Wayward by Chris Burkard

Author:Chris Burkard
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Abrams
Published: 2021-11-23T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER

7

RUSSIA → 2012 to 2013

My time in Norway erased whatever doubt I had left about whether the trips I was taking were worth it or not. The images and stories from our time there appeared everywhere from Patagonia’s wetsuit catalog to Yahoo! News’s trending stories. The issue of Surfer magazine that featured our Norway adventure was one of the bestselling issues ever. Norway cemented my place in the early cold-water surf movement, and my expeditions were becoming a signature of sorts, opening new doors—including opportunities to do bigger and bolder trips.

This coincided with the birth of my first child in 2012, and I now had an entirely new set of responsibilities at home. While I wanted to be involved and present every second of my son’s earliest years, my wife and I both understood these trips nourished me. I even believed—and still do believe—they made me a better father and husband. In fact, the recent memory of Norway was like a beacon in the storm. I had a need, almost a compulsion, to document the beauty and joys found in nature. Solace was waiting for me in the wild places on this planet. Solace and clarity. Even though I knew part of me was running away by returning to life on the road, I also knew it was the only way that I could find clarity. My wife and I agreed we would figure out how to fit my trips into our lives.

Ever since my first dicey visit to Vladivostok in 2009, I had been craving a Russian redo. Russia was unfinished business, and I wanted to redeem myself. But this time I had my sights set on the Kamchatka Peninsula, nine time zones from Moscow and across the Sea of Okhotsk. Kamchatka held the promise of more wilderness, fewer people, and hopefully more waves.

Ben Weiland and I had been studying the landmass through online forums and Google Earth for years. Satellite images of the serrated eastern coastline fronting the Pacific showed broad bays that stretched for miles, interspersed with smaller coves cut between headlands that stab the sea in every direction. Plus, we could tell that the peninsula’s interior, which borders Siberia, was dotted with swirling pinches of uplift—massive volcanoes—many of which are active and would help create some otherworldly photo backdrops. We saw endless possibilities.

We also knew that Tom Curren and Brian Toth had scored waves somewhere on the conch shell–shaped peninsula in the early 2000s with Australian photographer Ted Grambeau. Trips instantly became an easier sell once we knew there were pioneers who had succeeded before us.

Kamchatka is a northern link in the Ring of Fire, one of the most volcanic regions on the planet. Somehow, an abundant array of wildlife has managed to survive in Kamchatka’s explosive ecosystem, from otters and eagles to a quarter of all wild Pacific salmon, as well as one of the world’s largest populations of oversized brown bears that consume them.

Surfers, however, were not so plentiful. Kamchatka was not cheap or

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