A UK surf entrepreneur is building the ultimate surfing experience by converting a 7.5 ton removals truck into an epic surf motor. The Wagon Surf Camp will be hitting the coast of Portugal this September following the swells and delivering surfers to the best spots available.
Matt Gough from Devon is converting the truck into a luxury six person surf hostel “Think the luxury and comforts of a fancy-pants surf camp, combined with the culture and wave quality you can achieve being a van travel surfer” he told Drift
Matt is working with highly experienced surfer and photographer Matt H Blankley to document the trip and to utilise his local knowledge of the Portuguese west coast, ensuring that they are always chasing the best swell and to be sure the punters wake up to premium uncrowded waves.
Matt came up with the idea for the surf wagon after a very near brush with death. Back in 2013, Matt, an avid BASE jumper was living for his sport. On a cliff jump near lake Garda in Italy everything came to a head when his parachute didn’t open correctly and it threw him into the cliff face, crashing him down the rocks for 600ft. To make things even worse, his impact zone on the ground beneath wasn’t a nice bed of grass, but a metal container unit and rail littered with sharp spikes. His last words before impact were “I’m going in!”, which is BASE jumper language for “I’m about to die”.
When he put the video online it spread across the globe like wild fire, getting 2 million views in just 48 hours
Luckily for Matt, he was wrong and those weren’t his final words. As if by miracle his twisted parachute lines trapped in one of the spikes and caught him just inches from the floor. He escaped without any broken bones or soft tissue! The whole accident was caught on his GoPro and when he put the video online it spread across the globe like wildfire, getting 2 million views in just 48 hours. The media interviews and video licensing that followed provided Matt with enough pocket money to buy a van, new surf board and get back on the road with a new focus, chasing the swell!
While travelling the European and African coast surfing, Matt also worked in a number of surf camps along the way. He soon realised that while customers to the surf camps had all the luxuries and comforts of a ‘normal’ holiday resort, they often didn’t quite capture the surf culture and wave quality that you can experience from touring in a van. This spurred him to create a new concept of surf camp, and prompted him to start Wagon Surf Camp. He’s building a super-fly surf Wagon with all the luxuries you’d expect from any surf camp, and will be taking customers along the Portuguese and Moroccan coast, allowing them to wake up directly in front of the best surf every day.
To find out more or to get involved visit Matt’s crowdfunding page here you can also stay up-to-date with the project by visiting his Facebook page
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