Craving to skate: Sessioning with Jeffreys Bay’s skateboarding underground
Known as one of the best surf spots in the world, ‘J-Bay’ in the Eastern Cape is also home to a tight, hardcore crew of local skateboarders, all unsponsored, who skate its sketchy street spots and single local skate park, simply for pure love of skateboarding.
Words by bluntEd. Photos Tim Moolman, Fujifilm X.
Surf adjacent, and with a large population of surfers, skateboarding has been around in one form or another in J-Bay for decades. Its single skate park, the Element skate park, has been there since the early 2000s and for many years there was a sick bowl inside their warehouse (a skate sanctuary in shit weather, it is now sadly now no more – shout out to Dave Allan).
But once you weed out the surfers on no-surf days, hill bombers, surf skaters, little kids and posers, there is only a handful of local hardcore skateboarders who call J-Bay home. A few hardy skate souls, who brave this surf town’s unpredictable wind and weather, chunky street spots, Karens, busts and crusty metal skate park (and a new mysterious driveway concrete set up) to go out and play on the little wooden toy.
“We are hoping we can unlock funding to be able to have a world class park here to supplement the fantastic waves, it could be a great tourism drawcard. My hope is that we can create a community park with a pump track and some bowls that could breed a new crew of rippers in and out of the water.”- J-bay ‘rad dad’ and skate park activist, Garth Robinson.
Dedicated skateboarding soldiers, these guys skate for the pure love of it, with no sponsors, media hype, or groupies. They embody the typical spirit of the small town skater in South Africa. Introducing Adriaan Van Deventer, Ruben Oosthuizen, Barend Roche and Jerry Van Wyk, who all have their own approach and skate style – and their own take on what it’s like to be a skateboarder in J-Bay. (Shout out also to local ripper Tristan Wait, who we missed for this feature – next time bro).
No to forget J-Bay surfer and ‘rad dad’ Garth Robinson, whose son Fin is a local young skate ripper, is also leading the push to get a public skatepark built in the town.
“I put a proposal together with some ideas and over a thousand signatures and have delivered it to the local Kouga Municipality,” says Garth, “and I am now awaiting a meeting to discuss it further. We are hoping we can unlock funding to be able to have a world class park here to supplement the fantastic waves, it could be a great tourism drawcard. My hope is that we can create a community park with a pump track and some bowls that could breed a new crew of rippers in and out of the water.”
Big up to all the skaters of J-Bay, no matter what or where you ride, keep on shreddin’.
Featured Jeffreys Bay Skateboarders (Q&A Interviews below):
Name: Adriaan Van Deventer
Age: 23
Stance: Regular
Sponsors: None
Favourite tricks: Frontside grinds, anything with air time.
Favourite terrain: Bowls
Favourite skaters: Milton Martinez, Eddie “El-Gato” Elguera, Pedro Barros.
Name: Ruben Oosthuizen
Age: 24
Stance: Regular
Sponsors: None
Favourite tricks: Laser flip, nollie bs flip any no-comply.
Favourite terrain: Street/park
Favourite skaters: Brandon Westgate, Louie Lopez and Miles Silvas.
Name: Barend Roche (B-Man)
Age: 28
Stance: Goofy
Sponsors: Goodtimez
Favourite tricks: Backside flip, nose mannys, frontside noseslide, no complys and fast fakie ollies
Favourite terrain: Street
Favourite skaters: Ryan Towley, Dan van Der linde, Alan Marola, Christi Wiehahn and JP du Preez.
Name: Jerry van Wyk
Age: 25
Stance: Goofy
Sponsors: No sponsors
Favourite tricks: Backside 360, 360 shuvit
Favourite terrain: Street but not really street spots in J-Bay. So I just skate the park often
Favourite skaters: Ishod Wair, Mason Silva, Evan Smith.
Jeffreys Bay Skateboarder Q&As
blunt: What’s life like as a skateboarder in J-Bay? What rules and sucks the most about it?
Adriaan: Chilled, as you’d expect. Easy to grab your board and go, but you often end up skating alone. It helps that everything is close together. Unfortunately, the weather is one of the biggest factors here.
Ruben: Very relaxed, it consists of either skating park or skating a few street spots with the homies. Never overcrowded and for the most part people let you do your thing. The wind is by far the worst thing, especially if you’re craving to skate.
