After spending the last ten years traveling the world for contests and photo shoots, pro surfer Holly Beck will combine her passions for surfing, yoga, and inspiring others to present a unique opportunity for female surfers. Ladies of all ages and surfing abilities will be invited to travel to surf uncrowded waves in warm water while receiving professional-quality coaching and friendly encouragement from one of the icons of the sport.
Suave Dulce Women’s Surf and Yoga Retreat will initially be based in a beautiful beachfront home in Nicaragua, but will eventually offer multiple locations throughout Central America and further abroad. Guests will spend time surfing, practicing yoga, eating deliciously healthy cuisine, and also be presented with opportunities to interact with and positively impact the lives of local community members. Beck is partnering with several non-profits already at work within the country to allow visitors the chance to make their vacation more meaningful by doing some good and sharing smiles. Some possible projects include making art and music with local school children, bringing lunches to the poor kids that live at the dump, building water purification systems, and planting trees.
Another main difference between Suave Dulce and other camps is the experience and abilities of the founder. Unlike other women’s surf camps where the instructors and guides are often only intermediate surfers themselves, guests at Suave Dulce will be coached exclusively by professional surfers including Holly Beck and her friends.
“The thing I miss most about doing the tour is going surfing with my friends, who happen to be some of the best female surfers in the world. I’m really excited to have this opportunity to bring them down to Nicaragua to surf great waves in warm water and help me inspire other ladies to achieve their goals in surfing while also having a positive impact on the local community,” said Beck.
Let me introduce you to my little friend. This is my Rusty 5’4″ Dwart. It’s full dimensions are 5’4″ x 19.85 x 2.05. It has four fins, and it likes to fly.
I didn’t always like quads. I thought they were fast, but for some reason I didn’t like the way they felt when hitting lip. A solid off the top on a quad didn’t feel like it had the same satisfying *smack* that I would get from a thruster. Now that i’ve gotten used to the feeling of the quad, the speed and looseness has more than made up for anything I used to think was lacking.
It’s a perfect small wave board, but lately i’ve been riding it in hollow waves too. The short little board can take off so late and just drop straight into the tube. Unfortunately I don’t have any photos of this yet. But hopefully i’ll be posting a few soon. Thanks to Chris Grant at Jetty Girl for these awesome photos. And check out Rusty Surfboards to order your own super flying Dwart!
The first time we ventured to the North, fell in love with the place, and bought our lot, there was a cute little puppy hanging out at the hotel named Ducha. She was so precious and I spent as much time as possible holding and hanging out with her.
On successive trips I was always excited to see her, and she was excited to see us too. By the time our house was built and we moved in for six weeks in May/June of 2009, she started hanging out at our house every day. Technically she belongs to the hotel nearby but we fed her and loved her, so she spent as much time as she was allowed at our place.
We spent those six weeks feeding her, went home for 5 weeks, then returned to Nica for another three. By September Ducha was the best fed and therefore best looking dog around, nice and filled out with a shiny coat and a springy step. We werent’ the only ones who thought so. By the time we returned in November, she was pregnant!
We were a little sad she was knocked up because she looked unhealthy. Her fur was falling out in places, she had no energy, and her usual spunk was missing. We cared for her of course, and tried to feed her as much as we could to give her energy to have her pups. We heard that the last time she had puppies, she had almost died. We were worried.
The caretaker at the hotel Chevello promised to look after her. He had been there the last time she gave birth and said he actually had to reach in and pull out one of the puppies that was stuck. I trusted him completely and knew she would be in good hands.
I also really wanted to be there. I had to leave on the 19th to be in Fiji by the 21st for a photo trip, and asked Chevello when he thought she would have them. He said either the 19th or the 20th. I hoped for the 19th, and my hopes paid off. I was all packed up and dressed for the airport when Chevello came and told me that i’d gotten my wish. We rushed over to his house to see the beautiful 5 hour old puppies, all six of them.
Ducha was tired of course, but we brought her food and she wagged her tail at us happily then stood aside to show off her babies. I had never seen puppies so young and was so upset that I had to leave and get on a plane. Chevello promised that he would take good care of her and them. Ryan and I picked out two puppies that we would keep. The little brown one that i’m holding and the little gray one. Chevello would also keep two and the other two would go to the hotel.
