Summer's Over, Bring on Cold Surf

So I talked once before about the Jackson Bros and their epic board-sport-filled roadtrip from AK to Chile.

I've even checked in a few times here but I've been keeping up with them on my own time. Right now another seasonal migration in boardsports is happening, that from the surf to the mountains. Unless you can follow the summer around the world, winter for the average surfer means choosing between cold, burly surf or dusting off the snowboards and shralping some pow. And while it's certainly just a matter of tolerance, having grown up in the mid-Atlantic and occasionally surfing as late as Thanksgiving and as early as Easter I have to say there's nothing better than braving the cold and miserable for some tasty waves while everybody else is sitting around in sweaters falling into seasonal-depression-catatonia. That is, just because it's colder doesn't mean the surf season has to stop.

So what better segue into the winter than this sick episode of the Jackson boys and snowboard God Travis Rice surfing testes-shriveling AK waves accompanied by pro surfer Ian Walsh?

This is the thing that people might fail to understand about what's so great with these extreme sports. It's that on top of the cool art-meets-athleticism of the thing, they've also got this whole adventure-and-travel-meets-sport thing. Part of the fun of snowboarding is going to new places, seeing new mountains, riding new conditions, and always searching for that perfect line. In surfing you're looking for the perfect wave though you're also looking for those perfect days where environment is idyll. For example, in this ep they get to surf overhead peelers while staring up at majestic Alaskan spires. Pretty epic. Oh yeah, and it ends with a snow pond skimming party session at Alyeska.

So as you dust off those neoprene booties and hood for the winter, take heart. Even cold water surf is better than going to your job. Seriously.

Happy Friday.

- Ryan