Barend: Very chilled out and friendly skate scene. It’s fairly small which gives it special family vibes. The street terrain is super rough but can also be rewarding if you land something. Not many street spots, all the good hills are mostly main roads but if you catch it at a good time it’s super fun to bomb. Also the fact that the skate park is only open till 17:00 on weekdays and 15:00 on weekends makes it hard to go skate if you’re part of the rat race. Sometimes I can struggle to get a spot to skate after work.
blunt: What’s the Element Park like?
Adriaan: Inviting with a flow challenge. You have to get creative. But it’s not hard to find something new to try.
Ruben: I love it. It being the park where I have spent 90% of my time skating I suppose I would say that.
Barend: It’s super fun and is easy for all levels, pretty much an obstacle for everyone, it’s got a nice mixture of street and transition obstacles. The locals are very friendly and respectful. The park never really gets over packed which is really rad as you always get a section to skate. Only disadvantage is that it’s on top of a roof so it gets a lot of wind. Also the ramps are old but still very shreddable.
Jerry: The park is fun to skate. Different obstacles would be nice.
“J-Bay has a chilled out and friendly skate scene. It’s fairly small which gives it special family vibes. The street terrain is super rough but can also be rewarding if you land something. Not many street spots, all the good hills are mostly main roads but if you catch it at a good time it’s super fun to bomb. Also the fact that the skate park is only open till 17:00 on weekdays and 15:00 on weekends makes it hard to go skate if you’re part of the rat race.”- J-bay skateboarder, Barend ‘B-Man’ Roche.
blunt: Are there lots of young kids that skate?
Adriaan: Lots of kids on boards, yes. With the influence of major surf culture in J-Bay, every kid has a board somewhere. Most kids around here know how to skate, but only a few are interested in getting better.
Ruben: Less than expected but it goes through stages and with some the passion sticks.
Barend: Well more teenagers than kids. There is a cool bunch of homies that’s pretty much the skate scene in J-Bay all between 16 and early 20s. Not really that many kids that are locals.
Jerry: There are not a lot of kids that skate.
blunt: Are there many street spots? Are they chunked out or a bust?
Adriaan: A lot more have popped up recently as they’re redoing most of our roads. But it’s still tough to find something around every corner. A lot of rough pavements and cobble.
Ruben: There are a select few which are always fun to skate without a bust. It being J-Bay you can get away with a bit more here, however it’s what you make of them.
Barend: That’s kind of arguable, there actually some really cool street spots but really rough brick pavement for pretty much all of them, so it really depends on what type if skater you are or how much you feel like skating, I hardly go skate the park in the week because it closes at 17:00 which really sucks for the working class skaters, so I’m forced to mostly find spot in the industrial area or the beachfront; there are some gnarly sets and banks, but not anything smooth pretty much in the whole of J-Bay, only some of the roads are freshly tarred, which is also a vibe. We recently discovered a really fun ditch but can’t say where it is – people will probably find it close to their mom’s house and somewhere on the way to Durban.
Jerry: There aren’t really any street spots in J-Bay. The guys just tryna skate what we see here.
blunt: Do you see many other skaters? Do you travel around or do you see outside skaters in town?
Adriaan: Not too many skaters pull through, locals only. The holiday season can get crowded though. Port Elizabeth has some insane spots, and it’s close by – travelling to PE is easy. Other than that, Cape Town. Love the scene there.
Ruben: Mostly the local skaters. I often mission to PE and skate there or even the Cape. Outside skaters basically only come through in the holiday seasons.
Barend: Not so much in J-Bay, we have a very small skate community compared to my hometown, there a lot of skaters just passing by on the weekends as J-Bay is a holiday town and maybe never see them again. I do travel a lot but don’t always find skaters except for at the parks I suppose, go skate PE park when ever I get to that side of the world, it’s normally quite busy.
Jerry: Not many outside skaters come through the town or if they do, sometimes I’m not around. I’ve travelled to Cape Town a few times and Durban and skated a bit in Europe.
“There are lots of kids on boards here, yes. With the influence of major surf culture in J-Bay, every kid has a board somewhere. Most kids around here know how to skate, but only a few are interested in getting better.” – Adriaan Van Deventer, J-Bay skateboarder.
blunt: If you could pick anywhere in the world where would you like to go and skate?
Adriaan: Brazil, Floripa, Pedro Barros’ back yard.
Ruben: United States.
Barend: I know it’s probably so predictable to say, but definitely Barcelona and we all know why.
Jerry: I’ll skate anywhere in Europe for sure.
blunt: What’s the one thing that could happen to make J-Bay a better place to be a skateboarder?
