How Good Do The Waves Have To Be For A Floridian To Put On Gloves And A Hood?

Most folks who grow up surfing warm water don’t idealize throwing on a wettie and chasing freezing waves. Why would you? There’s a million cheap surf trips to be done along the warmer latitudes of the world, where you don’t have to deal with frozen fingers and the lingering smell of wetsuit piss.

Despite that, for 19-year old Ryan Huckabee, the promise of murky green visions and empty lineups was enough to convince him to don hood and gloves for the pilgrimage to Ireland. Ryan is from the steamy waters of Flagler Beach — coincidentally the same Floridian town our Vans Stab High winner Rasta Robb is from — but on his recent Irish mission, his surfing gave little indication that this much rubber was abnormal for him.

Hucking full-rotes and contorting his way through stretched out backhand runners, Ryan looks well at home in one of the Atlantic’s most rugged corners.

“December in Ireland is tricky because there’s only about seven and a half hours of light and the tides are so massive that even with good conditions, some of the good waves won’t break throughout an entire day,” says Ryan. “On top of that it’s freezing and rains almost every day, so it definitely takes a bit of dedication to score over there. We also weren’t old enough to rent a car.(laughs) Some of the local guys were nice enough to give us some rides but we did a lot of walking, getting taxis, and figuring out ways to take the bus around with board bags and camera gear. Took a lot of work but we scored a few fun windows that made it super worth it.”

Click above to enjoy Across the Atlantic, created by Peyton Willard.