Wednesday 16 July 2008

I'm not a hero, anyone else would have done the same

Sunday was a lovely day weather-wise, a lot better than Saturday. Clear skies, warm temperatures. The worry, whilst we were getting ready to go back to the beach, was that there would be no surf (hark at me, using the terminology... two days on a boogie board and I sound like a surf bum, brah)...
Anyway, we got ready and hit the beach again, the plan was to surf a couple of hours in the morning, go get some lunch, then take part in a coasteering course, which is basically a three-hour long assault course climbing rocks, abseiling, and diving into pools. Sounded brilliant.
As we arrived on the beach, we saw the tide was out but the swell was good, so in we went and caught some decent waves.
Unfortunately, after a while, it all went a bit pear shaped. At around the same time, we all noticed we were a little further out than we thought, and that none of us could put our feet down on the sea bed anymore. The swell had dragged us out over a drop in the shelf, so it was a lot deeper than we expected. Most of us were OK with this, as we were strong swimmers, but a couple of our group got into a bit of trouble. I will not name & shame here, but one of my friends started to panic a little as he is not a strong swimmer at all, so instead of pushing him under and nicking his board, I stayed with him, swam along side him, tried to keep him calm, and got him back to where he could stand again. We then got out to have a breather.
However, at the same time, the groom-to-be's future brother in law was also having trouble, and he was a little further out than us. The groom-to-be saw this, and as he is a strong swimmer also, he went out a little to try and help him in. But unfortunately, as he was swimming, he was hit at the wrong angle by a wave, and his left shoulder popped out. It was already weak, as he had dislocated it last year (at the same beach, ironically) and so it came out a little easier than it should. This meant that he, and his future brother in law had to be rescued by the coast guards that were on the beach. Obviously he was in quite a bit of pain, and we all thought "Shit, thats the weekend f*cked!"
At first they tried to put his shoulder back in in the back of the ambulance that had turned up, but it wouldn't go, so he had to go to hospital with his brother. The rest of us went and got some lunch and went back to the chalets. We waited around, had to cancel the coasteering, and then decided to go back to the beach for a couple of hours. I didn't bother with the wet suit or anything anymore, I stayed out of the sea with my mate and we just chatted and watched the others flailing about. The groom-to-be finally turned up at around 17.00... after spending four hours in the hospital. Poor bastard.
So, we headed back to the chalets, got showered and changed, and decided to go into Padstow to get some dinner. We went to a fantastic sea food restaurant (just round the corner from Rick Stein's place, but according to my mate who's been there, the one we were in had better food and better value). After dinner, we went back to the chalets and spent the evening drinking a few cold beers, chatting, with me gently strumming my guitar. A very nice end to a strange day.

Monday, we were up at the crack, and back on the road by 07.45 for our journey home. So all in all, a good stag weekend, but commiserations to the groom-to-be. Luckily, he's not getting married for about 6 weeks, so he has plenty of time to recover.

Some lasting thoughts and memories from the weekend:

Lee Stevens MASSIVE feet
The groom in a bikini (I have photographic evidence)
Smashing my left knee on the car door as I was packing up the car to leave on Friday afternoon - and then smashing my right knee on a bench on Sunday night
Discovering that Parmesan cheese isn't suitable for vegetarians as its made in calves stomach or some such bollocks (groom-to-be's brother in law was a vegetarian...)
Not looking as bad in a wet suit as I feared
Two men in one chalet bedroom over night after beer = the smell of the opening to the gates of hell.
Mussels in red wine vinegar and spring onion are gorgeous
Diving into a cold sea after too much wine the night before is bliss

4 comments:

Unknown said...

Would be very grateful for pics of the groom-to-be in a bikini to be sent to the bride-to-be (shauna.hoey@btopenworld.com)please! Go on, go on......

Glad you had a good weekend, and hope my brother didn't bore you too much with his pro-vegetarian rants!

See you in Armagh!
Shauna
x

Unknown said...

Woo and a HOO! What a fantastic weekend!

Gates of HELL- bwahahahah!

Anonymous said...

Not sure how heroic you were mate, you paddled next to someone until they were in shallow water! Back in my day they'd have saved em all, popped the arm back in underwater and be sipping one of englands finest ales within the hour.

Not sure your shoulders will be tapped with a knightly sword any time soon!

Haha

Mom said...

Sounds like a great week end.
That is one handsome dude with the boogie board!