By the time I reached Dakar, I had spent about two weeks traveling overland from Morocco through Mauritania and into Senegal. I wanted to stay put for a while. Ngor Surf Camp, on an island off Dakar, seemed like a good place to do it. There was one small complication: I was not much of a surfer. On my first day I managed to put my wetsuit on wrong.
I stayed for a week. The camp had shared rooms and meals around a table, with people who had come for the waves and people, like me, who were still learning what to do with them. There were travelers from Australia, India, Europe and the US, and Senegalese and other West African surfers who knew the local water and guided trips. I spent time barefoot, ate mangoes and fish, and let the pace of the place work on me after a long stretch of buses and borders.
What I liked was being around people who cared deeply about something I was only beginning to understand. They talked about tides, breaks, boards and the weather as if they were discussing a familiar neighborhood. I could follow some of it. Mostly I listened. There is a particular freedom in being the least competent person in a group and having everyone be kind about it.
I had traveled for years by finding reasons to stay longer in a place: work, classes, volunteering. I was beginning to see that a shared pursuit could do the same thing. Surfing gave this little group a reason to come to Ngor and something to do together the next morning. For me, mountains had started playing that role. A trek meant time with people on the same trail, meals together, a goal you couldn’t reach by skipping the difficult days. I didn’t need to become a surfer to recognize the feeling.
I came to the island for a pause and left with a better idea of what I wanted from travel. The places mattered, of course. So did having a reason to stay long enough to know the people who were there. I still can’t offer useful advice on putting on a wetsuit, but I got a lot out of the week.