EERIE PADDLE OUT IN MURKY WATER LED US TO THIS…. 

So great that you always keep a large portion of the paddle out on video. Positioning before takeoff and the paddle out are always overlooked in surf videos, but so vital in real life. Subscribed, keep it up!

Oooff, that raw audio, heavy slabs, and the paddle out/in, was eerie man. Glad y’all made it in safely. Ultimately, that’s what’s most important.

Some of the best surf editing I've ever seen, hire them full time. Mahina with excellent video and commentary! 🏄‍♀

Check out this interview below about this reef. This spot has some legendary stories. These guys got followed by a White back into the river, all the way in front of where Nate parked his car. And they were all vomiting out of fear. Yyyyew. NZ charging doesn't get heavier than this Nate dog you legend. SMART: Well, one of my friends used to live down here. He’s a Timaru boy. We got friendly with a farmer up the valley, and he had a little hut he used to let us stay in. We’d come down surfing, and my friend liked living down here, so he ended up coming down to live down here. We surfed a reef quite regularly - there's a nice reef break going on the next bay. It’s a bombora, so you’ve got to paddle for 15 minutes across deep water to get to an offshore reef. I wasn't able to go out, but three of them went surfing out there - Paul McLaughlan, Craig Welsh and Brendan Brooks. They said a few minutes earlier they’d seen some Hector's Dolphins in the bay. We quite often would see Hector's Dolphins there, and they thought "Oh that’s Hector Dolphins. It’s safe" you know? Dolphins, no Sharks, you know? As people always say - I hear that all the time here. And when they see Seagulls circling - that is not a good sign. CRAWFORD: Why not? SMART: Seagulls circling generally means there are some fish scraps. If a Shark come up and eats something, there’s going be a lot of debris floating on the ocean, and the Seagulls are going to go straight for it. All surfers say that in New Zealand - "If you see Seagulls circling, you’ve got to be a bit careful." CRAWFORD: Ok. RESUME SMART: And then Paul caught a wave, and he’d ridden down the wave, and he was paddling back out. As he’s paddling out, Craig and Brendan sitting on the side of the wave, and quite a big wave came in - maybe the size of this roof here [approx 4 metres], and Paul said it was like an 18-foot White Pointer in the wave, swimming towards where the other two guys were. Sort of going towards them, and then the wave came up and it was a really, really, hard broken wave, really hollow, shooting on it. And the wave just came, and last minute just sucked up and Boom! The guys who were out there heard the yelling. The guy was yelling "Ahh!" so they said they looked in towards the wave, and saw this massive Shark coming towards them, doing a big corkscrew dive. And as it went towards them, it dove, and it went down underneath. CRAWFORD: It turned over on its back? SMART: On its side, and then dived down, as it was coming towards them. That wave ... they were still maybe 15 metres away. Craig turned around, and he caught the wave and he rode it in to the end of the reef. CRAWFORD: And this reef is a 15-minute paddle offshore? SMART: Yeah. CRAWFORD: We’re talking half a kilometre offshore? SMART: Yeah. CRAWFORD: And all of this happened out there? There were three surfers - your mates? SMART: Yeah. Paul was on the inside, he had spotted it first. Craig managed to catch the wave that he’d seen the Shark in - because it had dove under the wave before it got to him. I honestly believe the Shark was coming in to get them, and the wave kind of sucked up, and took a big trove and just kind of messed the Shark up a bit. CRAWFORD: Why do you think the Shark was coming in to get them? SMART: Just because it ... oh, it’s one thing I forgot to tell you about. Fifteen minutes previous to that, they’d seen a big thing just go 'Flap' in the water, and they thought "That’s strange, might just be a Whale or something" - because we do see Whales here. But they didn’t think much of it, and they’d seen the Dolphins, and they probably thought it was safe. I mean, Seagulls - well, alarm bells ringing. But not a big Flap. And then 10 minutes later, Bang! they seen the Shark. The guy who was paddling out when he first spotted it, the wave stood up and he seen the whole thing. CRAWFORD: So, the Shark was parallel to the wave? SMART: Yeah. CRAWFORD: It was going along the wave? SMART: Yeah. Inside the wave, going towards the other two. They were out on the side of the wave, as it kind of came in, it did the big corkscrew dive, and then went down. Put it this way, if that wave hadn't been there, I think things would have been very different. CRAWFORD: Ok. SMART: Because it would have been flat water. That Shark would have been swimming straight towards them, and then Bang! - all of a sudden wave puffs up, something pops up in between them, and messes the Shark up. I believe. CRAWFORD: When your mates told you the story, you heard it from their three different perspectives, right? SMART: Yeah. CRAWFORD: Other than the corkscrew dive at the end, did they say anything about the speed of it? SMART: Didn’t really mention the speed of it - just that it was swimming with speed. CRAWFORD: And it was a big Shark? SMART: He said ... I mean, we’re all pretty familiar with the oceans in New Zealand. And the first guy who’d seen it, Paul, he’s a fishing guide now. He’s very, very, experienced. CRAWFORD: The guy’s been around the water. SMART: He’s been around. But he said, it wasn’t so much the length of it. He said it was the girth of it. The thickness of it. He reckoned it was like 6-foot wide. He said he could see it in the wave, and sure it was long - but it was but the thickness and the width of it. CRAWFORD: And that’s when the animal was coming to him? SMART: Well, he was spotting on the inside. He was kind of safe, but the Shark was swimming towards the other two guys, and the wave broke between them. CRAWFORD: So, the Shark was going across from him ... SMART: Yeah it was. Going towards the other two guys. Craig caught that wave, and rode it in to where the wave stops at the end. The guys were freaked out, and they started paddling in. Brendan had missed that wave ... CRAWFORD: And he was still out there on the reef? SMART: He was still out there. But then the next wave came, he caught that, and went in. He didn’t even have a visual of the Shark. The Shark was gone by then. So, between the second wave and the third wave, the Shark was gone. CRAWFORD: There was no indication, no circling behaviour afterward? SMART: Nothing. But when they got on the beach, they waited for Brendan, who was a few minutes behind them. That guy, when he got up on the beach he started dry retching, because he was that freaked out, you know? He wasn’t actually throwing up, he was just hyperventilating. They all got up there, and they walked up the beach. They got their clothes, they got changed. And five minutes later, that Shark swam all the way back in the lagoon! Exactly to where their footprints were on the beach. And then it just turned around, and swam back out to sea. CRAWFORD: They saw that? SMART: They saw that. When they got out, they had a camera there, and they took some photos, and you can see the fin. But that was at the same time the tide was getting a bit low, lots of kelp sticks out. Sometimes the kelp comes up, and it can look just like a fin. But we're used to that, you just don’t worry about it. But he had photos of it, and you could see it was inside the reef, and you could see it. But it wasn’t a zoom lens, and it was a long way away. CRAWFORD: But the fact was that they saw it, and they were absolutely convinced that that was not just a Shark but ... SMART: That one guy lived here. He was my best friend, and so many nights we’d sit around and he would just tell me so many times that story. Just burned into him, you know? After that, my mates were a bit freaked out, and didn’t really want to surf there too much. Then I came down one time, and we said "Right. Come on, let’s surf over the reef." We called it the reef because it’s a reef break, it was a good swell. We’d been over there, we had a good surf, and we came home and had lunch. And we thought "Right. We’ll go back and surf it one more time on the outgoing tide, because it’s a high tide break only." As soon as we arrived, we came up to lookout on the hill - the break is a good 800 meters out from the lookout point of the hill. As soon as we pulled up, I looked out and I seen a wave break and I seen this - I’ll never forget it - I seen a big kind of light grey shape of a Shark silhouette in the wave. And then that wave passed by, and then it was gone. So, I only seen that wave for about two or three seconds. CRAWFORD: And that was from an elevated perspective? SMART: Yeah. Looking down on it, so I had a pretty good look. CRAWFORD: 800 meters away, though. SMART: Yes. So, it was pretty big. I mean, I would estimate that Shark to be at least 12 foot. At least

