The Heroic Story Of A Surfboard That Got Lost At Sea For Three Months Before Returning Home

La Nord is a big wave spot directly in front of the main square on the beach in Hossegor, right at the point where a deep water trench known as the Gouf de Capbreton reaches the shore. 

When the swells are too big or too long for the shorebreak barrels the region is famous for, La Nord offers foam-endowed surfers the chance for some big drops and pacey walls across numerous, shifting peaks, way out the back. The only real snag is the lack of a defined channel, making the paddle back out after a wave troublesome. Due to the effect of the trench, swells can seem to bend in from the wrong direction, meaning you think you’re wide of the right, and you find yourself caught inside by a left. 

Andy King has been visiting SW France since the ’90s, rolling with his good pal and host ‘Crazy’ Sam Carrier, who always has a mightily impressive quiver for any swell eventuality, as well as a variety of terrestrial activities planned for lay days during the competition. Here, Kingy recalls the time he lost one of Carrier’s guns at sea, for three months, before it was retrieved by local fishermen. 

He’ll pick up it from here. 

KINGY: We’d had a long lunch, I was a bit drunk and was having a siesta. That’s how it started. I’d had like 4 or 5 beers at lunch, and I was just minding my own business, having a nice little snooze when Carrier kicks me and wakes me up. I was sleeping underneath his house in his little den. So he kicks me and goes, “The wind’s gone offshore, La Nord is fucking pumping.”

My first thought was that I didn’t have my flotation vest, which is pretty crucial because, ever since the accident that fractured my skull, I can’t tell which way is up. So I’m tired, I’m a little bit drunk — I’m disabled — and he hands me this purple 9’6” and says, “We’re on.”

The thing is, it’s always another trip with Carrier. You can’t really say no. If you ever wanna keep rolling with him or staying at his house, you just can’t say no, or I can’t anyway. That’s the basis of your stay; if he comes up with an idea, a plan, a scheme, you’re along for the ride. That’s it.

So I’m looking around for a leash and all I could find was a tiny comp leash, for this heavy 9’6” gun. I’m so underprepared it’s a joke. We get down to the beach and it’s really crowded, there’s people everywhere. I couldn’t even get out of the shorey. I was doing the baby turtle, getting blown up in the shorey, washed back up the beach and I remember thinking, ‘This is gonna end in disaster.’

Anyway, once you punch through the shorey and the sweep takes you around, it’s a pretty easy paddle out, just really long. So I finally get out, and Kolohe was out there with his dad on a ski, and there were a bunch of skis towing, it was pretty solid. I actually got a bunch of really fun ones and I started to get really confident, enjoying myself. Thing is, I hadn’t really mapped it. It was a really long period swell, and every half hour or so there were a couple of 15ft-ers, maybe 18ft-ers coming through.

So I was hanging on this kinda inside bowl, and of course there comes a set, and the horizon just goes black. I remember scurrying and seeing Jeremy Flores and Carrier scratching over it, and I was paddling up it thinking there’s no way I was making it. The only thing I could do was try and push the tail through. But because I was a bit drunk and tired, I got my timing all wrong. So I tried to push the tail through but just sorta got stuck and was hanging on to it, like a kiddies kickboard thing in a swimming pool.

So I’m going, ‘Is this the time to push through?’ Then I was like, ‘Oh I’ve left it too late, maybe I should hang on to it….?’ Anyway, I feel the weightlessness, then freefalling backwards, then I’m getting annihilated. I got winded straight away and thought, ‘Fuck, I’m drowning here for sure.’

Then I felt that horrible sensation, no pull on the leggie. The only way I can ever get back to the surface now when I’m under, is by climbing up the leg rope. Obviously, that little comp leash pinged and snapped at the very first opportunity. 

I was underwater, and in a bit of trouble. The gnarly thing about Hossegor is that it doesn’t spit you out anywhere, it just traps you, regurgitates you, and then the next one does the same thing. I was under for two waves, and then I came back to the surface. 

I was so far out to sea that there was no way I was getting back to shore. I couldn’t get in through the lineup, so I started swimming out further, thinking I could maybe go past Capbreton harbour, and come in with the current somewhere down there.

Carrier and the others would’ve had had no idea where I was, as I was so far out. Then after about ten minutes of swimming, a helicopter appears. I thought it couldn’t be for me, it couldn’t have been launched that quick. But it’s hovering over me, so I’m going thumbs up to the guy, “No worries, I’m sweet!” It’s done a loop around Capbreton and comes back around and I’m mixing up my strokes to save energy — a bit of backstroke and so on. To be fair it probably would’ve looked like I was drowning, as I’m not the most coordinated as it is. I would have been floundering.

So it’s hovering again I’m still going, “I’m sweet!” Shakas, yeew. It’s Sunday, sun’s out, I’m taking my time, all good.”

Anyway, after maybe a half-hour of swimming, I finally get to shore just before the rocks at the entrance to Capbreton harbour. I walk back up the beach and Carrier is there with his wife and my wife, and they’re all looking a bit worried because they haven’t seen me for quite a while. I’ve said to Sam “Have you seen your board?” to try and drag him in on it, as if it was his fault. “Where’s your board mate?”

Then the lifeguards came up and they were chatting in French, and Carrier explained that they’ll try and charge me for the rescue. So I quickly did the maths — it was about a grand for the board, the chopper was more like six, he reckoned. So I decided to let the board go and swallow that, rather than get fingered for the chopper even if they could find the board. 

Obviously, I didn’t pay him though. I just left the country (laughs).

Anyway, I didn’t think too much more about it. He’s got plenty of surfboards in his cupboard, I wasn’t worried. Then, around Christmas time, about three months later he gets a call. A fisherman out of Capbreton found it floating way out the back, hauled it in, recognised the name off the board, and somehow he’d got hold of Carrier. It had just been drifting out there over that deep water trench off Hossegor all winter. Carrier was still a bit wary of getting charged for the heli — apparently, a boat had capsized that day, and that’s why the chopper was out, but they were still wanting to pin the rescue on someone. Well, me.

So he gets his 9’6” back with barnacles and seaweed growing on the bottom (laughs). Anyway, he didn’t get charged for the rescue, and I didn’t get charged for the board. It’s back in his quiver now, ready to surf again after having a good long stint at sea to think things over.

There’re probably several morals to this story; it’s like a long list of all the what not to do’s. But the main one would just be, if in doubt, don’t go out. Seriously. It was the most humbling experience, and there was just no reason for it at all. Just stupid. We’re not young anymore, I’m in my 40’s and I’m disabled, I’ve got nothing to prove to anyone. Much better just to go surf a 2ft shorey inside the harbour on a mini-mal and save yourself all the drama.