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Has any surfer been more barrelled in a calendar year than Nathan Florence was in 2022? The North Shore local went full nomad, surfing and documenting iconic sessions from Shipsterns to Scotland, and the Mentawais to Mullaghmore. So, just prior to his back-breaking session at Jaws, Ben Mondy asked Nate for his take, in his words, on 12 months where he tweaked the very trajectory of surfing. Below, is an excerpt from Florence’s feature which is inside our new Travel Issue, where the Hawaiian recounts the viral Mullaghmore ride and his overall experience at the Irish slab.
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To Nazare or not to Nazare/Mullaghmore Madness
We bailed back to Portugal and just straight into The Cave firing again. Torrey (Meister) and I surfed it on our own for another week. We had two more weeks in Portugal and then my wife had to go home for a job. I’d been hanging with Tom Lowe, and he bailed to Ireland to chase a swell at Mully.
And I was, like, “Mully? That big, tow, windy, fucking scary thing?” And he’s like, “Yeah, exactly.” So, I had this crazy decision that I was stressing on. I could stay and do the whole Nazare thing, but that didn’t really excite me. I wanted to get barrelled and do something gnarly. I could stay and do the whole Nazare thing, but that didn’t really excite me. I wanted to get barrelled and do something gnarly.
Anyway, I needed some gas canisters and Garrett Mac told me to ask Cotty, who’d I never met. And he was such a good dude. We ended up hanging out watching Nazare, and I asked him about Ireland and whether I should go. He said, “Are you tripping? You got to go to Ireland. Everyone’s so cool and they are all like-minded, core big waves, guys.” I bought a ticket the next morning and I flew my filmer, Zoard, in from Hawaii.
We both got into Bundoran around 10pm, and the next morning we showed up at Mullaghmore at first light. I’d been in contact with a local surfer Ollie O’Flaherty, though we’d never met. He saw me and said, “What the hell, you’re here? Get your shit on right now, it’s on.” I saw a big reeling left come through and just drain super hard. It was clean with light winds and blue skies. Ollie said, “You’re fucking scoring dude. This is unheard of.” I paddled out with Ollie into the line-up, introduced myself and sat on the inside. I always sit and wait my turn and know that I’m bottom priority when I travel. I always pay respect to the locals and the time they have put in.
So, I sit on the inside and caught a few inside double-ups but I had seen a couple of bigger ones roll through, some ridden and some unridden. I paddled more into the bowl and this bomb comes. There was Postscript one other guy paddling for it, but I could tell that it was going to double up under him.
A few guys were screaming, “Go Nathan”, so I swung. I was on an 8’6″ and I was in a near-perfect position, somehow proper right place, right time. I got in under the lip and did this little air-drop and then looked up and saw this freaky bending wall. I had so much speed from that drop, and it looked insane but doable. I faded and then turned again, and I was like, “Oh fuck, what have I done?”
In big waves, it’s hard to tell what’s behind you until you see the lip land. In the tube, I saw this lip land and knew this thing was fucking huge! And then I was on the foam ball. I started to slide a little bit until my fins just caught. Suddenly, I had some speed and control and as it spat, I was like, “Oh, shit, I’m making it.”
I was kind of just tripping. That was my first ever surf in Ireland. That doesn’t happen .You don’t get the wave of your life on your first session. And it was cool too, cause Russel Bierke was there. He had been at the Shipsterns session at the start of the trip We spent the next three weeks hanging and travelling in Ireland.
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