All that was back in November. It’s February now and while I thought I would have been back to Nica in January, I still haven’t been able to make it down there. My friend Joe just returned from a trip and sent these photos of our two pups.
The photos make me happy but also so sad to not be down there playing with these guys.
He also sent a shot of Ducha and one of her puppies that now lives at the hot
Between mid October 2009 and mid January 2010 I didn’t spend more than five consecutive days in my own bed. Sometimes only two nights at home separated a couple of three week long adventures. Sharks in Mexico, well-pumping in Nicaragua, waterfall climbing in Fiji, the holidays in Baja, posing in Panama. It was amazing. But it was exhausting.
photo: Randy Ruby
By February, the best winter for surf in So Cal since i’ve been a surfer was going full steam. Back to back to back long period swells, days and days of pouring rain. At one point I just stood in the kitchen, stepped away from the sink with a soapy plate in my hand, and stared at the rain pounding the earth in a sudden drenching for the fourth or fifth time that day.
photo: Mike Balzer
It feels good to be home. I wake up at 5:30 and my boyfriend brings me a cup of strong coffee to sip while I geek out on the internet until it starts to get light. I use a fit ball as my computer chair and every ten minutes or so I roll backwards to glance out the window, checking the flag for wind direction and strength.
Black turns gray and I pull on a beanie knit by my sister, grab my Sector 9 and skate a few blocks to the beach. If it looks good I’m pulling on my 4/3 Vapor and booties, grabbing a Cliff bar to eat while running back down, sneaking under a fence, and trying to block out the ice cream headaches to get a few empty waves before the sun brings the crowd.
It’s not always great out front. The waves are exciting but short. A quick little view then a sandbar slamming. But I like not having to get in the car to get there. No parking meter conversations. Running back home to take my wetsuit off under a hot shower.
photo: Dave Hall
Sometimes the afternoon will inspire me to take a long walk down the beach to an overly-crowded rocky point. I’ve been surfing there since I was 17. The first time I surfed it my high school boyfriend got sent in by a scary local. In a surfing magazine interview from over a decade ago I called it my favorite spot.
I list a different spot in interviews now, and that scary local from long ago is now a friend. I remember a time when beginners and kids stuck to the inside, the shoulder, or didn’t show up at all. Priority in the lineup was based on dedication to the spot as much as surfing ability, and if the main guys in the lineup didn’t know your name you wouldn’t even think of paddling for a set wave. I wish it was still like that. I travel all over the world, sit on the shoulder, take the scraps, bow down to the locals. When I’m at home I take set waves.
It’s been about a month now, the longest i’ve been in one place since September. I’m starting to get antsy. I’m ready to get back into warm water. I want to see the puppies that were born in Nicaragua the night before I had to leave. I’m looking forward to getting my hands on that well pump. There’s been a serious drought down there this year and a lot of wells nearby are dry. I’ve heard mine still has water, but I want to see it for myself.
photo: Mike Balzer
One more month of photo shoots and meetings in California and Taiwan and i’ll get my chance. I always seem to be counting days….
Twenty hours from Ensenada on a boat that rocked ceaselessly, so that even friends who grew up on boats and claimed they’d never been seasick were green, we awoke to a cold sunrise that set rugged vertical brown cliffs aflame in gold.
Waking up to the sight of the barren rocky cliffs of Guadalupe Island, I was shaking with excitement. I was about to be in open water with Great Whites!!!!!
Coated from neck to toe in thick rubber, 7mm dive suit, 5mm booties, gloves, but no hood (wouldn’t look as good in the video), we climbed into cages just big enough for five of us to stand shoulder to shoulder. Something like eight feet long by four feet wide by ten feet high, made of smoothly rounded steel bars, a three foot square trap door in the roof and a metal ladder that allowed access to the open top deck.
Super stoked on my dive buddy Jenna Meistrell!
