History of Surfing

One of the most exciting water sports is called surfing; this sport allows you to ride on the waves on a board and have fun while doing it. It has its origins in Hawaii and was practiced here before the Hawaiian Islands were discovered.

Captain Cook was one of the first Europeans to reach Hawaii and he was one of the first to come in contact with this sport. He visited Hawaii in his third expedition to the Pacific and he wasn’t sure about what Hawaiians were doing on the ocean every time he watched them going on the waves. He soon discovered that surfing was an important part of the Hawaiian culture. Captain Cook knew after, that surfing was part of the Hawaiian culture. There are many petroglyphs that tell us that surfing in this part of the world actually dates back 1500 years.

With arrival of missionaries from New England to Hawaii, the sport started to decline. These missionaries discouraged the natives from the sport because they deemed it a waste of time. Along with many other Hawaiian native sports, surfing almost became extinct. However, some of the Hawaiian kings, such as David Kalakau, helped to keep it alive.

Surfing was suddenly reborn in 195, when a teenager, Duke Kahanamoku, and his friends started their own surfing club at Waikiki beach. They called their club “the Club of the Waves and they just used to surf together all the time. They became known as the “Beach Boys of Waikiki”. By this time, the influence of the missionaries was not quite as strong, so surfing was not as difficult as it once was. Another important person in the history of surfing was Henry Huntington. He designed a shorter surfboard and introduced surfing to California.

The original surf boards however through the years they were developed to make them lighter. These boards are made of balsa wood and fibreglass and the lightweight feature has helped to improve the popularity of the sport all around the world.

Now surfing is very popular wherever there are high waves. Many tourist destinations advertise their beaches as being great surfing locations. Surfing is popular all over the world and there are many famous surfing competitions. Although the original surfers were men, there are now many women who are doing well in this sport. The first surfer in Australia was a woman named Isabel Letham.