After four trips to India, I finally got a chance to go surfing. I found an ashram located in a city called Mulki which is run by a San Diego couple. The guy's name is Govardhan and they happen to be surfers. And so, not coincidentally, they are located at the beach. They also had a friend from San Diego named Dustin staying at the ashram with him, in addition to a few locals.

I spent the weekend with them, and had a blast. Everyone at the ashram was super nice and hospitable. They're an ashram, so they spend some time in the early morning and evening meditating and chanting.

So let's get back to the surfing. I arrived Saturday morning, and went surfing with Dustin and Govardhan's wife in the late morning. Their ashram is actually located right on a river. So to get to the beach, you paddle across the river and walk across a short sand bar. To my surprise, the river and the beach were both empty and quite clean. The beach was completely empty. During the two hours that we surfed, I didn't see anybody else on this clean stretch of white sandy beach. The waves were fair, and only about 2 ft on this day. I hear it can easily get to overhead conditions with the right swell, which is usually affected by the monsoons. Anyhow, we all caught a good number of fun waves on that day.

The next day of surfing was a little more interesting. Govardhan had commited to giving surf lessons to some local college students. So we packed up a couple rickshaws with a bunch of surfboards and headed to a beach just north of the ashram. I got a chance to surf a couple hours that morning before catching my noon bus to Mangalore. There were a few locals on this beach just vacationing, but probably no more than 20 people.

You can find out more about the ashram at their website: http://www.surfingindia.net/ashram-surf-retreat