The Wake

The surfing culture of the West Coast is slowly creeping into the Midwest, but there is one main difference—surfers have 10,000 lakes to choose from.

The northwest winds are perfect and the waves are glassy. As 42-year-old surfer Bob Tema looks out onto the smooth blue water, he couldn’t be happier. He pulls his black wetsuit over his thin body and he can’t seem to wipe the smile off his face. For most surfers, nothing is better than a day at the beach. After he rubs a quick coat of wax over the top of his board, a freezing gust of wind stings his face and reminds him he isn’t in Hawaii anymore. It definitely isn’t summertime; it is the dead of winter in one of America’s coldest states. With the crunching snow beneath his feet, he quickly dives into the icy water. Instead of his eyes burning from salt like they did so many times in the ocean, the water is nearly drinkable. Tema gets his surfing fix by catching a few wind-produced waves on Lake Superior, the largest freshwater lake in the world.

While he floats in the water and waits for the next set of waves to come through, the ice chunks slowly bob up and down next to him. It may be far from perfect, but for Tema, his love for surfing drives him to the Great Lakes.

Since he spent the first 20 years of his life on the north shores of Oahu, Tema has been surrounded by surfing and beach culture since he was born.

“All my brother and I would do is surf,” Tema says. “It was my life.”

It is the “stoke,” or the feeling of the surfboard shooting down a wave, which brings surfers like Tema back each time. They all have a certain kind of passion for lake surfing, maybe even an obsession. After they feel the rush from gliding down a wave, after they feel the unity of their body with the ocean, they are hooked for life. Tema is one of a handful of Minneapolis surfing die-hards, and the need to catch a few waves consumes them. The stoke of surfing is embedded deep within them and not a day goes by when they don’t want to head out to the waves. Tema lives and breathes lake surfing. For him, it is just a way of life.

During the fall and winter months, when northwest winds reach 20 m.p.h. and low pressure systems begin to creep in, the waves on the Great Lakes grow big enough to surf. In the film Unsalted, a documentary on Great Lakes surfing, Vince Deur helps to explain exactly how waves form on the seemingly flat lakes. During early September, warm waters in the Great Lakes can get up to 70 degrees. But, with fall approaching, the cold air from Canada comes down very fast and digs into the warm water in the lakes. In other words, the cold air hits the warm water like a boulder, creating big waves. But, during the colder months, when the water reaches lows of 30 degrees, the waves are produced solely by strong winds and storms. Even though the surf is better during the fall months, true addicts surf all year long. And, a few times a month when the weather conditions are right, Tema re-lives his childhood by surfing on Lake Superior.

“I actually like the cold water,” Tema says with a laugh. “I think that it is all part of the adventure of surfing on a lake.” In popular surf destinations like California, water temperatures rest between 60 and 70 degrees—about 40 degrees warmer than the water in Lake Superior during the winter months—and a wetsuit usually isn’t needed. The only time wetsuits come in handy is during December, the only month that can really be called “winter”, when water temperatures reach the mid-50s. But in Minnesota, a few different precautions are taken in order to keep warm during surf sessions. It’s necessary to put on six-millimeter-thick wetsuits with hoods, booties and gloves to keep the water from freezing surfers’ skin. To top it off, they apply a thick coat of Vaseline on their faces to protect their exposed skin from frostbite.

“Sometimes we can only stay in the water for about 30 minutes before we get some ice build-up on our wet suits,” Tema says. “But my love for surfing always seems to overcome the extreme weather conditions.”

The majority of society probably thinks surfers are “beach bums” with shaggy hair and baggy clothes. But at first glance, Tema doesn’t fit the typical lazy surfer image. His parted brown hair and clearly spoken words make him seem professional, and that is because he is. With dreams of a career in graphic design, Tema moved to Minnesota in 1988 to attend the Minneapolis Institute for Graphic Design. Now, he is the creative director for Whoop Design, a graphic design company. His job fits his personality perfectly because his work is portable. When the surf is up, Tema can pick up his computer and drive to the beach. “Sometimes I surf for a few hours and then work for a few hours,” Tema says.

Although Tema has been involved in graphic design since he moved to Minnesota, it took a little longer for him to discover the sport of lake surfing. After his countless trips to California and Hawaii grew tiring, Tema started doing some research online.

“I’d heard of lake surfing before,” Tema says. “So I looked up a few people online and got in contact with them.” It wasn’t until 1998 that he caught his first wave on Lake Superior. But even now, lake surfing is a new sport to the majority of Minnesota residents.

Most Midwesterners may not realize that surfing on the Great Lakes is possible, but people have been doing it for nearly 40 years. Thomas E. Blake, born in Wisconsin in 1902, was considered to be one of the grandfathers of surfing and has a lifetime of “firsts.” Before Blake, Hawaiians surfed on 100-pound wood planks without a fin. As seen in Bruce Brown’s classic film The Endless Summer, Hawaiians put their feet at the end of their long surfboards to help them steer down the waves. Blake saw the inefficiency in this way of surfing. According to a biography written about him, he was the first to create the keel, or fin, which was placed on the bottom of the surfboard to help it glide down the wave. Additionally, he was the first to create the “hollow board,” a board made out of plywood that was much faster and lighter. After years spent in Hawaii and California, where he basically reinvented the surfboard, he returned to Wisconsin and started to surf the waves on the lakes.

