surfresearch.com.au  w. h. lever  : surf riding at waikiki, 1893

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The great delight here is sea bathing.
It is indulged in by everyone at all hours of the day and night, and moonlight bathing picnics are quite an institution.
I am very fond of bathing, and have bathed in many places, but certainly never knew what sea bathing was until I bathed at Honolulu's Waikiki Bay.
A beautiful sandy beach, enclosed within a coral reef, which effectually keeps out sharks, a gentle rolling swell and water which is beautifully blue and clear, of a temperature varying between 75 (degrees) and 80 (degrees) make sea bathing at Waikiki a luxury scarcely to be obtained eslewhere.
Here one (can see native surf riders who)

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provide themselves with flat boards of a length and (shape), varying according to taste.
Armed with this they go out to just that point of the breakers where the waves (begin) to curl over, and choosing a large one dexterously, (place) themselves in front and on the top of it, and are carried at (great) speed high up on the beach.
Occasionally one of the surf (riders) will miss the exact time to catch the wave and is consequently (be) left behind or tumbled over amidst the laughter and she(?? of) the others.
To onlookers the sport appears very simple and (??,) but in reality it is not so.
Great skill and practice are needed (to) hit off the exact time and point at which to mount the bn(??,)  to be either too soon or too late is fatal to success.
The exhibition and excitement this sport affords to those who take (part,) it reminds one most forcibly of the fun of tobogganing (in) Canada.

Extracts from Lever, W. H. Following the Flag Jottings of a Jaunt Round the World. Simpkin, Marshall & Co, London, 1893.  Internet Archive http://archive.org/details/followingflagjot00leveuoft

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