Friday Morning in Long Beach: World-Class Surfing at the Quiksilver Pro New York

After three gloomy, rainy mornings when we had to get to work on the subway, once we woke up and found out that today's last day of the Quiksilver Pro New York was on,

we hopped out of the apartment and got on the L train to Atlantic Avenue,

running to just make the 8:15 LIRR train at East New York on its way

to Long Beach,

site of the first world-class surfing competition to come to these parts.

It was a great day on the beach,

with a large crowd watching the action

and seeing our fave, 21yo Australian Owen Wright,

win the $300,000 first prize over ten-time world champ Kelly Slater.

Our little dumbphone camera can't really take pics of the surfers where they appear larger than mosquitoes,

but our eyes still work okay,

and we saw some terrific surfing

-- though for the best views,

we relied on the jumbo TV screens.

We spent some time and a little money in the big temporary store on the beach.


The Quiksilver Pro New York was Event No. 6 of 11 on the 2011 World Title season.




Back in the summer of 1969, we were mesmerized by the surfing film Endless Summer.

We still enjoy watching surfers.


We're very grateful to Quiksilver and everyone associated with the Quiksilver Pro New York for extending our summer of 2011 by at least one more memorable day.

Friday Morning in Long Beach: Breakfast on the Boardwalk

Early this morning we took the G train to Fulton Street and then, at the LIRR Atlantic Terminal at 7 a.m., we just managed to catch a train to Long Beach so we could have breakfast on the boardwalk on this short sunny and mild respite from a long, hard winter.

Monday Morning in Far Rockaway: Breakfast on Rockaway Beach

We got up early, and seeing it was sunny, packed some food and drink and took a trip to Far Rockaway so we could have breakfast on the beach.

At 7:37 a.m. the L train let us off at Broadway Junction, where we transfered to the A train to Mott Street.

We know Far Rockaway pretty well, having family living and working nearby and having gone to clothing stores

and kosher delis and Woolworth's

and St. Joseph's (now St. John's Episcopal) Hospital to visit sick relatives

and the Pix and the Strand movie theaters,

and in the summer of 1976, we worked at the adult home New Haven Manor helping our boss, an accountant who owned medical clinics, commit Medicaid fraud by giving unneeded tests to the released mental patients who lived there. Later we turned all our notes over to special prosecutor Maurice Nadjari and Councilman Antonio Olivieri's investigating committee. We're in the 1980 Roger Weisberg-produced documentary, Back Wards to Back Streets, discussing our experiences.

Here we are on the boardwalk in the last winter of the Johnson Administration.

Now we see the shimmering images indicating the end of a flashback.

Just before 8 a.m. we ran to catch the Q113 bus outside the station and took it on a brief ride to the last stop on Beach 9th Street and Seagirt Avenue, where the Rockaway Boardwalk begins. It was a thrill to smell the sea air and hear the sounds of seagulls again.

It's actually concrete for the next ten blocks. That's the Atlantic Beach Bridge in the background. We used to love to take drives to Long Beach back in the day.

The sand dunes here are really nice. This is actually O'Donohue Park.

We found a bench to sit and watch the ocean. Actually, there were only a few morning strollers or joggers around the whole time we were there.

That's Silver Point in Atlantic Beach across the inlet. There's a Nassau County park at the end of the barrier island.

Even though it was bright daylight, the lamppost lights were on for this seagull.

There was a bulldozer onb the beach around Beach 21st Street near where the construction begins.

In early March in Arverne, we walked to the west end of the closed boardwalk where the rehabilitation project begins and today we reached the end. There is also an elaborate park planned for this beachfront area.

So after hanging out a little, we got off the boardwalk and walked a few blocks to Beach 25th Street, where our Grandpa Herb Sarrett's brother Jack used to have the Sarrett Pharmacy on the corner and got the subway home to Williamsburg. We're grateful for our morning at the beach.