Sam Bleakley is one of those people you'd feel immensely jealous of if he wasn't such an all round nice guy.
Aside from being a pro surfer and travelling the world, he also manages to be a family guy with strong ties to his native Cornwall.
It has been an absolute pleasure to interview him and I consider it a real privilege to understand a little more about his fascinating life. You'll therefore have to forgive me if I have failed to condense this interview it was all so interesting!
But hey don't take my word for it he says it so much better himself...
1. If you were given only a minute to explain who you are and what you do, what would be the main points?
I’m a travel writer and professional surfer sponsored by Biomimetics Health UK and based with my family (daughter Lola and wife Sandy) above Gwenver beach in west Cornwall. I specialise in projects with photographer John Callahan and the surfEXPLORE team to off-the-beaten track coastlines – places where better understanding the culture and the landscape is as compelling to us as riding the waves (but these projects take a lot of hard work and research). I’ve published two surf travel books (illustrated by Callahan) – Surfing Tropical Beats and Surfing Brilliant Corners (Alison Hodge Publishers). I have also edited The Surfing Tribe: A History of Surfing in Britain. I’m now researching a part-time PhD in Travel Writing at University College Falmouth, and my interest in exploration and geography is currently leading into some work presenting travel films.
2. As you are a professional sponsored surfer being new at it probably seems a long time ago but can you tell us how you first got into surfing and how long it took to feel like you were competent?
The ‘feeling’ of surfing is always compelling, and addictive, no matter what level you are at. We are all sharing the same priceless experiences of adrenaline, fear and fulfilment. I grew up with a beach family, so I was usually with my sisters and folks at Gwenver or Sennen in the summer, and Perranuthnoe in the winter. I started surfing aged 5 thanks to my Dad - Alan ‘Fuz’ Bleakley, who also grew up in Cornwall. An important step for surfing was spending 1987/88 in the USA because my dad did a University lecturing work exchange. We were based in Virginia on the east coast, but spent the summer visiting friends in California. I was eight years old and normally surfed with my dad pushing me into the waves. At San Onofre, I went solo, paddling out beyond the whitewater. Fellow Cornishman and close family friend, Paul Holmes, had loaned me a 6’ 0” channel-bottomed five-finned board shaped by Hawaiian Brian Bulkley. To me, a gangly kid, it was perfectly crafted and totally ‘magic’. Paul was the then editor of Surfer magazine (thus a big hero). He had an injured shoulder from a trip to Bali, and watched from the beach. Outback I remember the pungent smell of kelp and the local pelicans. I stroked into a set wave alone. It turned green, peaked, and as it broke I took off, angled and found trim. I rode its entire length, locked in the pocket. That wave was a defining moment. Paul gave me the board and I took it home to Cornwall in ‘88. It set me up for life. After that I real felt comfortable surfing, and from aged 9 onwards became a fanatic.
3. You are the author of two books, the first being Surfing Brilliant Corners, which details extreme global surf travel. Can you tell us how the idea for such a project arose and what the steps were to making the idea into reality?
Surfing Brilliant Corners tracks my passion for surfing, geography and travel. It’s primarily a travel book, illustrated by John Callahan’s awesome photography. I work with John (and our surfEXPLORE team) frequently, and the book journeys from my roots in Cornwall, to studying at Cambridge University, to competing in Europe, through travel to Africa, the Caribbean, the Americas, Asia and beyond, from the living vodou of Haiti to a serene Buddhist oasis in communist China. Framing surfing through metaphors of jazz, the book celebrates genius bop pianist Thelonious Monk’s 1956 album Brilliant Corners. Monk’s album was famed for its outrageous, groundbreaking compositional originality, and I explore how talented surfers think like great jazz musicians (even if they don’t actually like jazz music), using invention, complex rhythm, timing and spontaneity to turn impossible wave scenarios into beautiful but challenging music. I wrote the book to inspire people to be open-minded, tolerant of change, and paint surf culture and literature in a more intellectual and challenging way. I touch upon many complex themes that I’ve since explored in my latest book, Surfing Tropical Beats.
