Denise Hoogendoourn (now Faunce) with the girl board riding club, the ‘Kuranulla Wahines’, on the beach at Cronulla 1966, photo courtesy Bob Weeks
Talked to Denise Hoogendoourn today about her stint with the ‘Kurranulla Wahines’ and the kind of things a 17 year old Maroubra surfing girl got up to around 1966. According to Denise, the Wahines formed in 1966, spurred on by Caringbah sisters Sylvia and Sandy Hoogeveen, to give ‘girl surfers a sense of belonging and confidence in the surf…which the boys treated as their domain’. Denise remembered the surfer boys of mid 60s Cronulla as being pretty tough on the girls… ‘they didn’t give us much opportunity and thought of us as a bit of a joke’. The Kurranulla Wahines wore board shorts and home made bikinis in yellow club colours and competed against the Manly Femlins and girl members of the Manly Pacific Board Riders, before winding up around 1968. The old clapped-out car Denise and her girlfriends shared, took them on many a fun-filled surf trip although once fellow Maroubra surfer and future husband Rhys Faunce appeared on the scene, Denise’s parents began to get worried. Denise gave up surfing around 1968, when marriage to Rhys and kids got in the way, but there’s plenty of sandy memories and a camper van called ‘the endless summer’ keeping the 60s alive…
The chick with the board under her arm is my Mum she said she was Upset at having to come out of the surf for the photo… Waves were good that day!!
Kate
22 Jan 12 at 9:26 am
thanks for the note
Gary Crockett
23 Jan 12 at 12:34 am
My mum is 3 to the right of Denise! That still talk about the old days! Mum still goes for a body surf nearly every day at Cronulla
Dan Smith
30 Apr 22 at 5:18 am