It is about “the people who inhabit, visit, surf and protect” the coasts from France to Portugal, known as “European surf highway”, which is what most of us do in the summer. I had gathered loads of footy in the past four years from all this places, so he invited me to help them out with my archive. I also offered to help him film while we were on the road, why I really enjoy working with him and always learn a lot on the way. We had super good times, surfed breaks I have never been to and saw a great part of Spain, so I enjoyed every bit of it.

Here is the first teaser for the project and make sure to check out all about it on the website…

I first heard about Sebastian Funk a.k.a. Basti a.k.a. Basanostra from my friend Matevž Pristavec, who delivered me some of his shots. He told me that Basti is one hell of a filmer that always takes guys somewhere where powder and good kickers are waiting. It was my “rookie” year filming snowboarding and I though, man that is some heavy know-how right there.

I finally met Basti when I got this checkout for Qparks last year. We clicked instantly, had a lot of fun on Dachstein and this year we even spent a portion of summer surf tripping together. He is super down to earth guy, with tons of knowledge, who just loves to film and do action edits that have some sort of story behind.

This might sound a little cheezy, but I think of him as my mentor (although he hates to hear that, haha), while he was never affraid to share his experience or knowledge with me. For a guy coming from Slovenia, where it is really hard to get some quality film schooling, let alone an honest opinion or good advice, this always meant a lot.

He started a new webpage, BasanostraProductions, which is well worth checking out. You can also follow his work on his facebook fan page.

Horsefeathers Pleasure Jam is the first big event of the season and it is organized in Superpark Dachstein, which is build and maintained by Qparks.

This year the level was just off the hook, riders stomping doublecorks and 10s already in qualification, but everybody pushed it even more in the finals. The winners where Seppe Smiths from Belgium and Amy Fueller from England and Slovenia also had its representatives, with Cilka Sadar coming in second in girl division. Congrats!

I was picked to be a part of the video team again and this year everything considering my work was really well thought and set. The hungarian video wizard, Hambalko Balint, and I were the filmers for the daytime, while the head of filmers at Qparks, Basti Funk, was the editor at night. It was really great to work with them and I think we made a great job.

You can check what went down for three days in the video below…

Our german friends wanted to do a little surf tripping as the swell forecast was kind of huge. They went further west, to Asturias, where they had some good reef spots in mind, and Katja and I were happy to join.

On the second day of our travels we passed by this cool looking street spot in the town of Aviles, Asturias. Despite the rough grounds, it was pretty sick just pumping down the streets and doing little carves as it felt like surfing the concrete…

After quick stop in home camp Zarautz, we went further to meet our friends in St. Vincent de la Barquera, Cantabria.

Cantabria is next region from Basque, if you travel west, and it really is a whole different country… the culture, the people, the scenics, everything changes when you pass Santander and you enter a lot more quiet and lonesome realm of Spain.

After the “mandatory” surf session with Basti and Benno, we had to go check the local skateramp. It is under the old castle ruins by the river, surely the most beautiful setting so far, but sadly the ramp sucks… no real coping to get a lock, few metal plates sticking out and sort of slippery… yet we had a fun session with the local soccer kids, who seemed to enjoy skateboarding as much as they like kicking the ball around, so not all is lost, haha.