By PHIL JARRATT
Northbound over Easter to spend some time with old mate Chris De Aboitiz and partner Anna at his sprawling mountain-top acreage, the Dog House, just outside Agnes Water.
I go back a long way with Agnes, even further than Chris.
The first time was the most memorable, back in 1978 with the late, great photographer and kneeboarder Peter Crawford. PC and I landed a job for Australian Playboy to cruise the east coast of Australia and discover what had happened to the hippies and New Agers who had drunk the Cool-Aid at Nimbin a few years earlier and set up communes in coastal rainforests and battle-axe hilltop blocks.
The magazine provided us with a fully-kitted Kombi van and an expense account and sent us off to get photos of topless chicks with hairy armpits, made legit by some waffle about how they were pioneering the off-the-grid future.
We stayed on point for a while, hanging out in Nimbin and Mullum, taking pictures and notes, but then a late season Coral Sea low started drifting into place and we put the story on the backburner and headed for Noosa.
I think it must have been guilt that made us press north on the fifth or sixth day of the swell, but then a funny thing happened. The swell kicked again, and after a futile day searching for a commune near Childers, we took the long dirt road from Miriam Vale to the coast at Agnes Water.
I knew very little about Agnes but PC had it on the super secret surfer grapevine that there was a little known righthand point there that worked in similar conditions to Noosa.
His information was right.
We made our way past a general store and a dozen or so holiday houses and parked on a ridge behind a row of tiny fishing shacks. In between the shacks we could catch glimpses of a head-high right running down the point, with no-one on it!
It turned out to be a little bigger than that, with a fast outside section behind the rocks, and we surfed our brains out for three days, sometimes sharing with a few friendly locals, often on our own.
We rented one of the fishing shacks for two bucks a night, a double bunk with blankets and a two-burner stove and strolling peacocks on our front lawn every sunup and sunset.
I don’t think we even explored the glorious sand cays of 1770 just up the road. We just surfed!
Agnes was a kind of paradise, and yet it took me a decade to get back there. This time we camped on the waterfront at 1770 with the kids and I paddled my board out into the bay to buy prawns off the fishing boats more often than I paddled out at Agnes.
The surf was mostly disappointing, and when it wasn’t, it was crowded.
Since he bought his hilltop four years ago, Chris has frequently invited us to come and check it out, and when he suggested it again over a beer at Cafe Le Monde after “Super Sunday” – when Chris and his pack of surfing dogs drew the biggest crowd we’ve ever seen at the Laguna Real Estate Noosa Festival of Surfing – I thought why not?
So here we are at the Dog House, camped out in the huge motorhome that Chris and Anna have used this summer to spread the gospel of doggie surfing from Port Douglas to Bells Beach, and back to Noosa.
Along the way, coverage of their tour broke records all over social media, culminating in a video news release of the VetshopAustralia Surfing Dogs at the Noosa festival that was seen by millions on network television around the world.
But that was a fortnight ago, and now Chris and Anna are back at the Dog House, taking care of Lani and Rama and half a dozen other beautiful dogs that no-one else wanted, working on new media projects with photographer and videographer Peter Aitcheson, and taking care of business – which here at Agnes includes running a stand up paddle school and hire concession at 1770, and offering dog-friendly holiday accommodation.
Chris is full of enthusiasm (as he always is) and ideas for the property’s future, which include barramundi-stocked dams, horse-riding trails, terraces of discreet wilderness cabins, bike trails and dog training facilities.
He says it’s a 10-year plan and in the quarter of a century I’ve known him, I don’t remember anything keeping his attention for that long.
But Dog House might be different. Here he is combining two great passions in his life – the ocean and dogs – in an environment that’s perfect for both.
It’s a simple equation: you teach a dog to surf, you can teach it anything. And owners can learn a lot too, about patience, understanding and sharing good times with their four-legged friends.
It’s been a fun Easter. I’m happy to see my friend so happy, and looking at the 360-degree panorama of ocean and mountain from the summit of Dog House, how could you not be?
If you’re interested in a dog-friendly vacation just a few minutes from an aquatic paradise, visit naturalbalancedog.com.au for more information.
