“Revel Surf is a place where the small envision big and the broke feel rich..."

California surfers awoke, this morning, with cars packed for an exciting surf adventure. They made themselves hot cups of coffee, sprinkled with Laird Superfood Creamer, checked the air pressure in the tires, found the new FKA Twigs album on Spotify then pointed east, away from the ocean, to the newest, and closest, surf tub.

Revel Surf, in Mesa, Arizona, has officially swung its gates wide freeing the aforementioned wave sliders from the whims of Mammy Nature. The swell lagoon utilizes Wavegarden technology and offers four levels of experience. Level I, “Learn to Surf,” costs $119 per session. Level II, “San O,” costs $129 and is for those who enjoy longboarding in manmade waves. Level III, “The Bu,” also at $129, promises “a small point wave that will be a little bigger and faster than San O.” Level IIII, “Lowers,” bumps up to $139 and is the high-performance offering.

Sessions average 10 – 12 waves per participant.

Founder Cole Cannon bullishly declared, “Revel Surf is a place where the small envision big, the broke feel rich, and immutable memories are forged daily. Revel Surf at Cannon Beach truly is the intersection of lifestyle and adrenaline.”

I am broke but would like more than to just feel rich. I would like to be rich too.

The beach portion is free until Feb. 28 and features sand imported from Florida’s panhandle. How much do you reckon a pound of panhandle sand goes for on the open market?

Can I get rich there?

I imagine trucking sand across the contiguous 47, from Pensacola to Mesa would also be at the intersection of lifestyle and adrenaline.

Very cool.

Tears in Hawaii today.

Slip out the back, J-Bay. Make a new plan, Snapper. Hop on the bus, Belharra, we don’t need to discuss much, other than none of you is the best place to surf in the world. Neither is Pipeline, Cloudbreak, Micronesia, Lower Trestles, Abu Dhabi, Salina Cruz, the Algarve, Margaret River, Skeleton Bay, Cloud 9, Canggu, Steamer Lane or Puerto Escondido.

In a shock twist that has staggered surfers, worldwide, that honor has been awarded to Florida’s New Smyrna Beach by the powers vested in Southern Living magazine.

New Smyrna, located northeast of Orlando, south of Jacksonville, is praised for its user friendly waves, relaxing laidback vibe and glittering surf stars, including Kelly Slater, Evan Geiselman and Lisa Andersen.

Left out was Eric Geiselman.

Southern Living swoons, “New Smyrna is beloved among East Coast surfers because it offers some of the most consistent swells in the region. Though most waves don’t get much bigger than a few feet high (unless it’s hurricane season), you’re pretty much guaranteed to wrangle a set to ride during any time of year. Completely flat days are few and far between.”

Also left out was Aaron “Gorkin” Cormican.

Let’s remember him, together, here.

Goodfellas meets in The Departed in paradise.

Just when you thought that today could not any better, news is spreading that the legendary director Martin Scorsese, Academy Award-winning actor Leonardo DiCaprio, former wrestler Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and British bombshell Emily Blunt are all teaming up to make a Hawaii crime drama.

Deadline is reporting:

The film focuses on a turbulent time on the island paradise when an aspiring mob boss battled rival crime factions to wrest control of the underworld of the Hawaiian islands. It was a bloody battle, the kind of terrain Scorsese covered in both Goodfellas and The Departed. In 1960s and 70s Hawaii, this formidable and charismatic mob boss rises to build the islands’ most powerful criminal empire, waging a brutal war against mainland corporations and rival syndicates while fighting to preserve his ancestral land. It’s based on the untold true story of a man who fought to preserve his homeland through a ruthless quest for absolute power — igniting the last great American mob saga, where the war for cultural survival takes place in the unlikeliest of places: paradise.

Very cool but maybe not as cool as a book released twelve years ago, now, that provided an “unflinching look at the high-stakes world of surfing on Oahu’s North Shore—a riveting, often humorous, account of beauty, greed, danger, and crime.”

Ah yes.

Back to the Scorsese-DiCaprio-Johnson-Blunt joint, though, word around town is that a fierce bidding war is currently underway to make it with a projected budget of $200,000,000. Netflix is currently the odds-on favorite to win. The losers can comfort themselves, though, by bidding on another Hawaii story about an “exciting and dangerous place where locals, outsiders, the surf industry, and criminal elements clash. A fascinating look at class, race, power, money, and crime, set within one of the most beautiful places on earth. The result is a breathtaking blend of crime and adventure that captures the allure and wickedness of this idyllic golden world.”

Now that’s what I’m talking about.