So Markus has been trying to get me to go surfing with him for a long time now… and I always find excuses not to go, this has been going on cince Panama.

So everyone can follow I tell you the short version of what happened. We where in Las Perlas -Panama, and we whent out to a wave that was very short and powerful. I shouldn’t have gone out there at all, but fearless as I was  then, I did. And  I ended up hitting myself on the rocks and cut my foot really bad, I could see all my nerves and almost the bone, I couldn’t  walk for 1 week .

After that I started making excuses not to go surfing, as I got afraid of getting hurt again. The excuses could sound like this, “That board is to big for me!” “I need a board that fits me!” ” I need to go to a place where there is no other people surfing” “I need a good beginner wave, with no rocks”, ect.

Now I actually have a board that fits me, so I started with other excuses, “My hand hurt”, “I need to stay and clean the boat”. “Tomorrow…”.  Now I’m  running out of excuses,  It’s not like I don’t want to learn how to surf.  It’s  that I  have to face my fear of getting hurt and that is hard and scary!

So today I went surfing with Markus, to tortuga bay here in Santa Cruz. It was a long beautiful walk, but as I said a LONG 40 minuet walk. When we got there we saw this beautiful breach and nobody surfing!

It’s a beach break so it’s harder to catch waves, you have to paddle around and try to figure out where the next wave will break, as it’s not always at the same place.  But much smaller chances of getting hurt as it’s only sand on the bottom.

So we went out to the water and tried  to catch some waves! Markus got one or two little waves, I got used to get tumbled in the wave and paddel around. I was getting more and more confident in the water and trying more and more to take waves, when suddenly something burned my left arm really bad! I started screaming and trying to see what it was. Markus was next to me wondering what was going on. “SOMETHING IS BURNING ME! IT HURTS, AJ, AJ, AJ, TAKE IT OFF!!!!!!” …Then the right hand started burning “AJ AJ AJ!!!”

It was “Agua mala” a type of jelly fish with small long antennas that had tangle around my arms. It felt like an hour but it was only one minute or les, my arms started to burn more now, and I knew that I had to get away from the water. Im allergic  to all kinds of stings, so this could be serious. Markus asked me if I had to go out and I said “YES, now!”  We caught the fome from the wave that took us in to the beach, ran up and started packing up our stuff and we left  for the LONG walk back, that took like 30 minuets this time. My arm was getting more and more swollen, burning more and more. First you could see where the antennas had burned me, it was like someone had painted a long lines on my arm with a red pen. But now the hole arm was just red and swollen!  We where lucky that we just caught a taxi at the end of the road that took us straight to the hospital and the emergency room, where I had to get a shot of cortisone in the vain, so the swelling and the burning sensation wold go away. Witch it did after around 1-2 hours…

Well that was my Surfing experience in Santa Cruz! Alway fun to get another thing to fear in the water?!?, next time the shark and then I will learn to surf. hahaha kidding 😀

Soon to be a surfer Cathy!