiness. As in, my current state was joy and if I sought to be happy, this is exactly what I would do to achieve such a level of happiness. I think that’s what I will take away most from that evening, was the feeling of pure joy while spending time with my friends. Hoe could it get better than a picnic on the beach with a sunset and bonfire where we are all chatting, laughing, and drinking in a celebratory manner, stargazing, running to the shore to hear the waves, seeing others camp out around us for a bonfire but slowly leave until your group is the last one on the beach because you had that good of a time no one wanted to leave. Special. No other words.
I would love to recount more about what all entailed of the night, but it is just what I said above. A whole lot of happiness and good times spent with friends in a really cool place. We stayed at the beach until 12:30am. I stayed longer to stargaze. I hadn’t seen stars that bright since a cabin trip up north five years ago and I'd been on the hunt to experience it once again. And of course, this night delivered once more, in addition to the million other pockets of joy to make this not only my favorite night of the trip, but with this friend group, and of this summer, which I was already incredibly blessed with the many travels and experiences I've been privileged to go on.
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