The idea for Gay Surf Brazil started when Thomas Castets from gaysurfers contacted me to talk about a documentary he was making at the time, Out in The Line Up (OILU). He wanted to do an event in Brazil for gay surfers because Brazilians were the 3rd largest group of members visiting his site. After I watched the trailer of OILU, which really helped me understand the extent of homophobia in surfing, I started thinking of my own lonely experiences in the water. I’m usually the only woman riding the waves at my local beach, certainly the only older lesbian!, so I thought it would be great to give the LGBT+ community an opportunity to enjoy this amazing sport in a safe and friendly environment. It is easy to describe the day-to-day program of our LGBT surf camp. What’s harder is to describe how the surf camp really touches those who attend. A lot of people in the LGBTQ+ community, like me, may have wanted to try surfing at some point in their lives but didn’t because they believed...