Dave Rastovich not only surfs as smooth as a dolphin, he nearly is a dolphin. In the middle of his forehead a slight bony structure barely juts out much like the curved forehead or fat nose of a dolphin. And when he enters the Chilean Sea to surf, Dave cuts effortlessly through the chop to drop into the perfect wooly walls of Antarctic power that rush down the sandy points. He must be at least half dolphin. And then there’s that matter of how whales and dolphins always seem to appear in the lineup and hang out spouting water and waving their flukes while Dave is surfing.
For these reasons it seems to me that the organization Surfers for Cetaceans, which he co-founded with the artist Howie Cooke, doesn’t only exist to protect dolphins and whales from slaughter. Ultimately it’s an organization about saving himself, Dave’s inner dolphin, and his inner soul. I can relate because my environmental work spent protecting the forested coastline of southern Chile was born out of the same sense of spirit: I spent my formative years nestled in the thick fir and redwood forests of northern California, and my conservation work is entirely rooted in the fact that my emotions and drive connect more with wild trees than with the advance of industry. Since Dave is human as well as dolphin, “S4C” is the perfect marriage of ocean, activist and soul.
Chilean filmmaker Rodrigo Farias was the local guide for Surfers for Cetaceans as they traveled the length of Chile on an educational road trip to raise awareness and bring publicity to the problem of whaling. The International Whaling Commission held its 60th annual conference in Santiago in June 2008 and Surfers for Cetaceans were here along with dozens of other local and international conservation organizations to observe proceedings and keep tabs on the questionable characters in expensive suits making mortal decisions about the earth’s largest, most intelligent marine mammals. Rodrigo called me to say that Rasta and crew were going to be in Pichilemu for an event, and they would like to meet me to learn about my 7+ years of being embedded in the local reality of coastal Chilean environmental issues.
I anxiously took the bus to Pichilemu, excited to meet the world’s foremost freesurfer and half-dolphin-man in his ocean element at Chile’s funkiest soul surf city. Fortunately and unfortunately I found after getting off the rusty bus, that “Rasta and crew” was an understatement: in tow with Rasta to help him raise awareness in Chile was an all-star cast of surfers (Parko, Chris Del Moro, Crystal Thornburg, Dane Ward, Ramon Navarro, Diego Medina and more) as well as 4 filmmakers, 2 writers, 2 photographers, random environmentalists, whale artists, one beautiful blond mermaid and her attendant maids and various other hangers on. A total of 20 people in four cars were helping Rasta make his case for dolphins and whales in Chile. They had just driven down the coast 2,000 kilometers from Arica through the driest desert on the planet and they were an unshaven crew of cetacean lovers ready to share the love, and the outrage, with Santiago’s whale-hunting bureaucrats.
“What really impresses me about Ramon is how involved he is in his community. He’s organically, fearlessly committed with his hands in the mix and his name on the line for something he believes in.” After a week of trying I’ve finally managed to pull Dave away from the group and have a quiet conversation. We are talking about the seemingly endless environmental threats to the Chilean coastline, something that Dave and S4C had no idea about before getting here. Pichilemu’s local surf legend Ramon Navarro was instrumental in rallying opposition to an ill-planned sewage pipeline into the ocean. Ramon is helping me to promote opposition to a massive coal-fired power plant that will darken the skies and pollute the ocean near Santos del Mar, an offshore slab of a wave that the local crew found in 2007 and which regularly offers him massive quadruple-overhead barrels in the austral winter season. Dave is humbled and impressed not only by the scope of the problems that surfers face in Chile, but also by how Ramon manages to translate his fearless wave-riding into career-threatening advocacy for a cause. It’s something that Dave, balanced between angry dolphin man and professional athlete, can relate to all too well.
Dave and his mermaid wife’s mission in Chile is indispensably narrow and razor-sharp, a focused and specially-tuned machine made of seaweed, salt and wind set at protecting whales and dolphins at all cost. But the reality in Chile has finally caught up to their lofty aims, and it’s not so clean cut: the aforementioned coal-fired power plant set to import millions of tons of Australian coal and dump wastewater in the ocean; millions of acres of eucalyptus and pine plantations grown for logging wreak havoc on coastal ecosystems; over-fished marine environments cause local fishermen to set fire to their wooden boats in the middle of the highway in protest of government inaction to control multinational fishing conglomerates. All are priceless concerns coming to a head within the smaller context of cetaceans being hunted by man for profit.
As whales die, so does freedom. So Dave saves himself, I try to save the waves, and we hope that freedom reigns for another generation. Every bottom turn, every barrel, every racing pump down the line on this wave of life is a slingshot of inspiration to get out and do something brash for the environment – do it for the planet, do it for yourself, do it for your inner dolphin. Or just ask yourself, what would Dave do.
- Originally published in The Surfer’s Path, Issue 70, Feb/Mar 2009. TheSurfersPathMag.com