From Family in Colombia to Surf in Costa Rica

After three accidents and and some spanish lessons I've left Cali Colombia (and some of the world's most beautiful women) and am in Jaco Costa Rica near Playa Hermosa with a healthy swell pumping through the area.

With its notoriously tough immigration policies getting in to Costa Rica was tough! Costa Rica has implemented a new entry requirement that bears some discussion. If you are coming into Costa Rica from Central or South America you are required to have a yellow fever vaccination card. Its a yellow card that documents this shot. Whats worse is that after the shot you are suppose to wait 11 days for the results before entry will be allowed. In my case they wouldn't let me board in Cali.

There are a couple of ways around the system if you find yourself in this situation. In my case I cancelled my flight and booked a flight to Miami. I then booked a flight on another airline to Costa Rica. The next day I flew to Costa Rica and made it through immigration without any issues.

Someone also told me that you can fly to Panama and get the shot. For about $100.00 they willl back date the shot records.

New Surfboard Model on Surfboardbuilders.com - Larmo Squash

The new Larmo Squash is up and available. We don't have the pic up on the site yet but had a chance to stop Larmo's shaping room to snap a couple pictures for you here (thanks Mica!).

Here is the description of the board from Larmo himself:

At 5'3" this board has the volume of a 6' board. The added width and thickness along with the single to double concave bottom contour, low entry rocker, quad fins, and full shortboard rails makes for a super fast, super maneuverable board. This board does it all and unlike most fish performs great in the pocket, fits on the wave face, and performs much better top to bottom and backside.

Its Larmo's answer to the shorter, higher volume board trend popularized by world champ, Kelly Slater. The board comes stock with quad fins but you can set it up with tri or convertible 5's. You can tell from the pic that the lines look sweet!

Balls of Steel!

Here is some pretty insane tow-in footage from what must be Jaws. Don't have the info on the original source but Wow!

New Surfboard on Surfboardbuilders.com and Travel Update

Hello from Cali Colombia! I'm here for a few weeks of spanish lessons, visiting family (my wife is from Cali), seeing the country, and getting ready for a few weeks of surf in Costa Rica. So far its been great. The people here are exceptional and Cali...its full of life! Over the next few weeks I'll have more posts with videos and photos from different areas of Colombia.

BTW, we have some new boards coming on line and later more shapers. We don't have all the photos up yet but the boards are available to review and order. Most new ones we are seeing are along the lines of shorter boards similar in looks to those made in the early 80's and made popular again by Kelly Slater...of course the newer boards are much more refined. Regardless we love the direction and experimention going on. Doc Lausch has both an NDR and Lil Buddy. Up soon are the Larmo Squash and White Pony and shown below and available now is the Mitsven B-Tail Quad.


I'll get to demo a B-Tail Quad in Costa Rica and look forward to providing some feedback on it to you. Until the next post Hasta Luego!

Thanks from Surfboardbuilders.com

Maybe its the season or that everybody is just over it (worrying about the recession)...but things have been picking up for us at Surfboardbuilders.com lately. We just want to say thanks to all of our customers. It is a pleasure to work with you each day and the great group of shapers on the site. If you happen to live or visit in and around North County San Diego you might have seen our "fleet" of trucks...both of them. If you do please don't hesitate to stop us and say hello. Until then we wish you great summer surf!

Greg Webster's Surfboard Glasswork

Last weekend surfboardbuilders.com hosted a show of the incredible colored glasswork being produced by Greg Webster. Greg is pictured here standing below a Jim Phillips longboard with his handiwork.

The showing, complimented by great BBQ and the sounds of Joe Wood and the Lonely Ones (aka Joe Woods from TSOL http://www.myspace.com/joewoodandthelonelyones), was a way of getting the word out about his talent and setting the bar still higher for artwork on surfboards.

On display were boards shaped by mastercraftmen like Jim Phillips and Hank Warner. Between cooking and organizing Greg took some time to explain the process to the folks in attendance.

Instead of the normal tint work, Greg uses individual pieces of colored cloth to build his designs. As you can see his work is on a whole different level.





The work in the pipeline that didn't make the show is even more beautiful. If you're interested you can have Greg do the glasswork art on any board on our site. Give us a call for details... or you can just order your board without a design and then we will work out the design and cost over the phone.

Feedback on the Larry Mabile's Swinger ( new surfboard model)

About a month ago I got my Larry Mabile Swinger model after seeing it at the demo event and ordering one.  After trying it at a variety of waves I'm ready to give some feedback.  It has a fishy feel but is a little bit stiffer in the mid and nose section.   It paddles great and gets into waves super easy...all really nice.  It's on the wave that it was a little surprising.  The quad version of course is really fast and flatter sections are easy to blow thru or throw tail slides.  The difference was the feeling that it was more comfortable in the pocket (on hollower waves) than my other fish boards and easier to turn off the top than a traditional or normal modern fish.  This was pretty cool.  If you are looking for something a little different and super fun I highly recommend this board.  I can't wait to get mine in a long down the line point break!