I was laying in my warm bed listening to the sound of rain crash against my bedroom window. The wind sounded powerful and destructive and I thought for sure I wasn't going to get a text from Ben. After thinking of a hundred excuses just in case I did receive the dreadful message I realized that the wind and the rain had died down quite a lot. Sure enough my phone buzzed, maybe it's to cancel, yeah that has to be it. "We'll be there in a few"-Ben. Nooooooooooo! I can't believe I'm actually getting ready, I just want to stay in my warm cozy bed and sleep for another couple hours. After putting some clothes on I hopped back in bed. What seemed like just minutes later Ben was knocking on my door. "Chris get up, lets go! Pete's waiting in the car." Well, I guess I'm going, I'm definitely not going to punk out. I jumped out of bed, ran down the stairs and grabbed my wetsuit, booties, hoody and rash guard out of the restroom down stairs. I looked at Ben with a smirk and shook my head. "What are we thinking, we're crazy," I shouted. We ran out to the car, I threw my gear in the back seat and hopped in and with no hesitation we were off. The car was nice and warm and I soon realized I was in for a surfing experience of a lifetime as I watched the slate hit the front windshield of Ben's car.

After driving for about 40 minutes we reached our destination, Aramoana Beach, located on the north side of the end of the Otago peninsula. Pete was the first to jump out and run to get a look at the waves, Ben and me hesitated then ran up to where he was. After a few moments of scoping out the surf we all ran back to the car to get ready. Ten minutes later we were running down the beach with our boards, out of excitement to surf as well as trying to stay warm in the 4 degree C temp. The water was a whopping 8 degrees C, Brrrrrrrrrr cold. After saying a quick prayer and doing a few stretches we booked it into the water. Unlike Pete and Ben I have not yet invested in gloves so my hands were the only part of my body not covered in rubber. The first half hour was awesome. All three of us were catching waves and having a blast. We owned the beach apart from one other surfer about a hundred meters down from where we we were. I swear we experienced every type of weather in the 2 hours we were out there. The rain turned to hail, then the sun came out, back to a windy hail storm, then sunny and calm, right back to dark cloudy and rainy. The weather didn't matter though. Apart from getting pelted by some ice rocks and not having feeling in my hands I was so glad I chose to get out of my comfortable bed and go surf in the coldest weather I've have ever surfed in my life.

Psalm 136:1-3
1 Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good. His love endures forever.
2 Give thanks to the God of gods. His love endures forever.
3 Give thanks to the Lord of lords: His love endures forever.