I´ve been here for just over a week. I´m really not spending a lot of time on the internet so will just give a brief overview.
The town I´m in, Dominical, is basically a surfer town. I arrived about 2 weeks before the big tourist season (spring break) so it´s been pretty quiet at my hotel and in the surf camp. Worked out well, having an instructor to myself. So the week broke down like this.
Day One was all about the simplicity of surfing - you have a board, a wave, you stand up and you surf. We spent the afternoon at in the whitewater at Dominical. There are two rip currents at this beach so it was interesting to finally be able to see what that´s all about from beach level. I did well, and was really pumped about the rest of my lessons. Just thinking that if I had never taken up paddling, I would never be able to do this.
And if day one was all about the simplicity of surfing, day two was all about learning to respect the ocean. My instructor Raymond took me over to Dominicalita - a smaller beach in a protected bay. No whitewater surfing here - the waves were 4-6 ft and I got my ass kicked on a couple of them. Wiped out on one wave and as I was standing up, got taken down by the next one in the set. Tumbled, dragged across the bottom of the ocean, came up on the wrong side of the board and got a good crack in the quad. Learned some good lessons on this day!