Thread is semi-open - this is for the kids who Tapendra would have gotten to go to the surf school with him and would have been willing to get up at ~5am to do so. They arrived at the beach before the rest of the group by several hours.  Current time is 10am, just as the other kids are arriving.

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The beach just before dawn had been lovely, and had certainly woken Tapendra up. The kids with him likely hadn't been as lucky, but Tapendra wasn't too worried about that now - the water and rush would wake them up if nothing else did.

The surf school had been quite accommodating, and had gotten them all equipped with boards, wet suits and lessons at minimal expense. The surfboard they'd issued him was huge - apparently height and weight had something to do with this, not that he had much idea exactly how that worked. In the end, his surf board was 9 feet long. It was unwieldy...but the fact the only decoration on the otherwise white board was a Google logo made up for it, in his mind. Nerdy though it might be!

Of course, he wasn't exactly pondering all this right now. After hours of practice and repeatedly getting his arse dumped into the water as the board took a wave and left him behind, he was finally getting the hang of it, he thought. Even if he did have to crouch down til he was nearly kneeling to keep his balance.

Of course, that new found confidence didn't save him from getting dumped; he caught a wave, smiled as he was actually able to ride it...and lost his balance as the wave capped, falling into the water.

He surfaced, grabbing his board and floating with it. The other students and teachers were going to be arriving any minute, he was sure; it was a good thing he didn't look completely like an idiot now. Which had been his goal from the beginning; Aileen didn't need fodder.

Some of the students who'd come with him were nearby, by one of the sand bars; he rolled ont ohis board and headed towards them, sitting up when he arrived, smiling as he tried to get his long wet bangs out of his face.

"How are you doing?" He asked, nearly tipping off his board as a wave went by that he wasn't ready for. He scrambled and found a grip, and very transparently tried to brush it off as on purpose. "Want to head in for brunch?" He asked, thoughtfully, as his stomach promptly reminded him it had indeed been several hours since their very quick breakfast.

Getting up at five in the morning was not difficult for Baxter. He had gone to bed early, and was accustomed to early mornings. At Hogwarts he generally woke around six, so one hour did not make much of a difference to the young Ravenclaw. Initially he had not been sure about getting on the surfboards early, or learning to surf at all in general. It seemed dangerous, and he wasn't a person accustomed to sports or physical activity- but Tapendra had encouraged him, and at the mention that the girls might be impressed- he had been sold. Baxter had begun to realize sometime last year that many of his older classmates were pretty, and the trip to Egypt had only helped to solidify the fact that at (almost) fourteen his hormones were starting to run more rampant.

He had been shocked at the size of the surfboard issued to Tappy, and was glad his was no where as huge. It had taken Baxter quite a while to get the hang of it, and to stop getting frustrated every time he was dumped prematurely into the waves.

Now, hours later, as the other students were finally beginning to arrive it seemed he (mostly) had the hang of it. And- oddly enough- Baxter was actually having fun. Fun was not a word Baxter used often, but the trip to Egypt was causing him to peek out of his shell a little- which what he and his family had been hoping for.

Baxter had just decided to take a short break after he'd managed to ride one of the waves without having a catastrophic wipe out, and looked quite pleased with himself when his head of house (and old family friend) approached. "Lunch is soon enough," he responded. "What's another couple of hours? Especially in this weather," he grinned. His own hair was wet and laying flat against his head, and he offered an uncharacteristically bright smile to the others who were there. "Besides, I'm just now getting good- I'd rather not test my luck."

For most teenagers, getting up at five am would be a fate worse then hell. For Nikolas, after adjusting to the time change, it was merely an annoyance. But today's sunrise hadn't even registered a grumble. He had been looking forward to this since Professor Trishna had announced it.

Unlike the others, Nikolas had been surfing before, it had just been a really long time. This meant that after a few trials he had remembered enough to make it to the end of the wave without falling in. Even then he'd been out in the water to start with, unlike everyone else who was learning about how to use their equipment and how to stand. So yeah, Niko was a bit smug.

"I'm fine either way. I'm not too terribly hungry yet." Niko was lounging on his surfboard. He grinned widly as another surfer wiped out rather specacuarly.

It was hard to believe that the day was only beginning for some, at this moment.

Raine had been more than willing to try her hand at surfing on the beaches of Alexandria; by all means, it was not one of the physical activities she had any experience with although she supposed that it resembled windsurfing, which she knew well enough. She had expected it to be far easier to balance on a board without having to hold up a heavy sail. To an extent, this was correct.

The Gryffindor's first hour on the board had mostly been an hour of falling away from the board and learning how to paddle further into the sea to catch the right waves. Many of the other students who had come along with Trishna had also found the experience challenging, and the professor himself wasn't exactly a fine specimen of stability. Raine smirked every time he fell off but she quickly stopped this after realizing how difficult it could be to both laugh and surf at the same time. It wasn't too long before her pace picked up and she found herself more often upright on the board than she did in the sea...

