Learn to surf in five days on our Strandhill surf camp

Learn to surf and a lot more in a safe, fun, structured environment on our Ocean Warrior surf camp. All our Strandhill surf camps are personally supervised by Sligo Surf Experience owner Seamus Mc Goldrick, a professional surfing coach. All our instructors are experienced surfers who know everything there is to know about surfing in Strandhill. The Ocean Warrior five-day surf course is one of the best Sligo summer camps. Our surf camp is great value for money with a 20% discount on the cost of five days of surf lessons. The price includes the cost of hiring the surf equipment for the week.

Ocean Warrior Surf Camp

Sligo Surf Experience's award-winning five-day Ocean Warrior Surf Camp is an educational outdoor summer camp in Strandhill, Sligo that is both inclusive and challenging. The surfing summer camp is suitable for nine to fifteen-year-olds. Teen surf camps are available for older children. You need to bring swimming gear and a towel and our surf school in Strandhill supplies the rest of the necessary surfing equipment (wetsuit, boots, boards). Equipment hire is included in the price. For more information check out our FAQ page.

The popular Ocean Warrior surf camp is available Monday to Friday, July and August and consists of daily surf lessons in Strandhill. Summer camps include daily surfing or bodyboarding activities, beach games, environmental education, water safety and ocean awareness and, of course, lots of fun in the ocean. It is the perfect introduction to Sligo surfing. All camps last two and a half hours per day. The minimum age for the Ocean Warrior surf camp is nine years old (no exceptions).

Surfing lessons in Strandhill are a great way to build a young person's confidence and understanding of the ocean. Our summer camp is designed to bring out the inner Ocean Warrior in every participant regardless of ability with the help and expert guidance of Seamus Mc Goldrick and his friendly and engaging team of Sligo Surf Experience instructors.

The aim of the Ocean Warrior surf camp is to change attitudes and behaviours towards the water and ensure that each student leaves with lifelong respect and awareness of the ocean. In addition to learning essential water safety knowledge, they will get lots of information about surfing in Sligo.

Our surf camp program aims to develop confidence and social skills while creating a new sporting interest. The Ocean Warrior surf camp motto is: 'Respect All, Fear None, Have Fun.'

Strandhill native Seamus Mc Goldrick is well known professional bodyboarder and an experienced Strandhill surf school manager with over twenty years' experience surfing at Strandhill Beach. Seamus has also represented Ireland internationally at European and world championships and surfed at the highest professional level.

Our Ocean Warrior surf camp is sponsored by Good 4U foods who provide healthy snacks for our hungry surfers each week.

Summer Camp Structure:


Each day begins at our meeting point at the Sligo Surf Experience surf van. The first three days of surfing lessons in Strandhill focus on introducing the surf camp participants to the ABCs of surfing. Each surfer receives an Ocean Warrior surf camp workbook that they can fill out every day to mark their surfing progress. Surf camp participants will learn lots about Sligo surfing from their Ocean Warrior workbooks and their friendly surf instructors.

During their surf camp, participants will learn and practice three fundamental surf skills. The first is how to lie on their board in a balanced position. The second is how to paddle their board forward in order to catch a wave. The third skill is how to paddle, catch a wave and stand up in one, two or three easy steps.

On day one, surf camp participants get to meet their surf instructors. The instructors guide the surf camp participants to the beach and play a quick ice-breaker name game so all the instructors and participants get introduced. Next, students are introduced to their surf equipment. They are shown how to handle their board safely and carry their board to waist depth water. They also learn where the safe Strandhill surfing zone is (between the flags) and the whistle and hand signals instructors and surfers use to communicate.

On day two of surf camp, instructors check for learning and ask the group to recall the parts of the board and the safety signals used the day before. We will go through the basic surf technique from day one again. Surf camp participants are asked about one thing they did well on day one and one thing they would like to improve on today.

On day three of surf camp, after recapping basic surf techniques, our instructors will offer extra coaching to each student and give them one or two coaching points to practice to improve their surfing technique. The instructors will also go into more detail about the ocean environment, how waves are formed and the effect of the wind and tide on the waves in Strandhill. Environmental concepts like Leave No Trace and Take Three for the Sea will also be introduced to the surf camp throughout the week.

On day four of surf camp, our beach talk will focus more on ocean awareness, how to describe the surfing conditions and how to spot a rip current. The group will play some beach games to help them build on the surfing techniques they have learned during the week. The goal at this stage of the week for our young surfers is to be able to catch more waves each session than at the start of the week.

Day five of surf camp is all about having one last, super fun surfing lesson in Strandhill. After patiently listening to their instructors all week, Friday is a fun day. Surf camp participants have learned basic surf techniques and have learned how to stay safe in the water and listen to their surf instructors. We also like to teach surfers on their summer camp about the problems we face from marine litter, particularly plastic. Our young surfers will participate in their own two-minute beach clean and learn about the national Clean Coasts organization which helps people all over Ireland organize their own beach cleans.

Surfers are people who visit the beach more often than other people. So surfers have a special responsibility to spread environmental awareness and show a good example. If tides and conditions allow, we get the surf camp to organize their own two-minute beach clean to see how much rubbish we can find on our favourite beach. The surf school provides gloves and bags. Then it is off to the sea to catch as many awesome waves as possible for the last day of surf camp.

Back at the surf school, each child gets their Ocean Warrior surf camp certificate signed by the Sligo Surf Experience manager before saying our fond farewells.