THE SWING BY RICHARD HARVEY

SURFER: LUKE WELLER

LOCATION: BURLEIGH ROCK BREAK

DATE: 1975

These children’s swings featuring a log wooden blank suspended within a metal frame once dotted the Gold Coast and beyond. A young Rabbit Bartholomew reckons he practiced surfing on one of these for a year before he was game to paddle out after his first ill-fated surf ended with a bodysurfer splitting his head open on the nose of Rabbit’s board. He was also featured riding one in the classic ‘70s surf film Free Ride.

At beachside playgrounds throughout the Gold Coast you could swing back and forth on the wooden plank like a land-bound surfboard, mind-surfing the waves, practicing your cross stepping, seeing how high you could go and still make the drop. They were also highly dangerous, and council eventually removed them as a grave risk to public safety after a spate of injuries. Some surfers might be asking, what swing? As their eyes are immediately drawn to the perfectly positioned surfer in the pocket of a tight little Rock Break barrel. Two forms of recreation for different tastes and demographics, both of which could easily end in injury.