With a hookah regulator in mouth and weight belt on waist, we are dropped to forty feet like bait in a cage. A small burlap bag of fish parts turns the immediate vicinity blood red when shaken or kicked with a “thunk, thunk, thunk.” Our eyes, searching the deep blue emptiness for shadows. An insistent tap on my shoulder and I turn around to see Jenna pointing into the distance off the corner and all of us cram to that side, eyes wide, as the outline takes shape. A fifteen-foot female great white shark.
Photo: Bernie Campoli
She swims closer, casually. Slowly. Tail graceful and strong, waving side to side propelling her towards us. Mouth relaxed, just open enough to hint at rows of pearly daggers. She passes and disappears.
“Shit, where’d she go?” Searching. Split up to the four directions, and one looking down below. Desperately shadow hunting as our hearts race.
I hop to reach the bottom of the ladder, just slightly negatively buoyant, and pull myself along its rungs ‘til I’m standing. There’s a single waist-level railing along three sides, the fourth totally open. I stand there on top of the cage, my toes hanging over the edge of the fourth unprotected side and soak in the adrenaline. I’m open and exposed in great white shark filled waters.
The initial sensation of delicious danger fades into the emptiness and I try to catch the silvery fish that swim past in a school with my gloved hands. They’re too fast and while the water temp is about 65 and I’m coated in a thick wetsuit, without moving around the cold slowly seeps in. Arms crossed tightly for warmth, I straddle the railing, gripping with my legs as the current and stormy surface above jostle the cage.
Suddenly there’s movement in the cage below. Everyone crowding to one corner, pointing, and I look in that direction. There she is again. She comes from below this time, swimming at an angle up along the cage to pass not more than three feet from me. I could reach out and touch her. Give her a friendly stroke her as she passes. Her big eye close and clear, showing intelligence, curiosity, and confidence. Not one hint of aggression. I’m there within easy striking distance, open and unprotected, but she makes no move to harm me. Just looks. Then keeps on swimming.
Photo: Bernie Campoli
I feel like Timothy Treadwell aka Grizzly Man. There’s a quick moment of almost fear as she comes so close and then intense respect and love as she keeps going. I’m not afraid of being eaten. Even less so now. There are so many ways to die, car crash, plane crash, earthquake, drowning, illness. I wouldn’t mind going by shark bite, becoming nourishment for something so awesome.
Jenna Meistrell, Scott Smith, and I with a couple of the crew of the Nautilus Explorer.
Looking for sharks with dive legend and Body Glove founder Bob Meistrell
For a couple videos I made from the experience, click here:
I like spending ten days in the same pair of jeans. Wiping the knife on my thigh and calling it clean. Getting a solid ten hours nightly – plenty of time to dream.
I like big smooth cobblestones covering the beach. Building fire pits and wind blocks and props for my sore feet.
I like Christmas without presents spent around a campfire. Appreciating that what I have now is all I desire.
I like surfing a wave that goes on forever. Leg burn and arms tired and still more un ridden, paddling back to the top of the pack to be called by name into another without looking back.
I like sand dunes with a line of footsteps and hidden pools of shells. Cacti, and desert emptiness, and myths of danger dispelled.
I like a beanie instead of a hairbrush and no need for a shower. My hair smelling of wood smoke and sea salt instead of a flower.
I like the friends that I met that like these things too. Beach fried turkey, baked brownies, and foraged clams with chanterelles stew.
I like the light of a big blue moon. The Ultimate Warrior waiting his turn, and sea shanties told as the party balls burn.
It was a magical setting that you would not believe. I like partying with pirates on New Years Eve.
I don’t own a full-length mirror. It was one of the first things I gave away after deciding to radically downsize my “stuff” in preparation to move to Nicaragua. Down in Nica, my house doesn’t have a mirror at all. Not even in the bathroom. If I decide I need to see what I look like, I’ve got to go sneak a peek in the car window reflection or twist my head to check out my mug in the side view mirror. I do own a few sticks of mascara and a tube or two of lip gloss, but their application is reserved for auditions exclusively. Otherwise, I never wear makeup.
Shoveling manure for fertilizer and relaxing with a cold beer and dirty injured bare feet at my other home in Nicaragua.
