Photography by A. J. Neste

“The premise was to surf the Quintang River Tidal Bore during its biggest week of the year…” Organized by Surfing Americas’ Mike Gerard and Mike Cianciulli of Surf Line, hosted by Chinese entrepreneurial group The Wabsono, Mike, Rusty, Greg Long, and Mark Healy, while being cared for like high-caliber Olympic sportsmen, apply their jet ski and surfing skills to wow tens of thousands gathered at the Tidal Bore Hotel during the week of the Moon Festival.

Photos by John Bilderback, Jeff Divine, David Pu’u

While on the surface a standout Surfer magazine cover boy of the early ’70s, beneath that veneer Hawaiian surfer Tom Stone was a drug-dealing tough guy and con, struggling for his identity amongst the North Shore clash of socio-economic realities. Realizing that his life path was on a dead-end street, he uncovered his higher self though his dedication to family, a return to the harmony of wave riding, and by revering the roots of his own culture.

Primary photos by Aitionn and Jeff Divine

The once powerful and influential surfing genius of MP, who crumbled into a state of mental disarray in middle age, is a wistful topic of discussion amongst his friends, fellow surfers, and aficionados of the sport. Filmmaker Hoff makes it the subject for a road-trip gathering process, searching out Peterson’s haunts, peers, and period journalists, collecting their thoughts and recollections in an attempt to decode that “wild, rebellious, and magical side of surfing” that faded along with MP’s grasp on life.

Primary photos by Bali Strickland with Scott Aichner and Morgan Campbell

A slight blonde girl who grew up on the ocean, sailing with her parents, who entered and departed the realm of competitive surfing, graduating UCSB in Environmental Studies, describes the deeply ingrown ethic, sense of balance, discipline, and view of nature’s rhythms acquired by cruising the South Pacific, often solo. “A sailing-to-go-surfing mission is anything but easy. There are no handbooks…”

“The work of Andy Moses challenges some interesting boundaries.” “Okay, so your dad is a famous artist, what do you do with your life?” Answer: Andy’s work focuses on the horizon. There’s plenty of stimulating art-speak in this piece by Colburn, himself an ex-school boy National surf champion now cutting-edge Director of the Laguna Museum of Art, writing on surfer/painter Moses. Andy’s paintings subtly deliver a surfer’s romanticized perspective of the edge of the ocean becoming a visual fantasy within the reflections of its reality.

Photos by Brian Nevins and Nick LaVecchia

“After nine years of searching through Maine, I’ve gathered only a handful of memorable sessions. A reasonable person might look at that as wasteful, but I don’t see it that way.” Brian describes a rich, rugged, and endless coast of which is almost impossible to mine for waves without doing the time. No hit-and-run strategy will yield the full fruit of these 3,500 miles of coastline with over 3,000 offshore islands, yet brief tastes prove worthwhile.

Using a historical 19th century process generally associated with American Civil War photography, Sternbach’s large-format box camera images of wave riders surprisingly changes how we perceive them.

Photos by Branden Aroyan and Reeve Wolpert/NativeCalifornia.com

Nole Cossart and Chadd Konig paddle the California coast to call attention to the threatened development of a surf-friendly, biodynamic stretch of rolling green foothills and centuries-old ag land known as Naples.

Stunning images of points and of the ethnic cultures that go with them: Originating from the unlikeliest of places, Montreal, Canada, Yassine began traveling and photographing frigid northern coastlines, often stumbling onto perfect setups that weren’t breaking. “I find that discovering a good setup is almost as exciting as getting good waves.” When eventually he comes back and they’re firing, he likes to think of the results as “returns on investment.”