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9 Hours in G-Land
Prompted by a hyped Indian Ocean swell, Kelly Slater, Shane Dorian, and photographer Jason Childs roll the dice, rent a helicopter, and score a memorable day at one of Indo’s legendary lefts.
Photography by Jason Childs

Timmy Reyes Matters
Why We Should All Be Pulling For The 11th Best Surfer in the World
by Brad Melekian

On the day before Independence Day, Costa Mesa looks exactly like itself: The Lutheran Church advertises for Sunday Services, folks spring from work early along a four-lane road, and fireworks stands set up in 7-Eleven parking lots entice hordes of kids on bikes and skateboards to crowd around and scrounge through their pockets for one more Black Cat.

There are no trees but there are miles of pavement. A highway gives way to several major surface-street thoroughfares. If you want to eat at a chain restaurant, get a chain-company cup of coffee, go to a chain store at the chain mall, or just see some concrete, this is your place.

The Shape of Things 
A Wave’s Eye View of Greater Trestles History
by Chris Mauro

We humans are a curious bunch. Our primary source of comfort is clinging to the familiar. Yet even our most reliable companions can’t elude the inevitable forces of change. Our friends. Our families. Our homes. Each is evolving through a steady flow of eras, each bringing new pressures, new patterns, and new arrivals. For many of us, the world we knew 10 years ago is barely recognizable. The world we knew 20 years ago no longer exists. That said, we surfers are luckier than most. We know how to find the same familiar face time and again, one that greets us warmly, like the best of old friends. I’m talking, of course, about the faces that belong to the waves we ride—the ones that stared eye-to-eye with our oldest ancestors, and our more recent heroes. The ones that worry more about how much more we’ll be changing than they will themselves. After all, they’ve been around for hundreds of millennia. They’ve seen plenty. Consider, if you will, the little stretch between Trestles and San Onofre. Man, if those wide grinning faces could talk, here’s just a sample of what they’ve witnessed, a veritable people’s history of one of California’s most storied wave zones. 

2008 WETSUIT BUYERS GUIDE

Don't go cold this summer! Check out the hottest wetsuit attire courtesy of SURFER.

SOMEWHERE OUT OF REACH
While Chasing a Rumored Wave, One Intrepid Surf Crew Finds Utopia
by Pete Hodgson and Alex Wilson

There are no flights to Tapuerangi. It has no electricity, no running water, no modern conveniences at all. The people there live the most basic lives of anyone on this planet. The name comes from the local Manihiki word, which means “heavenly footprint.” Amazingly, the island only looks like a footprint from space—a six-by-nine mile atoll with a lagoon at its center.