The raw story behind the Taieri Mouth drowning tragedy of April 2021 and the team of surfing doctors who discovered the fateful capsize. Doctor Will Allen takes us back to a day that still haunts him – but a day that has inspired him to teach other surfers to save......
New Zealand Surf Journal is excited to launch our nationwide Search For New Zealand’s Underground Chargers … powered by Emerson’s Brewery, of course. Yep, you read that right. We’re on the hunt for those surfers in New Zealand who drop tools when the swell starts maxing out. We’re talking big-wave......
I’m standing in the garage with him as he sniffles back the taps and shuffles through a rack full of surfboards, his long hair hanging flat. He pulls one after another out and they’ve all got stories: he’s made a bunch of them, rode others to world titles and has......
With more than 36 years experience shaping surfboards out of Whangamata, Pete Anderson is one of the most humble and well-respected surfboard manufacturers in New Zealand. In this film he shares his journey from growing up in the heyday of Whangamata’s board-building industry to his insights, his hopes and most......
Raglan surfer and artist Aaron Te Whanatangi Kereopa chats about his journey, following his mischief, taking the risky road and how his talent has guided him into an incredible place in his art and life. Since that first day he picked up a knife and surfboard more than 20 years......
A late-season swell offers one last roll of the dice for New Zealand’s big-wave riders and the stakes are high. As the winds swing through the ideal bearing the focus falls on a reef on a remote corner of coastline. Four teams of surfers get the session of a lifetime.......
After competing on the Freeride World Tour, and transitioning into a new career in nursing, Hank Bilous brings us an exposé into the relationship between different passions, the skill sets behind them, and the self-expression that mastery of them allows. In his directorial and producing debut, Hank adds another qualification......
Filmmaker Damon Meade brings us his latest gem of a film Days Between a New Zealand surfing showcase featuring a talented crew in action at some of the finest locations the country has to offer. Damon, who brought us Under the Weather in 2013 and the Maz Quinn-centered The Beaten......
Surfer and surf photographer Morgan Tahapehi is renowned for her body of work: Surfers of Aotearoa. Morgan has whakapapa to Tainui, but the reason she decided to hīkoi was to document the voices of New Zealand using her gift as a photographer. This is her story. Ko Tainui tōku waka......
Jack Candlish and team at Verdure Surf just might be the future of surfboard manufacturing. Operating on the cutting edge of sustainable surfboard development, they seem to have found accessible solutions to the environmental flaws plaguing the surf manufacturing industry. They’ve already won over top surfers and shapers, and they......
Organisers of Tauranga’s favorite music festival, In Bloom, have announced the launch of In Bloom TV. A union of their love of music and surfing, In Bloom TV is an all-new online surfing competition. “As planning commenced for the fifth year of In Bloom the crew behind the music event......
Surfing Australia has been awarded $1 million in federal funding to develop the “New Wave of Female Boardriders” project. In an announcement made this morning at the Hyundai HPC by local MP Justine Elliot, alongside key females from Australia’s surf community, the grant will be delivered over the next three......
Like all good sessions, it was a last minute decision to give chase. I didn’t even know if there would be surfers on the hunt. The chance to shoot a clean, long-period swell with perfect winds at dawn was enough to invoke that sense of hopeless FOMO – the type......
It’s an average Tuesday in Dunedin, New Zealand. The after school rush is in full force as I navigate traffic on the way to the St Kilda Surf Lifesaving HQ. The sky is blue and the air is almost warm – remarkably mild for a winter’s day in Dunedin. The......
So you want to get sponsored? We ask a handful of New Zealand’s leading team managers what you need to do and the steps you should take. Firstly, sponsorship has never been in a worse state in New Zealand (you can read our story on the surf industry state of......
If it feels like the surf industry has abandoned New Zealand then you’re kind of right. We look into the state of play of the industry and where the rubber meets the road here In New Zealand. I first started writing and photographing surf around 1993 – guys like Munga......