Hangin' Ten in GB DUUUUDE?

For my birthday (June 21st for those of you miscreants who forgot) PAB offered me, in the form of a "voucher" or coupon of the sort that children give their parents for Mother's/Father's Day, a trip to Pembrookshire, the beach in South Wales. PAB had brought an extra bodyboard from France and his wetsuit from middle school. It's always a sad day when a woman discovers that she once was (or even worse, now is) the size of her male companion, though at 5'11" I've never quite fit the dainty mold...

I waited patiently for a good weather weekend, which I am fortunate came within one month of my arrival. On Friday PAB came home from working ecstatic that BBC weather reported sunny skies and 75° for Pembrookshire on Saturday. We packed in a mass frenzy (although I was reminded of our disappointment with Air Tattoo I allowed PAB to act in the only way he knows how, anally and thoroughly). Saturday morning we packed the car to astonishingly blue skies and rolled down the windows for fresh air. We crossed the bridge (engineered by the French, best civil engineers in the world, information grace of PAB) that separates England and Wales and entered into Welsh country.

Wales is not all that different from England, though they strive to prove their independence by any means necessary. All sign were written in English and Welsh (or Cymraeg as you like). Exit Here, allanfa 'ma. No Hard Shoulder, Na 'n anawdd ysgwydda. I felt that we had entered some terrible German/Yiddish/Arabic twilight zone. I don't know how many people in Wales actually speak Welsh, but I imagine it is close to the number of Gaelic speaking Irish, meaning that the signs in Wales are all but futile attempts to conserve a dying and forgotten language. But I do admire the strong pride and the anti-Brit sentiment you find in Wales, Scotland and parts of Ireland.

Save for the multi-language signs and occasional "Museum of the History of Wales", Wales had much the same rolling hills and intense greenery of its ruling neighbor. We arrived at the beach early, and were greeted by a surprising number of...surfers? Perhaps others are aware, but I had NO idea that there was a surfing culture, of all things, in the U.K. I mean, honestly! Board shorts look much less cool when worn with a turtleneck and scarf! But here they were, bleach blond hair in their full body wetsuits. I actually saw one surfer struggling into his wetsuit while sipping tea from a travel container in his left hand. "Dude, pass me the biscuits"

PAB and I brought our bodyboards and wetsuits down to the beach and what we found there epitomizes G.B. 100s of surfers crowded into a tiny cove, all very respectful of each other, excusing themselves for the slightest infraction on someone's surf space, and waiting patiently for the tiniest of waves. Having spent most of the summers of my childhood on the beaches of Hawaii, I found the waves hysterical. PAB and I needed fins to even bodyboard and these silly Brits were going to SURF!? In addition to the sad spectacle of the waves, it was COLD. The kind of weather were Floridians and Californians are inside by the fire, NOT sunbathing on the beach. PAB and I did not have a favorable first impression.

But after 30 minutes the morning clouds disappeared, the sun came out in full force (mitigating the 65° weather) and I realized that despite their mediocre waves, all the surfers seemed to be having a gay, old time. I squeezed myself into PAB's wetsuit (making me into a flat chested blue condom) and waddled down to the water in my fins. We waited, with the other patient surfers, for a decent size wave, and suddenly, riding atop the wave on my bodyboard, I was transported back to age 10 and was overwhelmed by a giddy and immense happiness! PAB had been afraid of my reaction to the cold (not that you can feel a thing in wetsuits, they are the wonder of the cold climates), but after the first wave it was me who was pulling him back into the ocean for another and another.

The beach was eventually filled to the brim (reminding me again of how compact the U.K. truly is) with kids playing cricket and rugby on the beach, catching crabs in pools left by the tides and Brits using their disposable BBQs to cook sausage and corn. The entire day was, as the British would say, "absolutely lovely". After an entire day of beach bumming, PAB and I headed to the funfair (every British seaside resort MUST have a funfair, it is mandatory) for what we hoped would be greasy, fresh fish and chips. We found what looked like a small trailer set up outside the funfair, advertising "faggots and peas" (yes, faggots, apparently some type of sausage made of the worst bits of the pig, anus and all, I pray this is not where we got the American usage from). The fish and chips were everything I hoped for and more, the grease from the fresh caught cod literally soaking into the fries below. I was overwhelmed with the satisfaction of getting exactly what you want, when you want it.

I returned to Bristol with a sunburn, and although it hurt, it was a wonderful reminder that there is in fact SUN in England (or at least in Wales)! An amazing birthday present, one that reminded me that G.B. is what you make of it!