4. As you surf in areas of political unrest and poverty do you have any opinions about the effect of surf tourism on the local community?
In our surfEXPLORE work we never claim to conquer any surf zones, imperial style. And although we may be among the first groups to document surfing in certain areas, we cannot account for the many surf explorers who may have charted a coast without cameras or subsequent magazine features (and inspired the locals along the way). But surfEXPLORE has been a pioneer in many areas, such as part of southern China, Mauritania, Haiti, Algeria, South Korea, Kenya, Oman, the Philippines and southern Gabon. In both South Korea and Algeria nascent surf scenes already existed, but surfEXPLORE gave the local surfers evidence of the quality of their waves, and confidence to further establish their local surf culture sensitively. We try to promote strong environmental values so surf culture can be a voice to help protect threatened coastlines. Local surfers are a vital community along any coastline. They showcase not only a healthy lifestyle, but a crucial voice in coastal ecology. Often the places we visit are devoid of surfers. But where there is a surf scene we always attempt to interact in a mutually beneficial way – the message is about open-mindedness, tolerance and embrace of positive change.
We travelled to Liberia in 2006 just as the capital Monrovia had turned on its streetlights for the first time in fifteen years (after a bitter civil war). President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf announced that this symbolized the country’s journey from darkness to illumination. The kids we met had, for years, either been toting guns or fleeing from their homes in fear of their lives. They had grown up knowing only civil war, and now have to adjust to a civil life. The psychological hurt was etched deep in the country’s psyche. We met up with a former UN employee called Dominic Johns who was keen to develop surf tourism at Roberstport, three hours away. There are five remarkable left pointbreaks here. The moment we arrived this was clearly a place that will benefit from sensitive surf tourism, to aid a country rising from the ashes. Those priceless waves offer a wonderful, renewable resource, in the development of eco-sensitive surf tourism. Dominic and others have since started to achieve that. Surfing here looks like a beautiful, singular alternative to war.
I arrived home from that Liberia trip deeply affected by what I had seen, and more, what I heard about the suffering, loss and human destruction brought about by the fighting. Child soldiers have grown up never knowing a peaceful existence, where hatred was more prominent than love, and now they are trying to make sense of a ‘normal’ life, rebuilding a culture. For weeks I dwelt upon stories I had been told, such as Robertsport continually changing hands among different warring factions, each one torturing, raping, then forcing kids to join the warlords. The local kids had lost friends in the conflict. Drunk on fermented sugar cane, they were given machine guns and ordered to fight without mercy. Some escaped to Monrovia, walking at night along the coast for weeks to avoid being kidnapped. This scenario would be replicated in other parts of Africa, particularly the Sudan. Some of the Robertsport kids then had to spend six months hiding in Monrovia to avoid the same fate under a different warlord. Here they heard about cannibalism – gunmen eating a victim’s heart in the search for courage; and children wearing wedding dresses into combat because they thought it made them invincible. When they finally returned home to Robertsport, and the war ended, surfing became their sanctuary, their escape. This is the purest example I have come across of how surfing can offer healing and hope. Nothing was certain in an unstable post-war climate, but among the uncertainty, these Robertsport locals had found identities – as surfers. Thanks to the publicity given to the Robertsport area in recent years from a variety of sources, the steady flow of surfing visitors has made it possible for locals like Alfred Lomax and Dominic Johns to make a modest living with accommodation, food and drinks for visiting surfers, something that was not possible before.
5. Which destination has resonated the most with you and why?
I have developed a particular interest with West African culture, and the upbeat polyrhythmic music reflecting the ingenuity and charisma of the people in the face of hardships that would crush the pampered Westerner. A single off-the-beaten path trip to West Africa might pack more bone-shaking and head spinning moments into a few weeks than many will experience in a lifetime. But Haiti, in the Caribbean, is the most exhilarating and vibrant place I have ever been. You will witness a wonderful celebration of carnival, colour, resourcefulness and style in the face of great adversity in Haiti. Despite the hardships and disasters, there is no poverty of spirit in Haiti. I have written three chapters on Haiti in Surfing Tropical Beats (with Callahan’s mouth-watering photos) and recently presented a film with University College Falmouth to attempt to capture the spirit of Haiti. This will be free to view online soon.