Surfing was exhilarating. There was nothing that could keep the smile off her face every time she climbed  a wave and rode it down towards the shore; the adrenaline rush kept her in such good temperament that even when she did take a dive, she'd hit the water laughing. Raine much preferred this to her morning jogs but regardless of how well anyone surfed, a few hours of it was exhausting. She lay on her back now, after having joined some of the other surfers on a sandbar some ways from the mainland. Her head rested on the edge of the board and she had brought her knees up, one leg crossed over the other as the witch stared up at the morning sky. Unsurprisingly, she was dripping wet but her hair remained tidy in the french braid that slithered down the nape of her neck. It was cloudless and that meant a very hot afternoon was imminent.

Professor Trishna must have come up to the group because she heard him asking everyone if they were all interested in going back for brunch-- Raine was ready to make a protest at this. Not because she wasn't hungry (on the contrary, she was beginning to feel empty on the inside) but because she was having too good a time. It was like a parent asking their children to come out of the pool. Fortunately, the two fourth years with her quickly responded in the relative negative.

Raine's smile widened a little and she glanced away from the sky to look at the professor: "Can't we just have a beach picnic today?" she asked in a childlike tone:  "I could run... ah, swim back to shore and have a basket prepared."

Being the type who was always full of energy (at least until she passed out) Cytherea jumped at the opportunity to go surfing in the morning. So what if they had to get up before five, it was totally worth it. At least that was the thought. As it turned out surfing was actually really difficult.

So even five hours later, Cytherea still found herself falling off the board after a few seconds. Not that that stopped her from laughing and getting back up. On the contrary it probably encouraged her more. The only problem was her stomach, which so kindly reminded her of its existence about thirty minutes ago.

As of the moment Professor Trishna came over to where the students had clustered, Cytherea was flat on her back, staring up at the sky, only bothering to perk up at the mention of brunch. "Food?" she half asked, half exclaimed. "I want food, food sounds good, lets go get food!"

With a sudden burst of energy she hopped up onto her feet and bounced a few times. "Yea beach picnic!" Cytherea cheered happily. "Let's do that! Can we do that?"

"Two nos, a yes and a maybe? You lot are inconsistent," he told them jokingly, following that with a laugh. He drew his legs out of the water, the full-body black and blue wet suit he wore gleaming in the mid-morning sun. The board tipped dangerously and he had to coordinate himself to keep his balance again.

"Don't think you're supposed to be swimming on an empty stomach. Or was it full?" He asked this of himself more than them, crossing his arms and tilting his head to the side a little.

"Either way, a beach picnic works for me," he told Raine. "Besides, it's not like we can't came back out afterwards."

Glancing at the two boys for a moment, he looked between the group and the beach. "How about anyone who wants to stay out does, and you can come get food when it's ready?" He offered. Since, technically speaking, he was supposed to escort students. Rules and all - not that they were exactly helpless. But they were safer on the waves than off, right?

Baxter was amused by the young girls enthusiasm for a picnic, and nodded in slight agreement. "A beach picnic would be nice," he agreed. Though he wasn't hungry, Baxter wasn't one to go against the crowd in a group activity. Democracy and what not.

But Tappy soon suggested if they wanted to stay out they could, and that they could come to shore to get some food once it was ready. Baxter liked that idea. "Shouldn't take too long to get it together though, should it?" he asked. It might only be an extra ten or fifteen minutes in the water, but he was enjoying himself. Baxter couldn't wait to send a letter to his mother and father about the fact he had not only gone surfing, but had been fairly good at it and enjoyed it. (Good in comparison to the other beginners, at least.)

"We'll be ravenous once we start eating, I bet," he said to Nikolas. "Swimming and water sports usually make someone more exhausted than they realize and hungrier." Or so he had read. It wasn't like he was experienced in water sports, after all. Baxter was a bookworm by nature, and this had been his first attempt at breaking out from that shell. In his opinion, it was going rather well.

"Can you make sure there's some fruit with the brunch?" he asked. Baxter enjoyed having fruit for breakfast, and thought that it would be nice to have something sweet and juicy considering the heat was only going to get worse as the morning wore on.

"We'll be ravenous once we start eating, I bet. Swimming and water sports usually make someone more exhausted than they realize and hungrier."

"Probably, though if we gorge ourselves we'll have to wait a bit before heading back out." He shrugged, "Cramps, pain and the post feasting nap."  Nikolas started shifting positions so he could paddle back to shore. "So if you want to go back out it'll probably be an hour till then. Just something to keep in mind." He smiled lazily.

"Well, though if everyone's going in I might as well." Niko began lazily heading back to shore, mostly on his own power but also allowing the waves to push him closer whenever they rolled under the group. While he never got to surf very often, Niko always preferred vacations where he could surf, if only because 99% of the time that meant that his family was in a place where the water was warm and not fresh of the glacier cold.

"Can you make sure there's some fruit with the brunch?"

"Fruit would be nice. Though I'm craving a good crossant sandwich. One with the works." His mom made the best breakfast sandwiches. With spices in the eggs that were still moist and sharp cheddar cheese. And also bacon. "God, now I'm hungry." He began paddling towards the shore in earnest, his stomach gurgling softly.