Rip Curl Pro

On Good Friday, we drove down to Bells Beach to check out the Rip Curl Pro, a major surfing competition. We went on a great day; the weather was beautiful and we got to see Kelly Slater, the amazing 11-time World Champion from the United States. Zack has even read his biography!

First we watched a women's heat...

Then Kelly Slater came in for his semifinal bout, and his first ride scored over 9 points! He had some pretty incredible turns and tricks.

As Kelly Slater was ripping up the waves, Mick Fanning, the Australian who beat Slater in the final later that day (barely!), headed into the water for his semifinal round.

Champion Mick Fanning

Here are Kelly Slater and Jeremy Flores (from France) heading in after their semifinal...

Kelly Slater had a short interview after winning his semifinal, so I was able to get a close-up picture. He is not a bad-looking guy!

After watching some of the other semifinal, Zack and I headed to nearby Torquay eat some fish and chips and then to do some surfing of our own. Though we weren't quite ready for the Rip Curl Pro, we had a fun hour or two before a big hail and rainstorm blew in and we went running for cover!

That night, we drove to Lake Elizabeth to camp. More about that in the next post, but the sunset on our drive there was gorgeous! It felt like we were on an African safari, minus the lions and giraffes of course. We drove straight toward the sunset for awhile, and then the whole sky turned orange. It was a beautiful start to our Easter weekend. More to come soon...