By: Ana Rahlves
I saw a small wave approaching, turned my surfboard to paddle towards the beach and once I got enough speed, I stood up. It was my first ride in my country after 10 years, and I couldn’t be happier. How could a 2-foot wave give me so much joy?
It was May, 2022 and I was feeling very excited while preparing a visit to Colombia. For the past 10 years, my trips to Colombia had been mostly short visits to my family with little time to explore the country. This was the first time I had enough time and money, to spare on a domestic surf trip.
Located between two oceans, Colombia has waves on the Atlantic and the Pacific side. However, growing up, riding waves was never more than a dream for me. Something only my Barbie doll could do in my childhood fantasies. Like the people I saw on TV, I imagined her riding a pink board in a beach so far away that I could not even locate on a map.
I grew up in a town nestled in Colombia’s western mountain range, and while the closest surfable beach is located at mere 130 miles, geography, violence and poverty in Colombia has historically made domestic travel a difficult task.
Eventually, I made my surfing dream a reality. But I had to wait until I was a full-time working adult to afford it.
Undoubtedly, the best waves in Colombia are on the Pacific Ocean. Off the coast a department called Chocó, semi-isolated by a thick jungle, drug-dealing incited violence and government-forgotten roads, excellent quality waves break constantly with few lucky surfers to ride them.
The more tourist and developed Atlantic side, on the other hand, offers a vast diversity of beaches but not as many good waves. This region is home of national parks, natural sanctuaries and the famous Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, a snowy peak at only 26 miles from the Caribbean Sea.
Barranquilla, the biggest city of the Caribbean coast, was my home before moving to the United States. Next to it lies a small town called Puerto Colombia, the place where I stood up on a surfboard for the first time more than 10 years ago.
Well known for its colorful carnivals and for being the birth place of international stars like Shakira or Sofia Vergara, Barranquilla is, though, not popular for having world-class waves.
Nevertheless, my plans were set, my husband has agreed to join and I could only hope to find some rideable waves.
We left Orange County on a Friday afternoon and landed in Bogota on a cold and rainy morning. For people unfamiliar with the capital city of Colombia, the fact that its average temperature is 56 degrees Fahrenheit comes as a surprise.
After a short wait and drinking my mandatory Juan Valdez coffee at the El Dorado airport, I was on a plane headed to Barranquilla.
Barranquilla and the Magdalena River from the airplane
When the majestic Magdalena River, and the city that lies between its shore and the Atlantic Ocean were visible from the airplane, I couldn’t help but wonder why I had waited so long to be back.
Outside Barranquilla’s Ernesto Cortissoz airport the shock of the temperature change was brutal. I was now in a city where the lowest temperature sits at around 77 degrees, in a very cool day.
A short taxi ride took me to my home for the next week: a beach house in Puerto Colombia with a colorful bar facing the ocean, a surf school and board rental place just steps away.
Fruit bowl and fruit sodas
With the scorching heat I appreciated all the cold drinks offered in the menu. I discovered new drinks that were not popular 10 years ago, like the amazing “sodas saborizadas” or flavored sodas (mixed with real fruit), and went back to my favorite classics like the corozo juice, the most traditional drink in the area, and coconut lemonade.
A beautiful sunset and the unique beach vibes reminded me that very close to the newly opened surf hostel, more than a decade earlier, is where I finally had the chance to rent a surfboard and hire a surf instructor. A local guy who pushed me into a wave for the first time, yelling “párate, párate” (pop up!).
I did pop up with unexpected little effort and rode the wave all the way to the beach. When I went out back to my instructor, he asked me surprised if I had surfed before. Never, I said. Which, sadly, became obvious almost immediately after.
That first wave was only beginners’ luck and little I knew then that my surfing learning curve was going to be a painful, slow, yet absolutely addictive one.
