I came to Goa for yoga. One month with a teacher, properly, daily, with intention. No surf trip. No swell windows. But I’m a surfer, and I’d heard there were waves somewhere along that coastline, so I couldn’t help but be curious. I didn’t bring my shortboard though. People had told me it wasn’t worth it. So I arrived open, boardless and ready to be surprised.
Mandrem, Goa.
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The board
After a few days of seeing nothing but foamies, I found it. A 9’6” single fin, shaped locally by an Indian shaper. The kind of craftsmanship you feel the moment you pick it up. From the very first paddle, it generated speed in a way that surprised me surfing for the first time such a big board but also on those small waves.
I’m a shortboarder. I create speed, I pump, I generate momentum. On this board, none of that was the game. The speed came on its own. And that was promising to be fun !
The board and I.
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What the waves were actually like
Small. The biggest swell of the whole month barely stood out. Lots of closeouts, short rides, the kind of waves that would frustrate you if you’d flown across the world specifically to surf them. I hadn’t. So they were fine. More than fine, actually.
Some days were genuinely good. Not Indo good but good in their own right. There was something freeing about surfing with zero expectations. Nobody performing. Nobody watching the horizon with that tense, predatory focus you see at better breaks. Couple of people were just in the water.
Goa in March is the tail end of the season. Best months for surf are November to February. March still works, especially if you’re not there only for the waves.
Not me, obviously :)… Just a surfer in Mandrem, Goa. This is the kind of wave !
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The learning curve
Days 1 to 3: finding the position. Not too far forward, not too far back. The board punishes every small imbalance.
Week 2: understanding the trim. How the board wants to move, not how I want to make it move.
Week 3-4: cross-stepping. One step, just to the middle of the board. Finding my balance.
Week 5: either walking back or trying a second cross step.
A lot of people think longboarding is easy. It’s a technique entirely its own. It took me a month of daily surfing just to begin understanding it.
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The thing about not having a choice
Sometimes the best things happen when you’re not given an option. I love my shortboard. I’d choose it every time if the waves were there. But in Goa, in March, with those small beachbreak sections, the shortboard wasn’t the answer. The log was. And because there was no internal debate, I just surfed.
Slowly, over days, something shifted. I stopped thinking about the waves being small. I stopped comparing anything to Indonesia, to Sri Lanka, to the last good trip. I was just trimming across a one-foot section and loving it completely.
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Yoga, India and the ocean as escape
Early mornings on the mat, mid-mornings in the water. A month of that rhythm, discipline and freedom, stillness and surf, turned out to be exactly what I needed without knowing I needed it.
The ocean in India has a particular quality. Warm, yes, but also forgiving. Nobody judging anything. There was joy in the lineup that didn’t depend on the swell. I found myself paddling out even on the flat days, just to have that getaway from the city, from the noise, from everything that isn’t the ocean.
Goa is not on the surf map the way Indonesia or Sri Lanka is. And that’s fine. It doesn’t need to be. What it offers is something different: the possibility of surfing in a country you’d never have expected, on a board you didn’t know you needed, in waves that teach you to stay present because there’s simply no other option.
Not the best waves ever. Still good. Still worth every paddle.
The vibe in Goa.
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