Introducing The Silver Surfer; A New Book About A Unique 70 Year Old Surfer From Cornwall

There are so many new and exciting things coming out of the south-west surf scene, it’s sometimes hard to keep up.

From amazing charities and eco-innovations to excellent events and quality bits of self-publishing, we’re always keen to bring you the best of the best of it.

Recently, we came across an exciting new project from this latter category (which has just launched on Crowdfunder) conceived by an art director and all-round creative named Jon Herbert.

It’s a book about the life of a 70-year-old surfer from Cornwall named Andrew Forrest, who after many years travelling as a photojournalist and working as a chef, settled in St Agnes and began surfing. Despite taking up the past time a little later than most, Andrew has become all consumed by it over the last 30 years and even more so since becoming a pensioner- or, as he puts it: “a full-time UK Government-sponsored surfer.”

Jon met Andrew last year, following a move from London to Cornwall, to ‘escape the rat race’ and seek a quieter life by the sea. The pair immediately struck up a friendship, and over daily morning coffees began to trade stories about their time in the media industry, their shared love for surf photography and literature and eventually Andrew’s own surfing experience, as Jon explains:

“As our friendship developed and Andrew’s trust in me grew, our conversations turned to his 30-year surfing journey – encompassing a series of waterborne adventures and stories that, I would discover, he’d been documenting in yearly journals.

These handwritten journals, collated and published here for the first time, record the essence of each day’s surf session – a star rating (out of ten), beach location, the surfboard(s) ridden, fin set-up and whenever possible a photo for posterity.”

Crowdfunding has just kicked off and offers pledgers a whole range of rewards including art prints, postcards and a first edition copy of the ‘Silver Surfer’ as soon as it lands off the presses.

To find out more and support the project, head here and to follow its progress, follow @silversurferjournal on instagram.