Jasper's Surf shop in Eastham, Mass, Cape Cod...since 1967. The building is still there on Route 6A, a few miles north of the Orleans rotary. As a kid, my Dad would take us there to rent Sunfish sailboats and to look at the longboards and Birdwells...my Dad didn't surf, so this was all foreign to me. I can remember walking into the shop and stepping onto the sand floors...there wasn't much in there, but what was in there was cool. There were some transition single fins, longboards, Birdwells, tee shirts, stickers and really cool local surf shots on the wall...the place was dripping with Soul. Jaspers is also connected with Wellfleet's "Old Timers's Surf Classic" held each summer.
The summer I started surfing, 1979, we got up to the Cape in August...my Dad had just bought me my 1st Surfboard, a 5'10" Michaels Freemont single fin, double ender. My buddy Doug had just picked up his 1st board at a garage sale...a mini mal McTavish Tracker. We were ready to go. We got down to Nauset Beach and found some waist high peelers rolling in by the south unguarded beach. We jumped in and caught a couple waves...the water was 59 degrees. Not a problem, except we didn't have any wetsuits...or leashes for that matter. We did lots of swimming that morning...and got really cold! We asked one of the local surfers where to rent a suit...or a 'smug' as he callled it. He sent us to Jaspers and we rented a couple suits. I got an old O'neill long john and Doug got an old 3/2 full...made all the difference in the world. Later that week, we got up for a dawn patrol session and found Doug's suit missing...they were drying out on the railing of our deck. We were staying at a little cottage in Orleans, right on Boland's Pond, behind Ellis Market and the Nauset Middle School. As we thought what happened, we realized that we had just heard the garbage truck. Even though the garbage men denied it, we knew what happened...problem was, we had to explain it to Jasper. The guys were cool and we got another suit...they treated us well and earned our business.
We paid our dues that summer, got some fun waves and knew we were hooked. I'll never forget that summer and all the fun Doug and I had learning to surf and learning to respect the ocean. Thanks Dad for getting me my 1st surfboard, (it still hangs on the ceiling of our shop) thanks Doug for sharing those awesome early days and thanks Jasper's Surf Shop for showing us the way and trating us like surfers and not the kooks that we really were.
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| My first surfboard...ceiling of the shop. |
