I am on my way to Salinas where I will spend 4 days with Edu. We met a year ago in sunny California.
Edu, quiet and reflective, lives for his profession: Edu shapes surfboards in a very dedicated manner. His boards combine modern design with individual shapes, and range from long to short.
Edu lives on a hilltop in an old house with no heater: the MONSTER villa. The delicious aroma of homemade bread filling your nose wakes you every morning. In the dark and well into the night, the light in Edu’s shape room is still visible as he finishes yet another board to be shipped to some other person, living anywhere out there in the world.
Asturias, in the north of Spain, is still cold in spring and it rains a lot, but there are constant waves; if you can find them. Not many people know how to read the wind and the ocean. This leaves Edu with stretches of lonley beach and waves that break only for him. We are surrounded by natural beauty contrasted by industry. Sitting on your neon board in the water, your view is of factories on the beach breathing dark smut out of their pipes.
As an asturian surfer 5/4 is your number and being wet before surfing is quite normal.
Published in Wilderness Magazine 17
