Decommissioned Surf Lakes wave pool in Yeppoon listed for sale at $4 million

"The real estate agents have a job to do and the market will decide whether that price tag is worthy."

Six years ago, the mood surrounding the Surf Lakes wave pool in Yeppoon, Queensland, was bullish as all hell when the developer announced it would soon be open to the public.

After two years of testing, and at one point rebuilding after the wave-creating mechanism’s giant plunger blew apart, the world’s most picturesque wavepool was set to fit two hundred surfers over the five different waves, gobbling up thirty-three waves every minute.

It wasn’t as pretty or as straightforward as it might’ve seen, however. And it was the journalist Tim Baker who blew the whistle on its myriad tech problems two years ago when he visited Surf Lakes on a press junket.

“There are frequent delays while they tinker with the machinery or attend to glitches in the system. When a crack in the lake’s cement floor begins turning the water from an aqua blue to a muddy brown we are encouraged to help lug rocks from an on-site quarry into a trailer to help plug the cracks.

“By the end of the second day, it appears we may have pushed the Surf Lakes prototype to its limits. There’s a lengthy delay in the afternoon to attend to some mechanical issue, and when we eventually resume, after only a couple of sets, Occy sounds the alarm that something’s not quite right. The large concrete tower that the air compressor sits on top of looks dangerously off kilter. The force of the swells has knocked it off its footings and we are asked to clear the water immediately.”

Now, BeachGrit can report that Surf Lakes Yeppoon has been decommissioned and is listed for sale at around four million Australian dollars or 2.7 mill US.

Buy it and you get council approval for cabins, restaurant, scuba pool, skate park and a learn-to-surf lagoon powered by the sun.

Mary Carroll, the CEO of Capricorn Enterprises, who manages economic development in the area was realistic about the chances of someone throwing four mill at a beat-up ol’ wave park that was never commercially viable eight hours drive the state’s capital.

“The real estate agents have a job to do and the market will decide whether that price tag is worthy,” she said.

The property, at 1668 Yeppoon Road in Mulara, a rural locality between Rockhampton and the coastal town of Yeppoon, about 375 miles north of Brisbane, is being marketed by Knight Frank and Elders Commercial Rockhampton, which are seeking expressions of interest