As the first evening hours of my first day back in Puerto Colombia cooled the air, I heard that there was rain in the forecast and locals said the waves are usually very small after a rainy night. I was a little disappointed but was also so tired that did not think too much about it and went straight to bed.
At 6 am next morning, I woke up with the hot air and some dogs barking. I rushed to check out the waves from the hostel’s balcony.
A peaceful, clean, beautiful ocean, offering 1 to 2-foot waves appeared in front of me. I was stocked! The rain did make the waves small but at the same time the wind was so calm that the water had a beautiful, glassy aspect.
I changed quickly into my swimwear, had some coffee and run to the board rental hut.
The beach in Puerto Colombia
I’m not sure if it was me being too excited about tiny waves, me being a woman, or me being a tourist, but the board rental transaction was shockingly harder that I expected. For the past 10 years I had put a lot of effort in learning all I know about surfing, and I was not the beginner woman who had hired that instructor to push her on white water any more.
While I may not be the greatest surfer out there, I felt a little discouraged when the board rental manager looked at me in disbelief and pointing at some beat up foam boards said, “those are the only boards I can rent to you today”. Hard top boards are not for beginners.
As I understood that I could not persuade him to rent me a decent long board, and as I was too antsy to get wet, I grabbed the least battered foamy board and run to the water.
Surf school and board rental hut
I dipped my feet in the warm ocean, free from a wetsuit, and started walking out towards the deep ocean without worrying about any ferocious stingrays hiding in the sand. I put the board on the water, jumped right on it and started paddling to a spot where small waves where breaking and rolling in towards the beach.
A couple of strokes later, I sat up at a deserted line up. I looked back to see the green mountains in the background and a sleepy beach with traditional thatch huts in front of me, waiting for the weekend tourists that had not started to arrive yet. My heart was filled with joy.
I tried to soak it all in, the sound of birds so different from those in California, the warm water touching my skin, the green all around me, and the low-rise buildings of the town claiming space among the trees.
Then, I saw a wave approaching. With some effort I turned the heavy and stiff board around, paddled towards the beach and as the energy of the wave picked me up, I stood up.
It wasn’t a gracious ride; I wasn’t used to the volume of the foamy board and it was difficult for me to turn it into the face of the wave. But I enjoyed the ride. I bent my knees, got as close as I could to the face of the wave, enjoying the view of the sun reflection on the water, and for a tiny moment I thought I was event getting barreled.
It was my first ride in this land after 10 years, and it’s one I will never forget.
While the local surfers checked the waves from their windows and discouraged decided to go back to bed, I kept catching wave after wave, feeling like a small girl in an amusement park the first day of summer, not wanting it to end.
My husband showed up to the beach and thankfully captured some images of that session. We then surfed together. I convinced the rental guy to let me use a hard top board and kept playing in the ocean until we couldn’t surf any more.
Conditions didn’t improve during my time in Barranquilla, but it didn’t really matter. I surfed more and got to meet some of the local surfers, all of them passionate about surfing and about continue growing the small surf community that was not there a decade before.
I saw new signs popping up around the town, all related to the sport: surf schools, surf hotels and surf-themed coffee shops. Even local musicians where now getting inspiration from and devoting their lyrics to the pastime of wave riding.
That’s when I knew there was something special about the combination of my two worlds. California and Colombia. So distant and different and yet so special to me.
I already had toyed with the idea of starting a women’s swimwear brand but now it became clear to me: my brand had to be a connection between these two places, a bridge between Colombia and California.
The fun didn’t stop in the water for me then. I also visited beautiful places like the newly built “Malecon” in Barranquilla and re-visited the historic city of Cartagena. I saw old friends, ate my favorite dishes and re-discovered an area that is exuberant in natural resources as well as in warm people.
Final note: Conditions did improve the following week. The new friends I made posted photos of a fun swell hitting Barranquilla. They definitely enjoyed it. While it was a sad for me to see their posts, I am sure it’s just a sign that I will have to be back there very soon.