I love finding out stuff like this about authors: Agatha Christie, surfer.
Rebekah Send a noteboard - 30/07/2011 10:58:05 AM
Blows my mind a little bit. After all, Agatha Christie is an older author in my world. 
This remarkable picture reveals how crime writer Agatha Christie was one of the first people in Britain to try stand-up surfing.
The author was an avid bodyboarder after taking up the hobby during a holiday in South Africa with husband Archie in 1922.
But it was during a trip to Hawaii that she picked up the art of surfing while standing up, which experts say was one of the first examples ever recorded by a Briton.
Researcher Peter Robinson, from the Museum of British Surfing, said the discovery about the author's pastime had come as a "complete surprise".
He said: "My research shows in the early 1920s very few British people were surfing and the only one we know about earlier than her, standing up, was Prince Edward.
It certainly shows a new aspect to her life, she clearly had a passion for the sea and was one of the first wave of new surfers.
She was such a prolific writer that people tend to associate the image of an older lady writing books like Poirot with the name Agatha Christie.
But when she was younger she was actually a very accomplished surfer, and one of the first I know of from the UK."
At Muizenberg beach in South Africa she was first introduced to 'prone' surfing – lying down on the board.
The acclaimed author detailed in her autobiography her travels, when the sport was just starting out.
But for the first time researchers have uncovered that she was one of the first British people to try the sport.
Christie, originally from Torquay, Devon, wrote at the time: "The surf boards in South Africa were made of light, thin wood, easy to carry, and one soon got the knack of coming in on the waves.
It was occasionally painful as you took a nose dive down into the sand, but on the whole it was an easy sport and great fun."
Christie and her husband, Archie, continued their tour through Australia and New Zealand before arriving in Honolulu in August 1922.
They quickly took to riding surfboards standing up at Waikiki.
She wrote: "I learned to become expert, or at any rate expert from the European point of view – the moment of complete triumph on the day that I kept my balance and came right into shore standing upright on my board!"
Christie added that she had bought soft leather boots to protect her feet and her flimsy costume was replaced by wool swimwear, described as "a wonderful, skimpy emerald green wool bathing dress, which was the joy of my life, and in which I thought I looked remarkably well!"
Research is now under way to see if she continued surfing on returning to the UK.
A writer's retreat was built at Burgh Island, in South Devon in the 1930s and that among the regular visitors to the beach house were Agatha Christie and Prince Edward who had both learned to surf in Hawaii a decade before.
This remarkable picture reveals how crime writer Agatha Christie was one of the first people in Britain to try stand-up surfing.
The author was an avid bodyboarder after taking up the hobby during a holiday in South Africa with husband Archie in 1922.
But it was during a trip to Hawaii that she picked up the art of surfing while standing up, which experts say was one of the first examples ever recorded by a Briton.
Researcher Peter Robinson, from the Museum of British Surfing, said the discovery about the author's pastime had come as a "complete surprise".
He said: "My research shows in the early 1920s very few British people were surfing and the only one we know about earlier than her, standing up, was Prince Edward.
It certainly shows a new aspect to her life, she clearly had a passion for the sea and was one of the first wave of new surfers.
She was such a prolific writer that people tend to associate the image of an older lady writing books like Poirot with the name Agatha Christie.
But when she was younger she was actually a very accomplished surfer, and one of the first I know of from the UK."
At Muizenberg beach in South Africa she was first introduced to 'prone' surfing – lying down on the board.
The acclaimed author detailed in her autobiography her travels, when the sport was just starting out.
But for the first time researchers have uncovered that she was one of the first British people to try the sport.
Christie, originally from Torquay, Devon, wrote at the time: "The surf boards in South Africa were made of light, thin wood, easy to carry, and one soon got the knack of coming in on the waves.
It was occasionally painful as you took a nose dive down into the sand, but on the whole it was an easy sport and great fun."
Christie and her husband, Archie, continued their tour through Australia and New Zealand before arriving in Honolulu in August 1922.
They quickly took to riding surfboards standing up at Waikiki.
She wrote: "I learned to become expert, or at any rate expert from the European point of view – the moment of complete triumph on the day that I kept my balance and came right into shore standing upright on my board!"
Christie added that she had bought soft leather boots to protect her feet and her flimsy costume was replaced by wool swimwear, described as "a wonderful, skimpy emerald green wool bathing dress, which was the joy of my life, and in which I thought I looked remarkably well!"
Research is now under way to see if she continued surfing on returning to the UK.
A writer's retreat was built at Burgh Island, in South Devon in the 1930s and that among the regular visitors to the beach house were Agatha Christie and Prince Edward who had both learned to surf in Hawaii a decade before.
*MySmiley*
Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read. - Groucho Marx
Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read. - Groucho Marx
I love finding out stuff like this about authors: Agatha Christie, surfer.
- 30/07/2011 10:58:05 AM
1081 Views
I need to check more of her books *NM*