The latest addition to our Surf Ambassadors’ crew, we spoke to Andy Jones about returning home to Vancouver Island, his passion for fickle waves and alternative shapes, and how he balances his surfing lifestyle with environmental stewardship.
Andy Jones: The Homecoming
14.12.25
3 min read
Written by Danny Burrows
Photography by Liam MacDonald
An all-round waterman, fluent in environmental stewardship with a passion for oceans and their communities, Andy Jones cuts the green on an assorted quiver of alternative shapes, in waves that are equally diverse.
Jones's relationship with water began on Lake Huron, Ontario, where he was born. But his family was transient, moving from Central Canada to the Pacific Northwest and then on to Australia, where again they were footloose. They finally settled, 45 minutes inland from the Sunshine Coast, in Kabi Kabi Territory.
Andy plunged headlong into competitive surf lifesaving, honing his “ocean awareness” before transitioning into board riding, his land-locked condition adding fuel to bonfire of surf that burned in his belly. “Surf was pretty much everything for me,” he divulged to the Finisterre crew. “That and working as a Lifeguard at the beach.”
But neither the perfect waves of the Sunshine coast or competitive lifesaving could bleach out Andy’s memories of a childhood in the Pacific Northwest, and at 19 he moved ‘home’. “My choice was 100% surf access related,” he admits, “but ironically, over time it led me to lead a more balanced life with surf adjacent pursuits.” The forests of Vancouver Island, where he’s lived for ten years, conceal a web of mountain bike trails, where Andy draws lines when the waves don’t play ball.
According to Andy the Island’s waves are fickle, and not just your run of the mill inconsistent. “I’m talking pull up Surfline, and all signs point to a head high, glassy, reeling right point at sunrise with a perfect pushing tide. You show up and it’s flat and onshore. Drive up coast, it’s maxed out, and you blow your fins on a hunk of driftwood. Later you flip open Instagram, only to see a story showing the original right point overhead and pumping all evening.”
This capriciousness, pooled with inspiration from the likes of Bryce Young and Ryan Burch and what Andy modestly describes as “a lack of success in the pursuit of riding thrusters,” has led to his eclectic quiver of alternative boards - from logs and shorter single fins, to twins and mid-lengths: “I love trying all sorts of different shapes” he says, but his board of choice on a good days is a 6’9 Album Townsend twin asym, “with a bit of a full nose, pulled in tail, long toe side rail and snappier shorter heel side rail.”
His deck work and rail play is free-thinking and poetic, driven as much by improvisation with environment and craft as it is unfettered talent. But he is quick to turn the spotlight onto his local crew, from his “surf dad” Mike, the owner of local board shop Seek and Surf, to the women out riding single fin logs at the local points. “Love surfing with Hanna Scott,” he adds enthusiastically. “Great taste in boards and great stylie person on the water.”
As well as playing on the faces of Vancouver Island’s waves, Andy works for a marine oil spill response organization, pilots a whale watching boat, guides surf boat trips and is coming to the end of a diploma in ecological restoration, his final project a collaboration with the T’Sou-ke Nation and the District of Sooke. “We are planning a small riparian restoration project alongside a local pond, in hopes to restore some culturally and ecologically significant species at the site, whilst engaging the local community.”
In fact, community – from surfing’s own to the First Nations people of BC – is central to who Andy is. Prone, like any surfer to share a surf yarns, he is as quick to unpack the Instagramable beauty of BC to talk about the cultural and ecological genocide of European colonization and the work of local communities and First Nations to reverse it. “Surfing has always been central to my life, but I’ve been searching for ways to use it as a tool for something greater than self-promotion.” For both Andy and Finisterre their new partnership feels like an opportunity for change, and like Andy says, he and we are “excited for what the future holds.”
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