Adriaan: A proper skate shop.
Ruben: Another park or bowl. Most DIY spots get taken down and street spots are limited.
Barend: More hype at the park I suppose, maybe a bit of a revamp and have some competitions going every once in a while, that will help the scene, as the park is normally the place for us to link up but for me, I’ll say if the municipality can just do their jobs and fix the pavements in J-Bay, the roads are really bad and have not really been maintained in the last 10 years or even longer.
Jerry: They should make J-Bay more skateboard friendly.
blunt: What should we watch out for in J-bay? Good or bad.
Adriaan: Wind forecast.
Ruben: Challenging Jerry to a game of skate.
Barend: J-Bay is pretty chilled all around, hard to find street spots sometimes. Good things: there’s a smooth parking lot at point surf break that’s got lights so it’s cool for night sessions. There has been a rumour that the park is going to get a revamp sometime soon but it’s still just words.
Jerry: We are trying to get a few kids into skateboarding. So hopefully we’ll discover some new talent.
blunt: Any final words?
Adriaan: Dankie, Pa en Ma.
Ruben: Shout out to all the local J-Bay skaters.
Barend: Just have fun and always be humble.
Jerry: Skate because you love it. Not because you wanna be cool.
Garth Robinson interview below photo gallery.
Photo Gallery (all photos by Tim Moolman, Fujifilm X):
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Q&A with Garth Robinson (local surfer, old school skater, rad dad to young skater Fin), who is trying to get a public skatepark in Jeffreys Bay.
Tell us a bit about your own history with skating?
I used to skate a lot as a grom growing up at Warner Beach on the South Coast. We skated to the beach to go surf and cruised wherever and whatever terrain we could, starting with flat ground, empty pools and then we finally built some half pipes in the garden. Got more into it living in London, being landlocked, until I broke my wrist on the vert ramp at the Sony PlayStation park. Then a long hiatus until my son Fin started getting into skating and so here I am again having my second childhood and trying not to hurt myself too much. Kids today should be more inclined to use their pads, helmets and especially wrist guards, otherwise arthritis and joint pain on cold days will await them one day… but they say it ain’t steezy.
What obstacles do you think skateboarders face in J-Bay?
The big one is a lack of decent skateable terrain. The Element Skate Park is pretty worn out and sketchy, lots of rusted metal and rough concrete, it scares me. The town offers mainly tar and paving setups, and any DIY work done to improve spots generally encounters Karens living nearby that don’t want skaters ruining their Sunday naps. Lots of Karens here! But loads of families and kids are living here too nowadays, so we desperately need facilities for the youth.
You started a petition to get a public concrete skatepark in J-Bay, how did that go? What was the local reception like and what do you think needs to be done to make this happen?
The reception was great, and not only from locals, but also lots of inland and overseas support. I put a proposal together with some ideas and over a thousand signatures and have delivered it to the local Kouga Municipality, and I am now awaiting a meeting to discuss it further. Hoping we can unlock funding to be able to have a world class park here to supplement the fantastic waves, it could be a great tourism drawcard.
Do you think a concrete park in J-bay will be popular? A lot of surfers skate, especially transitions, so some kind of bowl / snake run or pump track element would be well used no doubt, perhaps even attract more visitors to the town?
There are tons of kids here now, most surf or skate or both. There are a lot of cruisers as we have some decent smooth tar roads, but most are street skaters. The surf/skate overlap is obvious here, when it is flat we skate, if there are waves we surf, so a pump track would be great. The local surfing conditions produce talented kids who, like Matt MacGillivray and Joshe Faulkner, could go onto the world stage. My hope is that we can create a community park with a pump track and some bowls that could breed a new crew of rippers in and out of the water.
Apart from a public park, what else do you think could, should be done to grow skateboarding in the Kouga area?
Presently the skate scene here is quite fractured, you have different cliques into their own thing, riding their own chosen spots. I would like to see more events that bring the various skate disciplines together to induce more of a skate community that can then use their combined efforts to grow the scene. Combining downhill, street and transition events with some fun and getting everyone out there together would be epic. If there could be someone here who can rise to the top of the game, it would inspire others living here to go for it.
Any other last words?
Stoked that we have a skateboarding photographer of Tim Moolman’s high calibre living here now, and look forward to the skate scene here going from strength to strength. as we all forge ahead with our dreams while being lucky enough to live in this amazing place.