Graeme Thickins on Tech

Reflections & analysis about innovation, technology, startups, investing, healthcare, and more .... with a focus on Minnesota, Land of 10,000 Lakes. Blogging continuously since 2005.

Tag: Cold Water Surf Fest

I’m Stoked! ‘Coldwater Surf Fest’ Is June 6th, Park Point, Duluth

May 23, 2009 / / 9 Comments

(UPDATE 6/8/09:  Here's my Flickr set from Friday night and Saturday, June 5-6.  Alas, no waves on Saturday — but we had fun, anyway! … and a very successful Surfrider Foundation beach clean-up. Several surfers stayed on for waves forecast at 4-7 ft Sunday and Monday.)

It's that time again, surf fans!  For the annual celebration of Lake Superior surf culture: Coldwater Surf Fest, brought to us by the Superior Surf Club. Time to gather for food, laughs, maybe a brew or two, and your chance to take a dip in the Big Lake They Call Gitchigumi. CWSF-09-logo350w But, regarding the latter (unless you're just wading), do bring your 6-mil or 5-mil wetsuit, hood, booties & gloves, as one never knows what the water temp may be, even in June (let alone the air temps and wind). The surfers in the group, of course, will be hoping for big winds blowing out of the Northeast to produce rideable waves!  Readers of this blog may recall I wrote about the 2007 Coldwater Surf Fest. And, for those of you who don't think surfing on Lake Superior is for real, here's a shot of our own Bob Tema surfing Stoney Point, north of Duluth: SurfSuperior-Tema-StoneyPt2

Event Details:

FRIDAY NIGHT 6/5/09:  Gather at Fitger's in Duluth for brews and grub, starting about 5:00 pm. (Map and directions.)

SAT MORNING 6/6/09 10:00 am:  Beach clean-up at Park Point "First Turns" Beach, sponsored by the MN-Superior Chapter of the Surfrider Foundation. (Map and directions.  Street parking available.)

SAT 6/6/09 NOON:  Party!  Pavillion at Park Point. BBQ, drinks, stories, trade/sell equipment, memorabilia. Raffle to benefit the Tom Blake Memorial: tickets $5. (More info on the Tom Blake Memorial.)  Map and directions.  Lots of parking available.

SAT EVENING 6/6/09:  After-party at somebody's place.

SUN MORNING 6/7/09:  Brunch at Pizza Luce's.

Come for part or all of the event — stay as long as you can!  I'm driving up Friday afternoon and staying over through Saturday.  All are welcome: surfers, friends, relatives, spouses and kids, participants or spectators, and anyone who thinks they may someday want to take the plunge into surfing the Big Lake… whether that be regular surfing or stand up paddleboarding (SUP), as shown in these two pics from last year's event — when, unfortunately, surf conditions were totally flat. (All photos of last year's event courteous Bob Tema. The guy in this shot actually teaches surfing at the U of MN-Duluth!) CWSF08-SUP1

Whatever the conditions, though, you will be guaranteed to have fun at CWSF!  Bring a board and wet suit if you have one, or maybe you can borrow someone else's and paddle out! You'll meet great people, including many of the top surfers on Lake Superior, eat some good grilled grub and partake in some cold(!) libations, all the while enjoying the wonderful outdoors in our great State of Minnesota! 

The Park Point peninsula is really a natural treasure, if you haven't experienced it yet: wide, sandy beaches, stretching out from the Canal Park bridge, which is the heart of Duluth's tourist center. CWSF08-SUP2 Park Point is a thin strip of sand with beach houses and lake-front condos, reaching all the way out to a small airport at the end of the peninsula, adjacent to a great park that has a picnic pavilion, barbeque grills, even a beach concession building — with birch and pine forest lining the wide stretches of pristine sand.

Well, it's pristine when people keep it that way!  But we're out to do our part in that regard at this year's Coldwater Surf Fest — because our new MN-Superior Chapter of the Surfrider Foundation is sponsoring a Beach Clean-Up the morning of the main event (Saturday, June 6). SurfriderMN-logo225w We'll take an hour or so to each don plastic gloves and grab a garbage bag to pick up trash and debris to ensure our favorite Duluth Beach is left better than when we got there!  It's all part of giving back to our environment.

For more info on this year's Coldwater Surf Fest, just ask in the comments section of this post.  Or visit the Superior Surf Club site — where you can even order the limited-edition event T-shirt (long or short sleeve). Here are some more pix (again, courteous Bob Tema) from last year's event…

CWSF08-4

CWSF08-1

CWSF08-2CWSF08-5 CWSF08-3 

Jack Johnson Made Me Do a Post About Surfing

July 1, 2008 / / 8 Comments

Well, not Jack directly, but my local buddy (and San Diego transplant) Jim Perry, a fellow Surfrider Foundation member. He was lucky enough to catch Jack’s concert on June 22 at River’s Edge over in Wisconsin, and said it was awesome. Sigh, I was too busy. But his email inspired me to post something…at least surf-related. The photo here is from the Minneapolis Star-Tribune’s review of the event, Surf-Rocker Riding the Green Wave. Jackjohnsonconcert
And, no we’re not talkin’ about "spending some time in the green room" here (surf lingo for locked in a tube) — we’re talking eco stuff. Jack is huge into it, and is working closely with The Surfrider Foundation to promote its cause, and they in turn attend and help promote his latest tour events. [They even traveled from CA to set up a booth at the River’s Edge. And we didn’t even have any waves for ’em, just a river and water slides… 🙂 ]

Okay, maybe this post is more about music than surfing, but I’m throwin’ in a shot of Jack surfing at one his favorite spots in Hawaii (where he’s from), just for the hell of it.  Call it a gratuitous attempt to assuage some of my guilt in not posting about surfing in a while. Jackjohnsonsurfing
Haven’t been to my place in California for way too long, and (darn) I missed a return to the Cold Water Surf Fest up in Duluth this year, too, back in early June. But, for that matter, I really haven’t been posting here at all much lately, I’m sorry to say.

I’ve been a little busy here, and posting elsewhere, here and there …when I can grab a little time on evenings and weekends. And, of course, Twittering. Micro-blogging is just so much easier and faster — seconds or a minute per tweet, versus an hour or more to research and write a good blog post (often much more). There’s a reason I’ve done more than a thousand tweets in maybe seven months, versus maybe 400 blog posts in three years.

But you know my heart will always be with surfing and surfers everywhere, and anything I can do to protect our oceans, waves, and beaches.  And hat tip to my buddy Jim Moriarty out in San Clemente for a his great blog of that name. I read it religiously; he does great work. Aloha, bro, and to all in the global tribe of surfing…. And, oh, say hi and thanks to your buddy Jack, too… 😉

UPDATE 7/2/08: As long as we’re on the topic, let me get all the surf outta me that I can. Another thing I learned this week (actually from my surfer/skateboarder son) is a cool new site that sells surf clothing & gear cheap, one item at a time until it’s sold out — similar to woot.com, except for surf stuff, not electronics. It’s WhiskeyMilitia.com — a hilarious site, funny just to read the copy. One day earlier this week, it was a full Ripcurl wetsuit for $125, another day board shorts for $15, the day before t-shirts for $7. Hey, I’m all over it, already gettin’ daily alerts… 🙂

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