“We just thought he was some goofy beach bum,” says Tony Woiak, a man who remembers seeing Blake on the shores of Lake Superior. “I was only a kid when Tom was surfing the lakes,” says Woiak. He was only 10 years old, in the mid-1960s when he remembers seeing Blake on the beaches. “We didn’t even know his name,” he says. “We just called him surfer Joe.”

Woiak, now 51 and President of the Washburn Historical Society in Wisconsin, says that Tom was the original beach bum and had shaggy blonde hair and a tan all year long. “He would just camp out in his white van all day,” recalls Woiak. “He was the first guy to surf on the lakes. No one even thought you could do that.” In 1994 Blake died and was buried in Washburn, but his grave site does not go unnoticed. Woiak makes frequent visits to lay shells and sand across his tombstone. “We are actually working on creating a statue of Tom that overlooks Lake Superior,” says Woiak. “We want him to be remembered.”

Although Blake brought the Western culture of surfing to the heartland of America, it has taken decades for the pastime to become popular. But since Tema took up lake surfing, he says that the popularity of the sport has grown tremendously.

“When I first started lake surfing, it was just me and a few of my friends out on the water,” says Tema. “But now, I feel like every time I go surfing I see a new face.” And for Tema, the more new people, the better. “We welcome anyone who wants to try it,” says Tema. “We definitely want to spread the word.” And through a few phone calls, Tema has done just that.

On a Saturday morning in mid April, eight guys gathered at “The New Calhoun Bar and Grill,” a breakfast joint that borders Lake Calhoun in Minneapolis. They weren’t there to talk about business or to have a mid-morning brunch. They gathered to talk about lake surfing. They came in casual attire. Mostly jeans and sandals with a few sporting T-shirts with “Lake Superior Surf Club” written in bold letters across the back. They all sat around a small table tucked away in the corner of the restaurant where their stories of lake surfing filled the air. Some were in their mid 20s and some were reaching 50 years old. But, no matter the age, after a few handshakes were exchanged, the surf talk began. Surfers have a way about them. As an outsider, you may think that the eight guys who Tema called up for breakfast that morning knew each other for years. When in reality, some were meeting for the first time. No matter where they are, a laidback atmosphere seems to follow. “I remember when I took Bob lake surfing for the first time,” yells lake surfer Rob Rosell from across the table. “I was so nervous because he was this big-time Hawaiian surfer and I was just some guy who learned to surf in Texas and thought it was fun.” Rosell grew up in Columbia Heights, Minn., but spent time in Texas where he learned to surf on the Gulf of Mexico. “I thought I knew how to predict the surfing conditions well so I told him that the surf would be pretty big,” says Rob. “When we got to the beach, the waves were only about knee high. I felt so embarrassed.”

Thanks to newspapers and magazines, more people who live near the Great Lakes are buying surfboards online and trying it out. Luke Kavajecz, a 22-year-old journalism student at the University of Minnesota-Duluth, said that he read about lake surfing in a local paper. Since he grew up on the shores of Lake Superior, he has always had a love for its waters. But it wasn’t until 2001 that Kavajecz thought he’d give lake surfing a try. “I got a board from a shaper in Cali and got a wetsuit online and I was set,” says Kavajecz. Now, five years later, he says that there is no other place that he’d rather surf. It is hard to imagine that someone would truly prefer surfing on the cold waters of Lake Superior rather than the ocean. But lake surfing has its perks.

In California, it is almost impossible to surf with less than 20 people in the water next to you. Since the good surf spots are so crowded, it creates a hierarchy among the waves. If someone is a good surfer, then they are at the top of the bunch and can catch most of the waves. But the beginners better stay out of the way because on a crowded day, the waves belong to the locals. But on the lakes, it’s easy to get a wave to wave to yourself. “The culture, the people and the water is perfect,” says Kavajecz. “No pollution, no localism, no crowds, and when the waves get good on the North Shore, there is no place I’d rather be.”

“In California, the surf is usually generated from storms that are located hundreds of miles off the coast,” says Tema. “But here in Minnesota, the big surf comes from storms hovering directly over the lakes.” So, for the surfers that crave big waves to ride, they have to fight their way through choppy and stormy waters. In addition, surfers have to wait weeks and sometimes months before the right wind conditions will generate waves. “Sometimes we have to wait a while, but it is always worth it,” says Tema.

Despite the challenges of lake surfing, there is still a passionate group that is creating a surf culture unique to the Midwest. Lake surfing Web sites litter the Internet and many lake surfing clubs have been created as a result of surfers wanting a community to connect with, such as the Lake Superior Surf Club and the Great Lakes Surfing Association. And Great Lake surf shops are beginning to surface.

Ryan Gerard, founder and owner of the Third Coast Surf Shop in New Buffalo, Michigan, said that he conceived the idea of a Great Lakes surf shop after a few years of surfing on Lake Michigan. “I learned how to surf on the lakes in 1998,” says Gerard. “Eventually, I moved to California to surf every day, teach lessons and work in the Pearson Arrow Surfboard Factory making boards.” It wasn’t until January 2005 after he returned to Michigan that he decided to make a surf shop specifically for lake surfers. “We are currently the only shop in the Lakes region dedicated exclusively to Great Lakes surfing,” says Gerard. “The culture in the lakes is still small, but growing exponentially. We are excited about the future.”

When most Minnesotans would rather stay inside by a warm fireplace, if there is surf on Lake Superior, inside is the last place Tema will be. For him, surfing on Lake Superior is just like another day at the beach.