Like like a king.

Kelly Slater, the world’s most decorated surfer, has officially listed his Oahu manor for rent. Perched on the surf-rich North Shore just a stone’s throw from Laniakea, a short drive from Haleiwa, the 5 bedroom/6 bath beachfront estate, spanning 6700 square feet, also features a swimming pool, air-conditioning, hardwood flooring, decks, a patio and garage for which to park an SUV or pick-up truck on large tires.

The beachfront portion, it should be noted, is also protected by burritos.

Slater purchased the home in 2017 with Architectural Digest swooning, “(It) is infused with Asian and Hawaiian design elements, made especially apparent by the serene boardwalk over an outdoor pond with a Buddha statue sitting in the midst of tropical plant life.”

Now, how much do you think this legacy property goes for per month.

$150,000?

$75,000?

Wrong.

Act today and all can be yours for $46,000.

Bargain basement.

Imagine the stories whispered from the walls or places walls should be (due an open-ish floor plan).

Imagine resting your head, each night, where greatness occasionally does.

Examine Slater’s interior decorating touches below. Follow your heart and rent here.

 

CORRECTION:

Slater’s home, this his second on the North Shore does not have burritos nor a statue of Buddha.

Dave goes nuke!

If you knew Dave like I know Dave you’d be enchanted by his big eyes, delicate hands, never dirty, and silky hair that he smooths vigorously each morning in the hope of flattening a cow-lick which rears from the top of his skull. The living embodiment of the World Surf League’s pivot away from surfing’s roots and to its generously inclusive, diverse, LGBTQ+ friendly model. 

Given this background, I was dazed, shocked, and finally intoxicated, when Prodan, architect of the WSL’s Wall of Positive Noise, punctured the his own edict with a tweet eviscerating Republican senator Josh Hawley, noted for his Conan Hayes-esque objection to Joe Biden’s victory in 2020, but famous now for running terrified from the Jan 6 attack on the US Capitol. 

Following a post of the Jan 6 video, which shows “Hypocrite and coward” Hawley raising his fist in solidarity to the revolting throng before fleeing out a side door, Prodan went nuke, 

“…that treasonous, spineless shit stain of a human being @HawleyMO is very good. That’s your legacy you racist, bigoted, craven asshole. That image. We all know it.”

Good. If nothing else (and please, let there be…so much else), tonight’s hearing bodying that treasonous, spineless shit stain of a human being @HawleyMO is very good. That’s your legacy you racist, bigoted, craven asshole. That image. We all know it. https://t.co/TutSYvWZAy

— Dave Prodan (@DaveProdan) July 22, 2022

Infinitely more thrilling to be enslaved by a hero than a devoted company man.

Do you think this signals a pivot by the WSL to the more exciting principles of drama and conflict in sport?

Or, no.

A spasm of honesty and boldness, but temporary.

Someone has to do it.

World Surf League CEO Erik Logan appeared recently on the much-loved Lipped podcast and dropped jaws with an incredibly rosy assessment of professional competitive surfing. Engagement through the roof, new fans turned each and every day, partners fighting each other to throw money at the unfolding glory.

Long part of the bullish WSL growth push, since it was acquired for free by billionaire Dirk Ziff, has been converting those who don’t surf but fall in love with the “sport” as passive consumers much like the UFC has non-combat fans and football has non-brain damaged ones. Transitioning into “real,” as it were, or at the very least “legitimate.”

I am certain both China and India have multiple of these wonders who spend fourteen to sixteen hours a day locked in small cubicles loving professional competitive surfing deeply but for anything to really pop it has to pop in the great United States of America.

Even diminished, the land of the free, home of the brave, still reigns pop supreme.

And so I will drive from Cardiff by the Sea to Albuquerque, New Mexico, to Oklahoma City, Oklahoma to Memphis, Tennessee before ending in Nashville. My steed, a 2012 Volkswagen Jetta Wagon in black, that must be delivered to my ultra-talented soccer playing daughter at Vanderbilt.

Leaving in hours.

What will I find in bars and roadside hotels along the way? Gas stations and rest stops?

Graceland?

That, friends, will be the story of our time.

Of professional competitive surfing’s true rise or, as the case may be, Logan’s lies.

More as the story develops.

"There was a giant bite mark. That could have been me."

Any surfer who has traveled to the Hawaiian Island chain knows that it is paradisiacal but also knows a dark menace lurks beneath the plumeria and hibiscus flowers. Violently spilled açaí bowls. But also wild pigs. Nasty things that defecate in water sources, root around for goodness only knows what and terrify the unsuspecting.

Usually, this terror occurs on terra firma with the beasties snorting and glaring. They are not afraid of humankind and so gladly charge, tusks bloody and gross.

Sometimes, though, it occurs in the surf and let us, quickly, to Igrid Seiple’s harrowing tale on Oahu’s North Shore.

One day in December 2021, I drove out at dawn to Mokulē’ia beach on Oahu’s north shore. I picked a spot to surf and went down to the shore with a friend. It was a beautiful morning. The sun was out and the waves no bigger than two feet. We paddled out; he went right and I turned left. The nearest people were 200 metres away.

I began surfing the waves, then saw something floating towards me. I wondered if it was a seal, but it looked stiff. Suddenly, it lifted its head out of the water. I was eye to eye with a wild boar, only 1.5 metres from me. It was shocked – and so was I. It had a bloody face as if it had been attacked, the longest snout, with tusks like a baby mastodon, and a look of desperation. I was afraid and, more than that, surprised. What was it doing here?

It started piggy-paddling towards me with all its might. I turned to paddle away, but its face was at my foot. I got off my board and placed it between us as a safety barrier. The pig pulled itself up and took a chunk out of the board with its teeth. I swam underwater in the other direction, and when I surfaced 3 metres away I realised it had broken through the fibreglass casing of the board and crunched through the foam. There was a giant bite mark. That could have been me.

Seiple, thankfully, made a getaway but if she hadn’t I’m certain the most feared pig hunter on the island would have been called in to TCB.

Yours truly.

Or don’t you remember how I was an integral part of a crack team that slayed a terror up Kualoa Ranch way.

Refresh here.