Feels good to be back – exhausted but sound – at El Solitario Ranch after surviving for another year our best and worst week of the year. As the festival gets bigger so do we and so do the risks and challenges we encounter. Thinking on the way back home about this  chronicle, couldn’t help  but ask myself if it is worth so much effort and stress for what it feels like an altruist path to redeem ourselves.

Although one thing we know for certain is that chasing meaning is better for your health than trying to avoid discomfort. And so I would say that the best way to make decisions, is go after what it is that creates meaning in your life and then trust yourself, buckle up, and handle the stress that will surely follow. 

How big shall the counterculture movement become before the always moribund mainstream phagocytes it leaving no trace? At the times of W&W-1, in the midst of the economic meltdown,  the world was full of new ideas and outrageous propositions. The new wave custom scene was born! Shortly after, populist custom houses extended the same model of “bespoke” motorcycle across the globe filling gaps and  wiping the voices of those that dared to speak different. It didn’t take long until the industry learnt to run off with their style, dogmas and clientele. Today it feels like it might be the end of the scene and the motorcycle will continue its self destruction path and I begin to feel it might be better it this way. The outlaw way!

Still, I don’t know the right answers and for us, W&W still is our avant-garde quintessential space in which our rebellion finds its latitude and friendship steers the wheel, and who knows, maybe the motorcycle scene is not worthy of being saved. Anyway for us we still work like lunatics for a better W&W, because it is in our DNA to enjoy it with our friends and why not walk for a while on David’s shoes, with his loaded slingshot, fantasizing of dropping the system to its knees.

And how do we do this? How do we overcome the drift towards standardization? Gentlemen, the answer is Guerrilla Warfare. Irregular combat in which a small group of combatants use military tactics including ambushes, sabotage, raids, hit-and-run tactics, and mobility to fight a larger and less-mobile traditional military. This is exactly how we tackle Wheels & Waves. A first class ticket in a pirate torpedo aimed at the core of the decision makers & influencers in today’s motorcycle and surfing industry but without getting burnt.

“W&W, although most often been billed as a party, it has always been secretly operated as a convention of the most creative people in Motorcycle & Surfing today”. “If you didn’t come to the party before, maybe it is because you weren’t interested or didn’t think you were invited, but the answers to your questions are here, and it doesn’t look like you pictured… but then, the future never does!”. Paul d’Orleans

The Art Ride consolidated its presence in Casa Ciriza in the town of Pasaia with a more tridimensional line up  as the Surf & Skate got more power adding freshness to compensate the later lack of new concepts or ideas in the motorcycle world.

In the racing department El Rollo was as good as last year or even better proving that dirt track is one of the coolest things you can do on a motorcycle and Punk’s Peak was a success although starts lacking coolness due to an increased professionalization/uglification  of the participants and their weapons of choice victims of a loony power escalation. Among the news this year, was that El Solitarios 50cc racers from La Copita ruled on asphalt & dust, showing the rest of the world that you do not need hundreds of horses to have the most fun.

And to put a golden end to the event, on Saturday evening we organized an incredible barbacoa party, in which El Solitario unveiled its wisest endeavour so far. A secret project that has accompanied our family for years and after endless tastings cosy dinners and unfulfilled dreams, finally saw the light this early Summer night. El Solitario’s Barbacoa Sauce!@# We cooked, we ate, drank whisky and danced till very late into the night until the security kicked us out, but that’s another story…

This is just a mere introduction. Stay tuned for a detailed description and succinct photo essay of each and every event around Wheels & Waves in  this corner of the the blogosphere!

El Solitario wants to special thank The Southsiders, Dewar’s, Harley-Davidson, The Dyneema Project, SHOEI, Alberto Garcia-Alix, Classic Co. La Copita Family, our very own Wolf Pack, Dunlop, Sancho y Angela, Juanra, Martin, Pachi, Pio, the cities of Biarritz and Hondarribia and all of you that made this dream possible for another year. AWOOOOOOOOOOOOO!@#$%

Photography by KTFender