The Coffs Froth Out

Ahh Summertime. As the days grow longer and the ocean gets warmer there is a certain sense of romance that begins to consume you. The surfs are more enjoyable after trading your thick, rubber winter coat for a pair of knee-length boardies and a leg rope tan. When you walk down the street you hear laughter and music from nearly every house and the aromas off BBQ’s fill the air. Like milk and cookies summer tastes better with VONU.

To celebrate the beginning of summer, Harry and Blake from VONU travelled north from Sydney with their home made bars, loaded with a cargo of VONU beers to the playful shores of Coffs Harbour. The boys teamed up with VONU ambassador, Asher Wales, as well as Otis Carey and the Billabong crew to indulge in the fun waves on offer and to celebrate the opening of Otis’s new art show at the Open Studio space titled ‘GAAGAL.’ ‘GAAGAL’ translates to Ocean and is the totemic spiritual emblem of the Gumbaynggirr people, the traditional owners of the land surrounding the coastal areas of Coffs Harbour.

Friday night saw VONU host a party at the Open Studio space, inviting everyone from the community to come and celebrate Otis’s work.

Otis was psyched on the event saying, “Since I first started painting I’ve always wanted to have a show back at home, so it was nice to do that and to have everyone there hanging out.”

The party went long into the night with live music, good food, spicy Bati rum and ice cold Vonus.

The froth out continued into Saturday with the Billabong crew including legends Mark ‘Occy’ Occhilupo and Joel Parkinson taking the local groms down to tear up the waves at Macaulies beach.

Otis said that having the Billabong legends at the event was super special for him and all the local groms. “It was cool seeing guys like Occy and Parko surfing the wave that I grew up at. I would watch them surf on TV back in the day, and literally go to this same beach (Macaulies) and try to replicate it in the surf.”

As a grom, going and surfing your local With the Occ and the whole Billabong team is pretty much as good as it gets. Getting involved with surf communities is an initiative that Billabong has been taking to core surf towns up and down the east coast. Stevie Asmus, one of the brains behind the Billabong team was stoked on the event. “Pretty much the aim of the weekend was to stoke out the whole community and get involved at a grassroots level.”

The way the weekend unfolded from everyone surfing fun beachies together in the day to partying and celebrating at night represents just how strong the surf culture in Australia is. And it is this culture that VONU draws inspiration from and works to give back to.