The Shapeshifter

All things surfboards brought to you by the mastermind of design

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Have you ever stopped to wonder just how we all know about surfing in the first place? Did we see surfing for the first time at the beach when as kids our parents took us there? Did we see it on the internet, TV, at the movies or read about it in magazines? Regardless of how you discovered surfing, my point is that surfing was here long before the internet, TV, movies and magazines, but how did it get here? Turns out that surfing likely rode a wave here aboard the same canoes that brought Polynesian voyagers here several hundred years ago. It is an interesting point given that New Zealand was one of the last land masses to be settled on the planet, yet surfing got here long before it got to most other places on the same planet. Looks like surfing got to our shores way before it got to Australia or California for example, surfing got here straight from the source via express canoe! Import number one.

Depending on which version of history you read, our land of the long white cloud was already host to several other groups of inhabitants. The fact that those aboard the migration canoes may have had to contend with other peoples, a colder climate, and the need to find food and shelter probably put their surfing time on hold. Even so research reveals that Maori did in fact enjoy surfing around our coastlines and particularly in Taranaki. Written accounts by European settlers document Maori surf riders in the 1800s.

The next wave of surf-related importation (in 1915) was also Polynesian and direct from the source. Hawaiian Olympic Gold medallist swimmer and surfer Duke Kahanamoku gave surfing demonstrations in Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch and Dunedin and drew some big crowds sometimes amounting to thousands of onlookers.