Surf Snowdonia with Jeeka

Andrew ‘Jeeka’ Griffin giving the waves at Surf Snowdonia a go

I’ve been wanting to surf the wave pool up in Snowdonia since it first opened and in early June I got the chance.

Following a call from long term friend and photographer Ben Selway I agreed to do a shoot with model/surfer Lucy Donlan. The next day I met Lucy for the first time and we started off our 8-hour drive to the North West corner of Wales via Bristol to pick up Ben.

After the lengthy drive pulled up to Surf Snowdonia to see reeling rights and lefts down the central platform. The spectacle was amazing, and although a little windy, you could see how much fun this wave was going to be. We had an hour slot booked later on that afternoon, but I wanted to make the most of my time there so jumped in straight away. My first few waves were shocking. It’s certainly not like surfing a normal wave in the ocean. However, after a couple more attempts, it started coming together and it wasn’t long before you could put in a handful of turns on each wave.

Catching a wave every couple of minutes was extremely tiring, but it did enable you to get a bit of flow and to help practice certain turns and manoeuvres After a couple of hours break we were back on for a water shoot with Ben, and we managed to bag a handful of decent shots. The director for Visit Britain was made up with the photos, and both myself and Lucy had a great time, and couldn’t wait to do the same again the following day.

It was an early start and we had a 2-hour session booked with employee and professional surfer Joe Denison. Myself and Joe traded waves for about an hour and managed to get some cool photos taken from the platform, before Lucy took over for the final hour trading waves with Joe in amongst snow and hail squalls, both getting some amazing photos for their commitment.

It was a great experience throughout and I want to say a huge thanks to Surf Snowdonia and Visit Britain for the opportunity as well as Ben, Lucy and Dan for the non-stop laughter and company.”