Travel industry has changed a lot in the last twenty years. The emergence of low-cost flight companies has changed the deal for the market since about a decade. Also the industry is facing the crowds of sports addicts which are in the need of traveling to fulfill their passion.
Most adventures sports are transported on not far from home as you need to train a lot to become somehow good at them. But then, it is always nicer to do it in certain conditions and the UK and Europe in general go through lousy winters.
Sports like scuba-diving, surfing, windsurfing, kitesurfing, snowboarding, rock climbing will always push followers to seek new terrains on which to practice.
It is particularly true for scuba diving. This sport is based on the encounters one does with marine life and the more you travel, the more you are bond to find new species, flora and fauna that you had never seen before. Therefore, most keen scuba divers plan a scuba diving holiday at least once a year. That is something they are looking for all year round.
Surfing is another sport in which traveling is tightly bonded. As the swell producing storms differs from one season to another, the need to hop on a plane is a necessity. Every surfer is looking forward to escape gray skies and blown out waves. Coming off the plane in Bali for example, smelling the scent of Indonesia is already an experience. Standing on the cliffs of Uluwatu and looking at the swell peeling around the reef is just a mind blowing sight.
The 70's surf trips are now given away to full on surf holidays. Many companies offer nowadays special surf lodgings or live on-board surf holidays in paradise destination like the Maldives, Fiji, Mentawais, … Of course, prices are way up compared to a budget surf trip to Morocco but more and more middle aged surfers are willing to put a good amount of money for a surf holiday they will never forget. Some will get really lucky and ride infamous reefs at their best and then others will spend a week waiting on for these waves to fire up. That is what makes surfing so special.
A famous surfer, Nat Young, wrote a book titled "You Should Have Been Here Yesterday!" and that resumes pretty much the vibe of the whole sport: you have to be there at the right moment! There is no planning ahead a surf trip without knowing swell stats and a minimum of geography. Again the surf will be different from the morning to the afternoon and one need to understand tides and dominant winds. Offshore breezes are often in the morning in continental breaks due to the difference of temperature between the ocean and the continent. Some places function on an evening glass and the sand banks on some beaches will shift from one swell to another.
Traveling to different spot will let a surfer increase his general knowledge about the mechanics of waves.
Remember a local is nothing more than a surfer that does not travel!
