Byron Bay, a land of unfettered surf dreams and where “murfers” squabble over who has the best Blanc Marble countertops in their pretty haven of narcissism and clandestine infighting.

Rip Curl co-founder Brian Singer ain’t a man to die wondering.

Last October, after taking a dozen years to find a buyer they could live with and that and with the necessary bankroll, he and the brand’s other founder, Dougie Warbrick, sold the company they’d founded in Torquay in 1969 to camping retailer Kathmandu for $A350.

Brian’s 35.5 percent of Rip Curl got him $58 million.

And ain’t no better way to allocate a little of the spoils than with the best house in Byron Bay aka Far North Bondi, a land of unfettered surf dreams and where “murfers” squabble over who has the best Blanc Marble countertops in their pretty haven of narcissism and clandestine infighting.

Surf-wise, still real good, howevs.

Brian, who is seventy-six, has bought the new joint in a company name, sharing ownership with his four kids, Samala, Naomi, Anthony and Jade, outbidding it’s rumoured, Zac Efron and Matt Damon for the keys.

It’s the first time the house, which squats on a hillside overlooking the soft rollers of Wategos and under the watchful eye of the Byron Bay lighthouse, has been sold since 1994 when it was sold for a then record of $1.24 mill. 

Been a good month for Brian.

He has a share in the syndicate that owns Melbourne Cup-winning nag Twilight Payment, which won $4.4 million in prizemoney a few weeks back. 

Examine Brian’s new house here. 

The Vulnerable Adult Learner Swimmer!

Hardened Dublin Bay sea-swimmers are taking a leaf out of the surfers’ book of beefs with as they attack the bona fides of swimmers using Dry Robes.

Dry Robe is brand name of “the world’s most versatile change robe” and costs 150 Euro or 180 American dollars.

The veteran Dublin swimmers’ issue is that the Dry Robe prevents the wearer from experiencing the invigorating post-swim, life-affirming “scrotum tightening” chill of the Irish sea.

“Year-round sea swimming used to be the preserve of a few people, known as “hardies”, deemed brave or mad. That changed several years ago when sea swimming became trendy,” reports The Guardian. “Some hardies associate the robes with arrivistes who snaffle parking spaces, hog benches with their fancy fleeces, call sea swimming ‘wild swimming’ and try to undo the Irish Sea’s effects on the human body.”

Arrivistes? Snaffling parking spaces?

So far, so familiar. Clueless weekender newbies coming into a “our” sacred space and clogging up the line-up – sorry, benches. Those Hardies sure are mysterious; immune to the frigid chill of the Irish sea but very much attached to public seating facilities.

And, they’ve got even more in common with us surf types, complaining about the “Dry Robe Wankers” penchant towards “using GoPros, selfie sticks and other devices to document fleeting swims.”

Anti-Dry Robe posters have already appeared, surely we’re only a couple of hogged-benches away from a slashed tire or two.

Naturally, BeachGrit will follow the story as it progresses.

Thirty-five mill plus if you got the cheese… 

Last year, it was revealed, here, that a passionate newcomer to surfing had bought the hottest piece of real estate in surfing and was gonna fill it with a landmark twelve-storey tower catering to the fabulously wealthy.

“I love everything about it and can’t believe I’ve been lucky enough to buy it,” said Brisbane-based VAL Paul Gedoun.

Now, and just a few hundred metres north, the old 151-room Greenmount Beach Resort, a faded jewel that was as glamorous as it gets when it was built in 1980, is gonna be offloaded and replaced, likely, with four or five twelve-storey towers.

Queensland developer Sunland Group bought the old site in 2016 for twenty-eight mill.

The following year they lodged plans for a $370 million build featuring two curvilinear towers filled with 247 apartments. It didn’t happen and in a recent review of undeveloped assets the company figured better to sell than linger.

The Greenmount Beach Resort holds many pleasant memories for your old pal DR including, although not limited to, being attacked with a glass bottle by a noted surfboard shaper enraged by my involvement in a bodyboarding magazine; meeting a pretty brunette with smoky eyes who would later become my wife; and presenting Kelly Slater with a twin-fin surfboard made by Mark Richards and painted in candy stripes and which would feature in a number of surf movies – a surfboard I’m pretty sure, helped convince MR to put the old board back into production, and to great commercial success.