Thrasher Magazine

 

Most skate trips these days entail luxury accommodations in clean hotels and flights for all the riders. But for the new Altamont boys we had to work with what we could get. It was a very last-minute trip but there are some creative minds that manage things over there and they were able to pull some shit together and make an awesome, unforgettable skate trip happen. The goal was mainly just to gather lookbook content for the Spring ‘17 catalog so there wasn’t much pressure to get anything too crazy but we came back with way more gnarly content than we had expected. —Kyle Seidler

The trip spanned a total of 12 days. I missed the first few but flew in to Austin to meet everyone three days into it. It ended up being perfect timing: everyone was ripe and fully in road-trip mode. They'd had zero showers and had been skating all day every day. That night, we settled into a campsite for the night. Chris Wimer was telling his life chronicles around the campfire; it was great
Bucky, putting in overtime on the laptop

Jason Salillas doing some target practice while Noel breaks down camp. That morning we got up and gathered everything to head into Austin. Randy Randall from the band No Age was rolling with us. They were playing a few shows in Austin and he was also playing with the Ratfist, which includes the Altamont team manager, Noel, on drums

The first Ratfist show was at a small house that looked like a location from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre; it was rad. The boys got a little chance to unwind there and then onto skating the next day

Shotgun!

Daniel figured I needed one

The next day we checked out some local Austin skate spots. Luckily, a few of us had been there before so we had an abundance of schoolyards and rails to visit

Frankie Heck starts the day off with a risky boardslide popover

Chris Wimer, backside tailslide

Wimer can get tech too

Frankie is from Texas so he got a few friends to show us some rad gems in the area.

Victor Aceves warms up with a back lip

Frankie followed it up with a kickflip frontside boardslide

And Jason Salillas got the lipslide shove it

After the boys got tricks on that perfect little rail, we had to decide whether to light up a spot and keep skating or call it a day and head to a bar. Chris Wimer exclaimed, "Fire it up," so we headed to the closest rail before indulging in the liquid nightlife

Wimer warming up with a nosegrind

Eyeing her up

And then knocking out the kickflip lipslide

Party time! Daniel Dubois, loved by the ladies

The following morning we left for Dallas, stopping on the way at a few spots. We arrived at this perfect red rail where everybody in the van managed to get a trick

Ryan Lay has a big ol' nollie. Here he is doing one into a noseblunt

Daniel with a backside overcrook

Bump

Wimer, backside180 nosegrind

Frankie Heck, half Cab backside 50-50

Jason Salillas, hurricane

Ryan Lay, nollie backside 50-50

Victor Aceves shut it down with a 360 flip lipslide

Check, check

We moved on to the next spot where the same thing happened. The poor, unsuspecting glass rail got massacred

Victor with a back lip 

Jason with a very treacherous lipslide

Eventually we made it to Fort Worth and skated around that area. We met up with Frankie’s family who were nice enough to let us crash on their floor

Daniel messing around

Chris Wimer, kickflip backside nosegrind

The Hecks

Frankie, heelflip crooked grind

Ryan with a very long nose manual

We went skating that evening and ended up in the basement of a college parking garage. It seemed super sketchy but it had a really nice rail that Chris and Victor jumped onto. They landed their tricks as we were being ushered out by security. Victor back Smiths while Ryan documents it via iPhone

Victor sneaks a front blunt in before security arrives

Wimer noseblunts on the way out

The following day, we made our trek out of Texas but not before stopping at the Cadillac Ranch

Jason at a gas station on the outskirts of Texas

Daniel Dubois, Victor Aceves, Ryan Lay, Frankie Heck, Chris Wimer, Jason Salillas and a Texas flag. “Guys, this kinda feels lame and cheesy.” “No, just look cool. You’re killin it.”

For the last leg of the trip we cruised through New Mexico and made a stop at the classic Indian School ditch before heading back to sunny Southern California. See you later, road