Surfing
Île Amsterdam - Going off the surf map
This week we take you way off the surf map to the French Southern and Antarctic Lands. Keeping with the French theme that took us last week to the chilly North Atlantic island, St. Pierre and Miquelon, this week we’re heading to the slightly more livable south. Île Amsterdam, a French sub-arctic island, lays halfway between the southern tip of Africa to the west, and the bottom of Australia to the east.
Far more temperate than most of its Antarctic neighbors, Île Amsterdam has a year-round average temperature of around 55 degrees Fahrenheit, with winter temperatures of around 52 degrees, and summer temperatures 63 degrees. Water temperatures around the island are even more agreeable, with year-round temps ranging between 55 and 63 degrees. This translates to wearing a 3/2 in the height of summer and a 4/3 and boots in the winter, if you can even get yourself there.
Getting there will be the hardest part of your adventure, as the island is virtually in the middle of nowhere and has no year-round population. Furthering its allure as an isolated haven is the fact that less than a few hundred people have ever set foot on the island as a tourist. Get involved in one of the seasonal research teams that visit the island, get a job as a rock lobster fisherman who harvests nearby, luck upon a seat on the French supply boat that brings quarterly supplies to the island, or take your own ship there. From the photos available online, it looks like it’s worth the trip. Chances are, if you get there and surf, you’ll be the very first, and for the foreseeable future, one of the only. Get out there, go off the surf map and explore.
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Holy shit man, I dunno if I’d wanna venture out there to surf. At least if you’re on some Carribean island and the surf blows…you’re still on a Carribean island! Mai Tais, beautiful women wearing white linen, sun… I would hate to be hanging out with angry French military, lonely scientists, and horny elephant seals, waiting for the next supply ship to come save my ass from 3 months of solitude. But I guess that’s the point? I mean, check it out on Google Earth, why the hell would the French even want that shit? But if you look through the photos on there, there’s DEFINITELY surf.
Île Amsterdam is holding. Would be a great place to plunk down with a crew of like minded surf friends and a bevy of women. The orcas feeding on the tens of thousands of seals in the lineup are what creeps me out a bit.
PS - the Fronchies have a lot more islands around the world that are holding. Stay tuned…
im a south african just wondering is the surf there all year round or is it just winter sessions???? any thing like the uk?? recon it colder than uk?