Not too long ago I was on a surfing vacation in northern baja mexico. When I arrived around 9:30 pm a few guests had the fire blazing overlooking the k-38 surf break. After unloading the gear Brian and I decided to hang out for a few, so we pulled up a chair to the fire, were welcomed by Ricky, the New Zealand mainstay, and met the 4 other middle-aged gentleman from the LA area. If you did not know better you could have been fooled that one was Tom Arnold, the actor,more importantly, we me Efran. Efran is about 55 years old, was diagnosed with cancer several years back and later developed blindness from some of the cancer medications he was taking.

The group was really friendly and it was clear that Efran was blind. At this point we were not sure if he was simply joining his old buddies on a short surfing vacation for support, but, I certainly did not think he was participating. Soon enough in conversation about the earlier surf sessions they had mentioned that Efran had been out at the La Fonda surf break and that they had pushed him into a few ! Thinking in my head “WTF?” But I could tell the tone was still serious so I kept patient, listend and was inspired.

They spoke of surf vacations of old that they had ventured on and the different dubotchery that occurred while Efran was able to see. So clearly now is no different and the crew is still strong and not letting anything hold them back from living in spite of any difficulty or discouragement. Now that is inspiring and refreshing, still going at it and creating epic memories.

Before I decided to write on this post and did a bit of research to see if there were any similar stories and to my surprise I learned the story of a blind surfer from Brazil, Derek Rabelo, that not only was surfing he surf the pipeline surf break one of the most heavy waves around.A documentary had actually been in production for a bit and the movie appears to have select viewings (to see more check this out:http://beyondsightmovie.com ) . The reviews say, “You will learn from Derek’s story that the best journeys in life are walked by faith, and not by sight.”

I think both Derek and Efran’s are incredibly impactful and highly inspirational. Thanks Derek and Efran.