September 2018 we went on a camping surf trip to Montauk with a bunch of Rockaway friends – sounds like it would be a dream…
First stop was a grocery store. This idyllic photo was really just behind the parking lot, we went to look at the beach. Also inside the store Jesse felt the ghost of a little girl grab or push her arm, and she turned around thinking it was me, but I was more than an arms length away. The rest of the trip was kind of haunted and filled with mystical Montauk rumors.
Everything seemed to start off okay. These camp spots have to be reserved months in advance, so there wasn’t any coordinating with surf forecasts, and we lucked out with tons of wind, so we tried to park our vehicles close to shield some of it.
We were also camped on a plateau above the beach, extra exposed to the winds. On the first night, the tents were shaking all night, with gusts sounding like they were going to rip them apart, and heavy rains splattering loudly all night.
We drove to check a surf spot and Josh was still brushing his teeth.
In town buying ponchos from the local hardware store.
After an attempted surf, we returned to camp, and I was realizing every Rockaway resident that drove had a vehicle they could sleep in. This was also nice because everyone’s tent had rain water in it, and there wasn’t really anywhere else to relax at this flat lot camp spot. This is Giancarlo’s truck.
Jesse and Giancarlo.
Annelise’s wagon.
Danny’s van, which is no longer around.
Perzy and his truck.
The 2nd night we cooked over a fire in slightly lighter rain. We tried to rig a tarp awning to the van like we’d seen in the surf magazines, but the winds were too strong.
Danny had a proper prep kitchen in the van.
Almost everyone bought ponchos during the day.
Later that night the sky cleared a bit to reveal the beautiful moon, and we took a stroll down from the plateau to the beach to run around a bit and climb this dead tree buried into the sand.
It was a rainy weekday in the off season, so we could take over the little beach bungalows at the nearby hotel.
Annelise and Josh put on dance performance.
The next morning was still rainy, so Danny brushed his teeth out his window,
and Josh cooked breakfast burritos in the wagon with my dad’s probably 30 something year old Coleman propane stove.
That’s pretty much it, we surfed again, the waves were “blown out dog shit”, I think is the official term, but fun, just like camping in the rain and wind was shit but fun.