I prefer to allow my feet to be rough, tough, and naked. I bite my nails. My body is covered in an increasing number of scars from impacts with surfboards, tropical reefs, and suburban pavement. I’ve never had a manicure or pedicure. My boyfriend cuts my hair with a pair of kitchen scissors. I buy organic, and love a salad made from the garden, but basically I eat whatever I want in large quantities. Fortunately, I have good genes, plus a serious adrenaline addiction that keeps me active enough to burn through an almost-daily enormous burrito prefaced by chips and salsa.
I’m not a model. And yet, for some reason, people keep asking me to pose as one.
It started when I was only sixteen, in Cabo, on a trip with Rusty Surfboards. Through a random series of events I found myself the scabby-kneed, boardshort-tanned, totally clueless, un-self-confident surfer amongst a trio of gorgeous, manicured, dyed and bleached, tanning-bedded, food-conscious models. I survived, and was rewarded with a photo of me in a red bikini holding a surfboard that appeared in numerous magazines and a surfboard sponsorship that has lasted twelve years and counting.
The photo that started it all (above) was on this magazine cover, in a Rusty ad in Surfer and Surfing mags and used on Rusty products like school notebooks.
Since then I’ve been on surfing and fitness magazine covers, and learned the subtle and seemingly hypocritical art of ignoring the camera while being conscious of it. I’m well accustomed to walking back and forth, laughing on cue, and staring into the sun without blinking. It’s not really that exciting. I don’t particularly like it. It’s surprisingly exhausting and I’d really rather be surfing. But we all have to “work” sometimes.
Like everything in life, it’s all about the people. If the photographers, stylists, and assistants are supportive, communicative, and sharing positive energy, it makes all the difference in the world. If you feel comfortable in the clothing, even better. If those factors are present and the posing involves a physical challenge then I can say I am actually having fun.
I love photo shoots that involve a challenge. I’ll scuba dive with sharks, climb waterfalls, bomb hills on a skateboard, whatever. Give me a physical challenge and have the camera ready!
On my way home from a quick trip to Bocas Del Toro, Panama for a catalog shoot for Athleta I almost wish the shoot was lasting another week. We woke up at 4:30am daily to begin the process of having tangles removed and replaced with curlers. Faces and eyes coated in powdered color. We changed outfits every twenty minutes and were asked to wear sandals constantly, even on the sand. I had a stylist’s hand inside my bikini top and bottoms, constantly adjusting everything. My retinas were repeatedly burned while staring into the sun. I laughed and laughed and laughed at absolutely nothing whenever the photographer asked, which I guess was pretty funny. Sometimes it was a million degrees in the shade and sometimes we had to fight to keep the shivers from taking over. I was reminded of the aboriginal belief that a camera will steal your soul, and while I didn’t feel particularly soul-full, neither did I feel completely soul-less.
Pre-sunrise makeup and curlers.
It rained. The boat broke down. We nearly capsized in big storm surf. I rode a piece-of-crap skateboard switch-stance on a roughly paved road strewn with deadly gravel while carrying a surfboard and looking over my shoulder laughing. I carried an open umbrella while riding a bicycle and posed as a hippy in a hostel while the real hippies ate pork and beans out of a can and stared. I passed up stand-up left tubes at a reef around the corner to pose on a longboard in mushy two footers. BUT by the end, while you might think I’d be desperate and relieved to hop on a plane and jet back to my normal life of pro surfing, I actually felt reluctant to leave.
This is how I felt when I finally got to go surfing!
The large group of people assembled by Athleta and our hosts at Tranquilo Bay were interesting, intelligent, entertaining, and there was not nearly enough time to spend getting to know them all. Despite my momentary feelings to the contrary, it was a lot of fun and I am hopeful that I’ll be invited back on the next shoot.
In November 2009, I spent an incredible ten days on the Tui Tai exploring the Northern Fijian atolls. We had so many adventures that I scored a ton of footage and epic photos that I haven’t even finished getting through. Here are a few of the highlights. For your own adventure, check out the Tui Tai!
When I tell people that we’re moving to Nicaragua in Spring the most common response is, “permanently?” What is “permanently”? We’re going and we’ll stay until it doesn’t seem like the right place to be anymore. This photo pretty much sums up perfectly why I love this place more than any other. Afternoon, after surfing, after chores, hanging out in the grass barefoot, shirtless, drinking mojitos made with Flor de Cana the Nicaraguan rum and fresh mint from the garden, while Ducha the dog we love hangs out at our feet. This is the Nica lifestyle.
