Roy Meisel and Bare Nature 1972 to 1984....and Mcoy

Around 1979 to 81 I left the Byron Bay area and started work sanding, at Mcoy surfboards. I had known Geoff since W and M days , 1966, but had never worked for him before this, it was full production 30 to 40 boards a week tints, sprays,  pinlines , finishcoats and full polishes. Geoffs team of riders was impressive he had Cheyne Horan , Bruce raymond ,Larry Blair , Mark Warren and a few others whose names I've forgot, Geoff also had most of the Hawaiians when they came over and Barry Kanaipuni would shape 4 a day for about 2 to 3 weeks. So the passing parade of surfers through Mcoys was continual ,but this was a sad time for me as my marriage broke up and with my 2 kids gone it was heartbreaking at work ,I still had to do 40 boards a week( fin panels and cut outs and foils) in the end I had to leave and go back north and when I arrived at Byron I was back working at Cornish's and Roys at Bare Nature. Roy had now upped production to about 15 to 20 a week and Nigel Perrow was the main shaper with John Scott (american) doing a few. These were wild days, the Top pub was Rocking, as was the Northern hotel, but the town was not crowded and the Rails was just a watering hole fore the locals, and mushrooms and Gungha was aplenty. I don't recall many days up there then, that many people were straight, most of us who worked at Roy's were single and loose and lunchtime was Smoko time and sadly for Roy if there was a surf not many would go back to work. Roy was marvellous , he was going through hard times, with his marriage breaking up, but at the same time he had to cough up the money for his ex, and this went on to the eventuality of having to sell the buisiness and the shop. But it didn't stop Roy from being Roy, he maintained through it all , with the help of Tooheys Beer and some very close friends, and here I will tell you Roy was an ex Vietnam Vet. Both Roy and I had a passion for surfing Broken Head and many,many a great surf was had by us together there. We surfed the Pass a lot as Roy , myself and only a very few, Mark Smith , Nigel Perrow and Ronny Blewitt  rode Longboards at either the Pass or Broken so , many a glorious uncrowded smaller surf in perfect conditions was surfed. I was also riding a variety of short boards too, I had an old 6'6" Barry Kanaipuni ( for bigger surf

, a 6'0 made by me, a 5'4" kneeboard that I rode standing up, and 2 different styles of Mals ,one being Peter Greens chiselnose 9' 0 made by Mctavish ( this was the first custom Longboard by Bob out of San Juan) I made a few boards at Roys, they all went well but my little 6 footer was the Magic Carpet . I rode her in 2 foot slop at the Pass and 6 to 8 foot at the Haven ,magic board and with me at 33 years old and still bulletproof. The beauty of working at Roys was the passing parade of surfers and boardmakers that were there, and that Roy would let you make as many boards as you basically wanted....to be continued

BOB WITH PETER GREENS LONGBOARD, and me on Peters board BROKEN HEAD

JUST SHAPED and A GOOD EXAMPLE OF A BARE NATURE probably 1978 0r 80