Always refreshing to see John John Florence surfing new waves. Photo: John John Florence//screenshot
Last week rumors surfaced of a John John Florence sighting in the Caribbean. Then photos appeared, and now, we finally get to see some of the surfing he’d been doing on one of the region’s most famous beachbreaks.
“Found some waves and a little bit of sand!” Florence said on Instagram about a session at Bluff Beach in the Panamanian archipelago of Bocas del Toro. (Watch it here.)
By May, the swell season is usually winding down in this part of the Caribbean, but Florence was blessed with a late-season swell and the shallow tubes of Bluff turned on. For anyone who has ever surfed Bluff, you know how difficult the wave can be — slabby take offs in only a couple feet of water, mere meters from the shore.
But Florence makes it look easy in the clips he posted. Locals said he also paid his dues with some heavy wipeouts. That beach is notorious for claiming boards like few others.
Word on the ground in Bocas is that Florence is on his way through the Panama Canal to sail into the Pacific and disappear once again into the liquid abyss.
