Pacific Passages: An Anthology of Surf Writing

34. Roughing It (1872)

chapter 34 Roughing It (1872) Mark Twain 1835–1910 Mark Twain arrived in Honolulu in 1866 and spent four months writing a series of articles for the Sacramento Union newspaper describing his experiences in the Islands. Twain later added more material to the original letters—including the following account of his attempts at “surfbathing ”—when he collected the letters together and published them as Roughing It. The popular belief that only Hawaiian natives could “master the art of surf-bathing” would not be discredited until the early twentieth century and the founding of the Outrigger Canoe Club at Waikîkî. Honaunau, Hawai‘i July, 186623 In one place we came upon a large company of naked natives, of both sexes and all ages, amusing themselves with the national pastime of surfbathing . Each heathen would paddle three or four hundred yards out to sea (taking a short board with him), then face the shore and wait for a particularly prodigious billow to come along; at the right moment he would fling his board upon its foamy crest and himself upon the board, and here he would come whizzing by like a bombshell! It did not seem that a lightning express train could shoot along at a more hair-lifting speed. I tried surf-bathing once, subsequently, but made a failure of it. I got the board placed right, and at the right moment, too; but missed the connection myself. The board struck the shore in three quarters of a second, without any cargo, and I struck the bottom about the same time, with a couple barrels of water in me. None but natives ever master the art of surfbathing thoroughly. 117 ...