![]() What enticed him about the wave was how the river bottom and tide created seven distinct peaks, which locals call “Seven Ghosts.” During the COVID-19 pandemic, he got the idea to surf The Bono. ![]() He rode the famed French bore near Bordeaux on the River Garonne called “ Le Mascaret”. He traveled to Wyoming and surfed the Lunch Counter rapid on the Snake River. Graves expanded his focus from ocean waves to tidal bores and even river waves. Surfers on tidal bores and rivers often see how long they can stand on the wave-rides last minutes and sometimes even over an hour. He was hooked, and he marveled at the small community of surfers who coalesced around these unusual waves. “I found out about the subculture of surfers who only ride tidal bores, and they just look at wave riding differently, and as a surfer the whole thing lit me up.” “It was such a different experience from riding a normal ocean wave that I fell in love with tidal bores,” Graves says. He first got a taste for the experience in 2018 on the Severn River in Southwestern England, where the tide creates a rideable wave in the funnel-shaped Bristol Channel. Graves says the surf world has identified approximately 60 bores on the planet. The season for riding these waves is often short, and determined by the combination of the lunar cycle, height of the water, and shape of the river bottom. But unlike ocean waves, they happen just twice a day, and often just one of those swells is ridable. Peru’s “ Chicama,” believed to be the longest breaking ocean wave, covers a distance of 2.5 miles, and a lucky surfer might be up for four minutes. ![]() Traditional ocean waves break on a reef or a sandbar, and even the longest ones barely last longer than a minute. Instead, he was indulging in his relatively newfound interest in the tidal bore phenomenon-waves that are created when the rising tide pushes up against a river current. Graves, 37, told me he had no intentions of pursuing a record ride at The Bono. (Photo: Dylan Graves/YouTube)ĭuring the clip you can see him make 46 different turns on the wave, which according to several sites could be a new Guinness Record. And I was doing what anyone would do with a wave like that-ride the shit out of it.” Graves rides the tidal bore in Indonesia. I felt like I had this antenna up that was picking up on the frequency of the wave. You have this cosmic connection that makes the ride feel more grand. So really, you’re in synch with the moon. “With tidal bores the whole reason you’re able to surf is your spot on the planet at that very moment. “It was an insane experience-people talk about the ‘flow state’ during a ride and I had that, only it just went on forever,” Graves told me. So, how did Graves describe a wave ride that lasted that long? The water is pulled along by the gravitational pull of the moon, and the wave it creates just goes on and on and on. The wave, called “The Bono,” is actually a tidal bore that f lows up the Kampar river in Sumatra. That’s why I was determined to interview Puerto Rican surfer Dylan Graves after watching the recent video clip of him surfing a wave for five straight minutes-that’s 300 seconds-along a river in Indonesia. The very best athletes-think Laird Hamilton, Keala Kennelly, Kelly Slater-can talk for minutes on end about a ride that lasted maaaybe 20 seconds. Oftentimes, their soliloquies touch on topics that I care deeply about: spirituality, the connection between brain and body, the emotional release that comes from physical effort, and, ya know, getting so pitted. I always appreciate hearing them describe what it was like to actually ride the swell. My love of surf films goes far beyond the heart-pumping footage of surfers getting barreled and shredding monster waves.
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