Of course there’s plenty of work involved. Nearly every chore (including showering and flushing the toilet) begins with raising water forty feet by hand. It’s an excellent workout and it feels good mentally, physically, and spiritually.
It also makes me incredibly water conscious. Spilling water becomes a serious bummer. Our love of the place started in the surf. My 5’6″ Rusty quad is perfect for the hollow waves out front. It slides into the tube. We can see the ocean, the tops of waves, but can’t properly check the surf from the lot. Ryan scrambled up onto the gate to get a better view. That’s the new caretaker’s house behind him.
You know you’re in Nicaragua when two cases of Tonas equals a computer desk.
Nicaraguans don’t do salsa like Mexicans despite having all the ingredients readily available so I make salsa myself, daily.
Farm boy, watering trees. The chile garden is exploding in spicy color.
Basil grows really well down here.
This is Ryan planting flowers in the caretaker’s planter box. Curb appeal! Our caretaker Osmar shows up most afternoons to lend a hand.
Right at this moment, sitting hurts. I lean against the wall, both legs flat out on the sun bleached wooden walkway, toes just slightly hanging over the edge, but leaning perceptibly to the left. My right butt cheek is bruised like it hasn’t been in quite some time and so I enjoy this rare moment of repose balanced carefully between relaxed pleasure and excitement-numbing pain.
It was a rock that started it. A large black stone worn smooth by the constant flow of falling fresh water lurking beneath the water flow to slow my descent and give me something with which to physically remember the river. We stepped off the boat to find a fleet of mountain bikes perched on seats and hand grips just begging for a workout. Naturally we obliged their wishes, flipping over, hopping on, and pedaling away up a steeply paved road to a monument celebrating the crossing of the International Date Line.
Jenni Flanigan, Kaley Swift, and I, goofing around somewhere between today and tomorrow.
Back on the bikes, back down the hill, giddily savoring the first scent of adrenaline in an at least a week, particularly after noticing my back wheel breaks were all but inoperable. Turned a corner then up a steep dirt track with loose stones and sand that caused my back tire to spin uselessly despite my focused effort. Finally at the top we ditched the bikes in the thick bushes and followed a trail along a river as it wound through alternating pools and falls. Our guide vaguely gestured up river describing waterfalls that could double as waterslides allowing us to glide down the smooth worn stones.
I took off eagerly, barefoot, in just bikini top and boardshorts, to take part in one of my all time favorite activities – tropical river rock scrambling. I purposefully avoided the trail preferring to use both hands and both feet to climb, scurry, leap, cross-step, side-step, and shimmy my way to the top. So caught up in the moment, I went well past the designated starting place to the more intriguing fall at the top. Once I stepped to the center and carefully lowered myself to sitting, letting my legs dangle over the edge, caressed by that cool water, I had my first doubts. It was high and looked a bit rough. The landing didn’t appear as soft as described.
I yelled down to the guide who was just out of yelling range, trying hand signals to ask if it was ok to slide here? His response was ambiguous and I paused a few moments longer, allowing the two photographers to take their places. Cameras raised, they encouraged me, and eventually I suddenly decided to go. I tried bracing with my feet, but it was smoother than it looked and I sat back, mouth open in an exuberant smile, til that rock popped up to give me a slight bounce before splashing into the pool. Ouch!
Photo: Chris McLennan
The pain was forgotten in a flush of adrenaline and pure moment-embracing delirium. I slid and climbed and splashed and sauntered and scurried until the bruise started stiffening and the pain set in. Other than the mountain bike-perched descent down that loosely packed dirt trail at a speed just below out of control, the ride was done while wincing through a dull but growing pain and now sitting here I try to focus my mind on feeling it, on savoring it. I mentally connect it to the feeling of living. I could just as easily be sitting here without the again re-opened scrape on my shin, the slightly stuffy sinuses still hosting river water, and the tender tush, but then again, I also wouldn’t be looking out at the passing island with these electrified eyes.
Holly Beck 
