27 Feb 2016

The rip tide almost pulled my pants off, surfing Raglan in New Zealand.

We rolled in to Raglan like there was no tomorrow ,with our beautiful camper van Gunther .
Deeper tech house were pumping from the inside, life’s a bliss.

You feel the vibe right away when you enter this little town, the surf hippie vibe.
It’s like you feel at home right away, welcomed.

A surf hippie vibe is for me a feeling that everyone are connected through some kind of deeper passion.
A vibe of feeling great by being healthy in a way of happiness, being in the moment and being aware.
A feeling of everyone one of each other are giving something to support everyone’s wellness.
Being a part of the stokeness of life.

Burger shacks, bars and cafés all over the center.
Rip curl of course have a store here.
It’s here you got the “worlds” longest consistent left hander wave at Manu bay!

You have a bunch of surf shops in town, almost all of them sell and rent boards.
The best one we found was Surf Emporium (Click to get there).
It back in an alley on Volcom lane, you find the entrance to the alley next to Rip curl or the other entrance is just next to the surf shop Raglan Surf co, which also have a pretty good selection of boards and clothing.

You can rent a board for 3 days at Emporium for 100 NZD.
If you like the Torq’s and maybe decide to buy one at the end of those 3 days, then they can take those 100 NZD of the price and give you a great package deal!
Great boards!

We first checked in at Karioi Lodge (Click to get there), which is basically part of Raglan surf school.
This place was cheap 15 NZD per person a night but they only have 6 spots for camper vans.
These spots are placed pretty weird, up the hill, in the jungle, but just right next to the road.
Some of the camping spots are better than others, whatever you do avoid number 2 because that one is basically on the road!
It’s about a 15 minute drive out of town, close to the famous breaks Whale bay and Indicator.

This place is packed with “youngsters” all the time, it’s kind of a party place.
All the Stray buses comes up to the lodge to drop off and pick up people.

The best thing we found with this place was the Yoga!
A super nice chick that used to work in the reception decided to do here yoga teacher training a few years back and are now running a yoga class almost every day of the week.
5 NZD for an hour of Vinyasa flow yoga at one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever done yoga at!
The inspiration point, overlooking Whale bay and the gracious landscape surrounding the bay.

After a few days there we tried a new place, a way better. Solscape (Click to get there)

The camping ground here is way better and more flat, still very beautiful with the lush green forest all over.
The lodges you can stay in have the shape of train, almost look like one big one that got made into smaller pieces and then made into a little hut!
Looks really cool!

This place have a super nice restaurant with a big outdoor patio and a big lush lawn in front of it.
The view here is almost like the inspiration point at the other lodge, but here you can sit in the restaurant our outside and enjoy the spectacular view of Manu bay, some of the Ngarunui beach and parts of the main land!
Absolutely amazing sunsets!

This place is an Eco friendly retreat.
They grow all the vegetables and herbs themselves and all the products they use are organic.
Enjoy their foods!
If you want to save up the money and live on your own cooked food, then at least try their Raw Snickers chocolate cake, it is fantastic! Yummy!

Many of the workers here are “Wwoofers”, World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms. (Click to get there)
Such an awesome thing!
I have really never known what it’s all about until now, when we got to hang out with these cool people that did it.

You basically work a few hours a day with whatever is needed to be done in exchange for food and stay.
You can travel the world and live for free!?!? Incredible.
Now there are now excuses for people that want to go backpacking/traveling but say it cost too much money.
There you go!

Go in on the site and read about it!
You work a few hours a day in exchange for food and stay, and at the same time you can learn something new and meet a lot of awesome people!
You can even Wwoof at a surf camp to learn surfing, or on a sail boat to learn sailing!

The first days we surfed at the main beach Ngarunui.
On the left side of the beach it if you are looking out on the ocean, you have a really good wave.
It can produce really nice 3-5 foot ones.
All over the beach it breaks pretty nice, and it’s a very big beach!

Even though it’s very crowded some days on the beach and in the water, it is usually beginners from the surf schools and they keep themselves to the white water close to the beach which leave you more space where the good breaks are.
Always works best on hide tide.

Beautiful big beach with cliffs around it!
You see Manu bay and Whale bay from here.

Manu bay and Whale bay is the most popular places for more advance surfing.
At low tide it’s a hustle to get out in the water because of all the rocks you need to climb over, some are dangerously slippery!
Watch the strong riptide at low.

Way safer to go for high tide when it’s not so shallow, low tides at both Whale and Manu bay are for more advanced surfers!
When the waves are good here it is pumping, perfect peeling waves with around good 8 seconds in between and it’s barreling!
Some of these rip tides can pull you pants off.

It’s awesome to go down to Whale bay and sit on the grass with a n ice cold beer watching the surfers ripping waves at sunset!

Love both of these breaks!

We checked out the infamous or famous beach Ruapuke.
When Manu and Whale bay are flat, and you are an advance surfer, this is the place you want to hit!
You can see some hardcore wipeouts at this place.
10 foot swell at a beach break and the sets are always full on.
Getting out there is always the craziness at beach breaks , here you got to paddle fast trough an area of about 10 meters and it’s a struggle.
If you don’t make it say Hello to that fat lip of the wave punishing for not making it!

Fun place to check out the great guys surf, but a bit to hardcore for me.
Super nice beach, even bigger and longer then Ngarunui.

There’s tons of great surf around Raglan and the vibe there is absolutely awesome!
You will meet some great people for sure.

Check out the Yot club on their Sunday sessions, great fun!

One food place that’s a must try is Raglan Fish at the wharf, as far out you can go!
The seafood there is soooo good!

We had the Fish and chips, 2 red snappers, potato wedges and tartar, massive portion!
A Soy ginger tuna burger which was the best tuna burger I’ve ever eaten!
Such an incredible place with fair prices.
Go there!