The Braw Diaries – A Baltic Paradise

The Braw Diaries – A Baltic Paradise

Large ocean swells generated by Epsilon lit up many parts of our coastline, delivering near perfection to Scotlands north coast. Click into the edit above for some northern exposure at its best.
Untreated waste spewing into Belhaven Bay, Scotland.

Untreated waste spewing into Belhaven Bay, Scotland.

Surfers and swimmers are up in arms after reported human waste spill at Belhaven by in Dunbar, East Lothian.

Surfers and swimmers told not to use popular spot after human waste spill.

According to the Edinburgh Evening News they are reporting below.

The alarm was initially raised on December 18, when Scottish Water identified a “substance spill from an external site into the sewer network”, which prompted the issuing of a warning against bathing or entering the popular surf spot.

It is understood that use of a secondary pipe, known as a storm outfall pipe, at Dunbar Waste Water Treatment Works – used when there are failures in usual treatment systems – have breached contractual limits, as the substance continues to spill near the bay.

Recent samples taken of water from Belhaven Bay indicate that the water is now contaminated.
Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) said it is “continuing to take action after an incident”.
In a joint statement alongside Scottish Water, East Lothian Council and NHS Lothian they said: “Scottish Water identified a substance spill from an external site into the sewer network in the Dunbar area on 18 December which impacted the normal treatment process at Dunbar Waste Water Treatment Works.`

“Whilst the situation has improved, work is still being done to make the site fully operational again.
“Scottish Water is working 24/7 to resolve this issue as quickly as possible and in the meantime there may be some screened discharge of waste water from the long sea outfall into coastal waters, which is why the ‘advice against bathing’ continues.
“It is hoped this issue will be resolved before the end of January”.

Read more about the ongoing issue here.

Blown Away

Blown Away

A fun surf session a couple weeks back, some unedited clips taken over the space of just 53mins..
Surfers: Chris Clarke, Alex Sutherland, Ian Battrick & Dom.

Music: Them Crooked Vultures, Bandoliers.

Scottish Sanitarium…

Ian Battrick has spent a decent chunk of winter hanging around surfing’s most famous farmyard. The clip above is the result.

Deep winter in Thurso is hard, what’s the hardest part?
The hardest part is the wait. You have to put your time into score. Even charts ‘set in gold’ don’t do what they say swell wise or weather wise.

How windy was that stormy day?
Extremely, it was difficult to stay on your feet.

What’s the key to good GoPro footage … apart from getting bazzed obvs?
Just knowing your angles of what you are trying to capture/portray. Plus you always need to be deeper than you think to score good clips. I shot with MyGo Mounts which worked well.

When it comes to tubes what’s your favoured board and fin set up these days?
I have been working on my own fin template for a while now, and it has just been released this week and produced by Futures fins. it is a tri-quad with a unique ‘Luna Knubster‘. I’ve been riding them from 6″ slop in Jersey on my fish to the high performance shortboard, all the way up to my semi-gun in draining barrels. We’ve got crew like the Ash brothers, Cain Kilcullen, Timmy Turner, Chris Noble, Amy Kotch and more riding them.
For the tubes in this video Lee Bartlett of Fourth Surfboards had just shaped me up a tweaked version of their Shiv model in 5’10” that went amazingly. I also had a a couple from Jeff ‘Doc’ Lausch at Surf Prescriptions. For the tube I’ve always loved speed and freedom of the quad and the lines it can take the thruster has difficulty with.

Getting soft in your old age actually being in a building?
Haha! I still lived in the van, which was the softer version, it was actually colder inside that building (especially the upstairs) than outside, you would walk out the front door and hot air would hit you. I was just going in there to stretch my legs, leave some boards out the way, cook, get the coffees on and hang out.

When are they going to renovate the farmhouse?!
I’m not sure… its in the process now.