Belinda Baggs isn’t just a surfer; she’s a soulful reminder of why we paddle out in the first place. In first female cover of Surfers Journal with a style shaped by the point breaks of the Australian coastline and a philosophy rooted in deep respect for the ocean, she has quietly become one of the most influential figures in modern surfing—without ever needing to shout. Whether she’s gliding down a line or advocating for the waves we love, Bindy embodies grace, grit, and a deep, unhurried connection to the sea. We were lucky enough to have her, partner Jarrah and two children Grayson & Naia visit during Family Weeks…
Words by Belinda, photography by Jarrah Lynch with additional images by Jason Acott & Scott Winer.
Bula.
Not just a greeting you collect at the arrivals gate in Fiji.
Bula is a softening.
A recalibration.
A remembering.
It means life.
It means health.
It means I see you — exactly as you are, sandy feet and all.
And for women who spend so much of their lives holding timelines, holding families, holding space — bula feels like someone finally holding you.
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A week on Namotu Island isn’t just a surf trip.
It’s an exhale.
You step off the boat into water so clear it feels imagined — that impossible South Pacific blue wrapped gently by reef. The sand is warm. Someone is singing, and laughing. Your board bag is whisked away before you can reach for it.
Your kids are already barefoot exploring island paradise.
And something in your chest unlocks.
The noise drops first — notifications, performance, the subtle hum of being needed every second. Then the deeper static fades. The forward lean.
Bula.
Your body remembers how to arrive.
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Namotu sits quietly in the Mamanuca chain, small enough to walk around in minutes. You can see the sunrise and the sunset without moving your feet very far. There are no cars. No roads. No rushing.
Just reef. Wind. Tide.
Time bends to swell charts and trade winds here.
For ocean women, especially, there’s something deeply affirming about a place that honors rhythm over urgency. You check the wind before you check a clock. You read the tide like a mood. You watch the reef breathe.
And you begin to breathe with it.
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The waves wrap the island in options. Soft, playful rights on one side. Clean, peeling lefts on the other. Perfect for logging, for trimming, for those long cross-steps and levitating noserides that feel less like maneuver and more like meditation.
One glassy afternoon the surface is a mirror — sky reflecting sky. I step to the nose slowly, deliberately.
Just glide.
Just feel.
Out the back, my son Rayson trades waves with the other teenage boys and girls. There’s hooting, but no hierarchy. Encouragement instead of edge. It’s the kind of lineup that reminds you why you started surfing in the first place.
Joy before performance.
And then, out on the horizon, you see her.
Myth made visible.
Storm energy traveling thousands of miles before bending perfectly over coral built millimeter by millimeter over centuries. For advanced surfers, it’s a pilgrimage wave. For others, it’s a humbling reminder of nature’s architecture. For me it’s a dream come true to ride swell over this sacred reef.
At Namotu, families split gently with the conditions. Early dawn patrol for the experienced. Mellow island peelers for the rest. Kids cheering from boats and everyone trading boards and smiles.
Just flow.
Between surfs, the island becomes a living classroom.
My daughter is learning a different culture and chasing hermit crabs before breakfast. And my son is handed a foil board and grinning through wipeouts by lunchtime. Snorkels are perpetually fogged from overuse.
The reef gardens are otherworldly — coral cities glowing beneath your board. Turtles gliding with ancient calm. Reef sharks tracing the drop-off like quiet guardians.
You talk about ecology without it feeling like a lecture. About how reefs shape waves. How storms create swell. How everything — fish, wind, tide, humans — exists in relationship.
Life honoring life.
That’s bula, too.
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Meals are communal and unhurried. Fresh fish. Greens pulled from island soil. Kids drifting between tables with new friends. Stories shared across generations of surfers, travelers, and Fijian family.
By day three, your coffee appears exactly how you like it.
By day four, you’ve forgotten what day it is.
Your shoulders drop. Your jaw unclenches. You’re sleeping deeper than you have in months.
Saltwater does that.
So does being cared for.
The staff move with quiet attentiveness — boards stacked, zinc located, children included, husbands sent out for “just one more wave”.
There’s a gentle reverence for women in the water here. Space is given. Waves are shared. Stoke is loud and generous.
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As someone who grew up surfing — wax under fingernails, swell direction discussed over dinner — bringing my own children here felt like a circle being created.
Watching Rayson paddle into that same blue. Seeing him look back at me after a wave, eyes wide, salt in his lashes.
That shared glance — spray between us — is bula.
Naia splashing in the shallows, learning to swim, lie on a board, feel the movement of waves held by the embrace of a tropical ocean- this is bula.
Not spoken.
Felt.
For mothers raising ocean children, there is something profound about a place that lets you surf well and parent softly at the same time. Where your kids are safe. Where community extends beyond bloodlines. Where the ocean is both playground and teacher.
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Island rhythm replaces itinerary:
Dawn surf.
Long breakfast.
Snorkel missions.
More surfing for lunch.
Glass-off glide.
Sunset cheers — “Bula!” — sandy, sun-warmed, fully alive.
No one asking what’s next.
Just what the tide is doing.
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On our final morning, the lagoon rests in golden stillness. We paddle out before first light. No words. Just the sound of water moving against reef.
A small, clean set rolls in.
My son smiles at me.
“Bula,” he says — half joke, half understanding.
And I realize this wasn’t an escape.
It was a return.
To ocean.
To community.
To the kind of travel that deepens rather than distracts.
Namotu Island slows time.
For women who longboard.
For families who surf together.
For mothers who want their daughters to see strong women in the lineup and their sons to see respect modeled in real time.
Bula isn’t something you say when you leave.
It’s something you carry home in your salt-stiff hair, in your sun-kissed skin, in your slower breath, in the quiet confidence that comes from riding a wave.
