I’ve always been a surfer and having arrived in São Tomé e Príncipe, where I’d come to live for the following 9 years, I was astonished by the perfect surf conditions. I mean, great waves, warm crystal-clear waters… an untouched paradise with the most impressive fauna and flora.

When I first arrived, I noticed the locals surfed with nothing but pieces of wood, so my friends and I, with our immense love for surf and for the ocean, took it upon ourselves to establish and develop the sport in São Tomé, but that’s a tale for another time. This story is about sea urchins and the hundreds you can find in São Tomé e Príncipe and why they became surfers best friends.

I took this picture in Santana, the picture-perfect beach, where inevitably all newcomers ended up surfing. However, this particular beach’s sea floor, is lined with sea urchins, and only those that know how to properly navigate these waters would come out untouched. So this became our right of passage, a sort of imposed initiation to all newcomers. No surfer escaped!
It’s been over two years since I left this little lost paradise, and to this day, I occasionally find a sea urchin spine coming loose from a knee…
I hold these memories dearly and with a smile and miss that land profoundly.

Story by Paulo Pichel