Virginia lawmakers consider banning wake surfing as lakeside homeowners grow furious over child abuse: “The waves take our grandkids and slam them into the dock!”

We got trouble...

And the golden age of surfing is officially over. History will record 2015-2021 as a jubilee wherein the Pastime of Kings grew legs and wandered inland, making new homes in cow towns, protected wetlands and deserts as wave making technologies exploded in viability. Also lakes where new boats, fitted with impressive cavities, could lower themselves into the water and create large breakers for which wake surfers can ride without rope or care.

Very cool.

Except, as stated, over.

Lakefront homeowners in Virginia have realized that surfing is a wayward lifestyle that leads to many societal problems including, but not limited to, child abuse.

Rhonnie Smith, a grandfather who was recently profiled in the Roanoke Times, is one such lakefront homeowner. His grandchildren used to love to play in the water just outside his house at Smith Mountain Lake until those dreaded wake surfers came to town. Now, when they pass, “large waves” slam into the shoreline and the dock. Once during this past summer, Smith said, his grandchildren were playing down in the water by the dock, and the waves threw the children into the dock.

“We pull the children out of the water any time a wakesurfing boat goes by and won’t let them back in until the boats have left the area.”

Other homeowners are equally furious and have lobbied the Virginia General Assembly to pass a law that will keep the bastards far away. Or at least 200 feet from the shoreline.

Del. Kathy Byron, R-Bedford, who represents lake residents, told the Assembly the legislation “Will keep people involved in water sports at Smith Mountain Lake and those who enjoy the lake at their docks safe, it will reduce the erosion of property and mitigate the destruction of property.”

Many chimed in with horror stories of damage done to homes and families. Thousands upon thousands of dollars spent. Children sent to the hospital and rehab.

No one testified to the committee in opposition to the bill.

Very smart for we, here, know that once surfing takes root it is nearly impossible to root out and will very soon rot the soul.


Ain't she a peach. Probs gonna be knocked down, however.

Iconic surf shack bought for $48,000 during first-ever man-on-man surfing contest sells for $7 million!

Slice of history to be bulldozed to make way for "standout family home."

In 1920, a modest wooden house was built at number 10 Goodwin Terrace, Burleigh Heads, a joint typical of the period, elevated to snatch northerly breezes, a covered wrap-around balcony to shelter from the pretty damn relentless Gold Coast sun.

Six decades later, as man-on-man surfing was being debuted at the Stubbies Pro by Peter Drouyn, the house was sold for $48,936 and occupied thereafter, and for many years, by the winner of the 1980 Stubbies, Burleigh Heads local and the town’s postman, Peter Harris.

(Correction: An overnight email from John Lambert, the great-grandson of the man who built the house, reveals Stubbies winner Harris actually lived in the joint next door and that the house wasn’t sold in 1977, despite records suggesting otherwise, but was bequeathed to his dad from his great aunt that year. Lambert writes, “Because of our ongoing Burleigh connections & friends, this article hits all my family’s social media and its pretty insulting to read something so woefully researched and ludicrous in its sloppy facts. We have to deal with the fact its being knocked down and then also deal with your fiction! C’est la vie!”)

With sizzling views of point carpark and waves just beyond.

Now, a little after the hundredth anniversary of the house’s build, the iconic surf shack has traded for seven-million dollars, almost two-and-a-half mill more than it sold for in 2016.

The couple who bought the joint had been trying to buy it for the past three years. After the last refusal by the owner to sell, the pair bought a six-mill penthouse a little further down the street.

The agent that sold ‘em the penthouse then  convinced the owner of 10 Goodwin to sell ‘em the house, too, for seven mill.

A nice little pair of boltholes, although the historic house is gonna be bulldozed to make way for a “standout family home.”

Burleigh Heads in 1920.

Once one of the grittier parts of the Gold Coast, third in shittiness behind Coolangatta and perennial winner Palm Beach, has been transformed into a paradise for investors, including the Chinese man who bought the Old Burleigh Theatre Arcade, the former home of Surfing Life magazine, for eighteen-mill.


TMZ first major media outlet to declare Makua Rothman’s weekend Jaws wave to be over 100-feet: “Rothman beat out the other surfers to catch a Holy Grail type of ocean ride!”