6. For the benefit of non surfers can you articulate what it is about surfing which attracted you to it and why it continues to be a driving force in your life?
Surfing is both an illness and a cure – an addiction and a lifesaver. Extreme travel is the same – a welcome but awkward infection. The ocean has knocked me senseless, torn ligaments, ruined my sinuses, reduced my spectrum of hearing, dragged me across infectious live coral reefs, held me down so I am close to drowning, and engineered a face-to-face encounter with a tiger shark. But such bruises generate a kind of wisdom, and they are suffered because the rewards of surfing are immense. Surfing has opened me up, split my skin, widened my horizons, and closed me down, because any obsession restricts your involvement in other aspects of life. The sea has focused my restless, complex personality and given me calm. Travel has permanently reddened my eyes, but layered experience upon experience in building character. Surfing has been my life practise – all other activities, including my academic and writing passions, have been built around it. At the same time, travelling has taught me that there is nothing more special in surfing than being a local, having a family, and that one should cherish home breaks, home life. I have never tired of the vaulting granite cliffs at Gwenver in west Penwith, the bright skirt of sand, the changing seasons, and the familiar faces that keep me sane, acting as an anchor.
7. You seem to prefer riding a long board (judging from your photos so please correct me if I’m wrong), what is it about long board riding which appeals to you more than a short board?
I’m known for my longboarding, and it’s perhaps the board type which suites my style best (because I can focus on fusing noseriding, footwork and flow), but I like to ride everything. I don’t like to pigeon hole board types or approaches – the boundaries are so blurred now that it’s easier to think it terms of flow and style. Throughout my whole surfing life I’ve been interested in so many board types, and have explored everything from logs to bonzers to quads to eggs way before these boards became part of the ‘retro revival’. I love them all (and continue to ride them all), but I am most passionate about all-rounder boards that work in anything and everything. I’m most at home riding refined shapes that are well suited to the local beachbreaks and to the type of travel exploration work I do, where I need a strong, but lightweight versatile longboard. I’m really interested in flow and timing. I like to ride boards that smooth out edges and angles with interconnected moves, weaved together with footwork, so the whole ride forms an elegant whole, from take-off to kick-out, not a set of isolated, disconnected moves. The beauty of style is not about standard or ability, it’s about aesthetics – crisp, cool styles always look stunning, in either a beginner, Kelly Slater or Miki Dora.
8. Within your life who inspires you?
My family. And Gwenver beach continues to stun and humble. As far as travel writing goes, my personal favourite is the late Ryszard Kapuscinski - a sensational Polish journalist who spent most of his career in Africa. The way he articulated his encounters with ‘otherness’ through his working travel (for journalism) is a deep passion and source of inspiration for me. He wrote in Polish, but is now widely available in English. I am equally inspired by encounters with the ‘unknown’ or ‘otherness’. I’m also a huge fan of travel writing anthropologists Alfonso Lingis and Michael Taussig.
9. If you were to give advice to aspiring or beginner surfers what would that be?
Chose functional surfboards that will make the experience safe and fun for the breaks you are surfing. Be humble and respectful to both the places you visit and the people you meet.
Listen, be open-minded and enjoy every second of your surfing life. It can be a roller coaster, but we are lucky for the ride, and like my late geography teacher Barry Blamey said, ‘you will never know how wonderful it is to stand on top of the highest mountains until you have been in the deepest valleys.’ A full surfing life is not purely hedonistic, nor driven by self-interest, but requires navigating the contours of difficulty, anxiety, suffering and loss. These experiences bring deeper understanding back into surfing, and empathy for others less fortunate. Be grateful. Be stoked.
10. If you had to use only three words to describe your life what would they be?
Freethinking, colourful, balanced.
