The Tarkwa Bay Surfing Edition

Lilla Cosgrove (LC) is an entrepreneur and a co-founder of Candid, where she ran the product and UX teams. She is currently based in Lagos, Nigeria, where she is consulting for startups, working on her next company, and practicing being a beginner via surfing and guitar.   

Lilla here. If there’s one thing you quickly understand the importance of when you’re a beginner surfer, it’s feeling out the etiquette and attitudes of the surfers around you.  While there are plenty of stories about the more formal aspects of wave etiquette—the locals-only spots on Hawai’i you really must steer clear of, for example, or how to avoid dropping in on someone—it can be intimidating simply getting used to the looks and nods from strangers who seem to be eons better than you, all the while trying to just catch a wave yourself.

Despite this learning curve, after really learning to surf this year, I became completely obsessed, and when I arrived back home in Nigeria three weeks ago, I decided to head over to Lagos’ only real surf spot: Tarkwa Bay. The bay is a beach break created by two jetties that were put in place in the 1960s to protect Lagos’ harbor. It’s accessible only by boat, and there are many supernatural associations with it, including the rumor that it’s haunted by the ghost of a young girl who drowned there. Nevertheless, on a Sunday morning two weeks ago, it was nothing but clear and hot.

Alan van Gysen for Surfer Magazine

Why is this interesting? 

The moment I hit the water, it was clear that the dynamics of this particular spot were different than others we’d seen. It was 10 am, and there were about ten kids in the water, none of whom looked older than fifteen, with just three boards between them. The waves were small, but the kids were out there, paddling for everything, swapping the boards around after a couple of rides each, and whooping and cheering whenever anyone got up on a wave, including me. The primary feeling coming through was joy. No side-eye, no protectiveness. Instead, high fives, compliments, and a truly special feeling of community.

I’m not the first to feel this. In 2020, Vans sponsored a series hosted by two surfers who visited Tarkwa Bay and called the episode Time Travel. It does feel that way, being in the water there—like being transported to a year when surfing wasn’t the hype-filled sport it is today but rather a new skill to learn and a chance to hang out in the water with your friends.

Featured in Vans’ series, and a few other videos about the spot, are a local legend named Godpower, who really developed the surfing community in Lagos, and an Italian-born, Nigerian-bred surfer named John Micheletti. Today, Godpower rents boards and gives lessons, and he and Micheletti have worked to bring more equipment and more support to the community over the years. This was especially important in 2020 when the Nigerian Navy temporarily forced much of the community out of the area. In addition to Godpower’s crew, there is now another venture called Tarkwa Bay Surf Club, a two-level structure that also rents boards and gives lessons.

Still, the increased interest and resources have yet to dampen the warmth and camaraderie of the group there, even as the professionalization of so many things in our world often seems to suck the joy out. What I fell in love with in surfing was the full-body thrill of catching a wave—paddling until my arms were about to fall off in order to land just one more ride. Learning at 33, the pressure of ever being truly excellent is removed, so I get to be only in it for the joy. And I found that feeling in this special little surf community in Lagos.

That said, right as we were leaving, someone from Godpower’s crew came to tell us that we had rented our boards from the wrong place and that the newer Tarkwa Bay Surf Club didn’t have the right community values. So maybe where there is surf, there will always be some beef. (LC)

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Thanks for reading,

Noah (NRB) & Colin (CJN)

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