I looked at my daughter’s face and tried not to wince. ‘I won’t join the team.’ 

‘That means we won’t have enough people to compete.’ It was true. I was stopping Lulu joining her first-ever surf competition. We needed a three-person team to compete. Lulu, Jack and yeah, I know.. I felt awful but I held on. She paused from giving me the stink-eye and looked. At all the people. At the marquee. At the colour-coded t-shirts. 

The sun had come out in full Caribbean force on Saturday morning. We’d driven down Tortola’s back roads to Josiah’s Bay, in and out of pot holes with the boogie board and Fin stretched out in the back. Heaven! As we got to the surf school’s car park, we slowed. For the first time, there were more than three cars in the car park. And not just a shipping container on the beach with surfboards.. but large marquees too with people milling under them, a group of babies sitting in the sand, bags of prizes on table, 3 huge bottles of champagne. It was the annual BVI surf competition. 

From being a beach with normally no more than ten to twenty people frequenting; this was like rush hour. No slouch in the smell of greenbacks either. Good-looking, British-speaking, money-squirrelling day jobbers were here in force, mixing with the usual beach-bum suspects (here, Miss). And Lulu wanted to compete. 'Sorry, Lu but I’ve only stood up on a board four times. Even that might be optimistic. I don’t think the world is ready to see my face smack repeatedly into the sand.’ Well maybe they are, I thought, but I’m not showing them. Lulu sat next to Steve and did the great tweeny thing. She sulked. Steve looked like he didn’t blame her.

The judges (there were three including an orange t-shirted Icah) sat under a marquee. Next to them I noticed our friends from Newquay, Cornwall; James, Fran and their two kids, Heath and Isla.They’ve been surfing at Josiah’s Bay for the last few weeks. The whole family surfs. Their boy, Heath who is ten, paddles like a steam train and catches waves like a feather. Sure the grown-ups are good but the kid, well it’s something to see. Afterwards he doesn’t smile so much as beams. Loving the wave. For sure, this family was ready-made to join the competition. Perhaps even win it. 

It didn’t take long to see their main competitors; three ladies wearing tropical fruit-patterned bikinis. Each lady seemed to possess her own special talent. The first was power. She surfed like she was carving the wave out herself. The second surfed tall and gracefully. The third lady performed a special brand of surfing yoga. Definitely the first time I’d seen anyone do the downward dog skimming towards the shore. And surfing in-between the best teams were the money-squirrellers. Sure, some did a fine job too but none collectively matched the skills of James, Fran and Heath and the fruity bikini surfers. 

About halfway through the competition, we went for a swim in the part of the beach not reserved for the competition. Walking back, we could see a few others had joined the competition waters; the best part of the beach to surf. It was a competition but it was also a Saturday and a hot one. I made out a kid in a long-sleeved red rash vest. She was paddling hard for the wave, caught it, climbing on a little unsteadily at first and then riding it like a steel wire. Lu. 

Our friends from Newquay were making steady progress. Then a break before the final. The final had the best teams surfing a thirty-minute slot; the three team members required to catch three waves each. Lulu had come out too and was munching on a sandwich. I watched a woman approach her. ‘Would you like to be in the final?’ she asked. Apparently one of their team members was due on a plane to Puerto Rico and wouldn’t be able to compete. The team were redundant without an extra pair of legs. Lu swallowed her sandwich in one large gulp and had her competition t-shirt on before it reached her stomach. She paddled out.

James had plonked his surfboard as a lean-to by the water’s edge and we gathered round. Handy to hide behind. Lu caught her first wave. Rode it. Then the second. Rode that too. She started paddling. Out to sea. 'Where is she going?’ I wondered. She always did like swimming out into open water. The buzzer sounded her time to come in and she heard it. She saw us waving and paddled back, catching up with her third wave and rode it in to the beach. Three waves! I leaned against James’ board. ‘Atta girl.  

Next was our friends’ turn. Of course they would share their final round with their closest rivals; the bikini ladies. James went out first, followed by Fran. Heath the ace at the end. The bikini ladies too, power, grace and yoga surfing finale. The judges sat impassively under the marquee ticking their forms while each surfer rode their waves. Blink of an eye and done. Except for Heath who ripped his way to the beach, taking a seeming fantastic forever, a little sprite on his board. The beach erupted. Wonderful!

We held our breaths for the announcement. The bikini ladies clenched it while James, Fran and Heath came second. Meanwhile, Lulu was awarded a very handsome shawl with the other lady competitors and Delphine pilfered the box of give-away water bottles. Good times. 

Then Icah, who had sat for most of the day judging each competitor, stood up. He joined a group of little kids who had been patiently waiting for a booked surfing birthday party. We watched as he and Steve pushed them to shore, each little person standing up like baby foals on their boards, the odd one hitting the shore for the sand scraping I’ve become so intimate with. Each kid stood up and went back in for another go. Everyone was beaming now. 

Love from Quest and her crew xx