Finally!

I’ll be honest with you here, I forgot that a 100-foot wave was the “Holy Grail” type of ocean ride but I forget more and more these days. I do recall a day where the mystical 100-feet seemed both atmospherically impossible and physically impossible. No way could a wave ever get that big. No way could a human ever ride.

Then, climate change, then very progressive tow-surfing et voila.

The “100-foot wave” moniker has now been hung on a few different ocean rides, notably Tom Butler, Garrett McNamara and Sebastien Steutner’s Nazare beasts but much debate as to where the trough, or lowest point, of those Portuguese Mamas actually is.

Eddie’s son Makua Rothman, anyhow, was out at Jaws over the weekend, feasting on that ridiculous run of swell and TMZ is now the first major media outlet to declare his wave to be 100-feet or over.

Is Jaws easier to measure than Nazare?

Is this a 100-foot wave?

This is BeachGrit where you are judge and jury.

How do you rule?


Gimme: Former world number two surfer Taj Burrow adds ”stunning” 11-acre Yallingup property to $10-million property portfolio!

A slice of bucolic heaven.

The Western Australian surf great Taj Burrow is one of the few high-profile shredders from the nineties who didn’t invest his formidable bankroll in hookers, Balinese bars and coke.

Instead, Burrow, who will turn forty-three in June, has squandered his fortune building a property portfolio that includes a Tuscan-inspired villa overlooking Mackenzies Bay in Tamarama, Sydney, bought for 2.3 mill and valued six years later at four-mill and, now, eleven acres of bucolic loveliness fifteen minutes from Yallingup’s white-sand beaches and unforgiving reefs.

Maccas joint, Tama.

The property, bought in November for a million dollars, was marketed as the “perfect blank canvas for your new dream home.” 

Right now, the joint has a shed that’s been converted to a house as well as a small dam. 

Burrow’s principal residence is the award-winning “nautilus shell” house in Wardanup Crescent, Yalls, aka “millionaire’s row” by architect Dane Richardson. The property was bought for two-milll in 2004 and the new place was built in 2011, winning the overall Design Excellence Award at the 2012 Building Designers Australia WA.

“I pushed through with many questions but the owner travels most of the year and was young without family so it was hard to pin down exactly what was required. The brief then developed to include a small pool, a lot of storage space, small home office, games room large enough for pool table and a large open fire place for ambiance,” Richardson told Architect and Design.  “The master bathtub was positioned to have a commanding view of the clients favourite surf break. This was managed by loading our 3D model into Google Earth and tweaking the alignment of this particular window to the surf break. Another nice touch was to include a roof top deck; this is a small space sitting high on the concrete roof deck, fully exposed but an incredibly dramatic space for the old glass of wine.”

Neighbours still recall, fondly, the demolition of the old place.

“He had a pretty nice place before, but he knocked that one down. He had a demolition party and everyone came around with sledgehammers and knocked the walls down,” neighbour Candice McKiernan said. 


Chart-topping British singer Anne-Marie rudely slapped in the face by Great White Shark while visiting South Africa: “It swam past then slapped me in the face with its tail. I was in shock!”

Blame Erik Logan.

The Sunset Pro was supposed to start today at Sunset Beach, North Shore, Oahu where Surfline is calling 18-20 feet, four times overhead. Oh what fun we would have had live chatting, willing Pip Toledo to use his newfound mass, generally carrying on but alas, World Surf League CEO Erik Logan, just last month, became the poster-child of what not to do during Covid-19 and single-handedly destroyed professional surfing as we know it.

Which leaves us here, with British singer Anne-Marie vacationing in South Africa and becoming slapped in the face by a Great White Shark.

Per her report, “Exciting activities are a must when I’m on holiday. When I was on tour in South Africa with Rudimental we got in a cage to see sharks…” except that’s where things took a nasty turn. Inside the cage, “It was freezing cold and one of the sharks came really close. It swam past then slapped me in the face with its tail. I was in shock.”

I dearly hoped the #MeToo movement would have cancelled this sort of boerish behavior but South Africa, am I right?

Get it?

Boerish?

I’m sorry.

Blame Erik Logan.