No music for this video was such a good choice, you can even feel the tension and nervousness in the air... Also those visions from inside those heavy barrels are crazy, thank you for sharing it with us as always, you a true hero. Now this is probably one of my favourite videos of yours

Really like the filming style, almost like a point of view documentary, telling a story without speaking. Sparse commentary lets the day spent on the water speak for itself.

0:44 “here comes a wave, here comes a wave” Wave spits. Both go “mMmm” in satisfaction 😂

That feeling that comes over you when you come to the conclusion in your head that something below you is probably watching. Time to go in!

Nate, having multiple camera angles is absolutely the way to go. The result is way more than the sum of the parts. Personally, I find the majority of POV shots - unless you're locked into a long barrel - to be almost useless if there are not also pulled back shots to provide a sense of scale. Btw, your lovely wife should be doing professional voice-overs. She has a gloriously warm and smooth voice, which is so rare with modern women.

When I was a wee lad I jumped off the end of a jetty in Newport Beach in the middle of the night. I was with a bunch of buddies and a few were on mushrooms so I thought I'd give them a scare. I knew the jetty well, had surfed there many times. I looked at the tide and really measured everything out. It was a high tide and the waves were mellow and the distance to shore was pretty easy. As we were all at the very tip of the jetty I suddenly dove in and proceeded to breast stroke my way to shore. The water was pitch black and as I swam I started to get a funny tingly feeling, but didn't want to spook myself so I kept with my steady pace. Suddenly at my legs I felt a whoosh of water, but couldn't tell if it was from my own efforts. Then just a few seconds later something very large bumped into me right below my underarm at my ribs. I couldn't help but react by swinging my arms and kicking. I stopped all motion and waited for a second, then slowly swam in. I know there's sharks all around us when we're in the water, but when you get spooked it's probably because you're being stalked. Til this day I'm not sure what that was, but counted it as one of my 9 lives. Thanks for the video Nathan!

excellent stitching together of all the different angles. really captures the mood as opposed to just one angle. great editing. i prefer this kind of footage of what it actually feels like over polished "fun" shots and music. this is raw and real

That first duck dive...total darkness. Reef is definitely more dangerous, but those dark water surfs test your courage like none other. And then when you wipe out and find yourself swirling in a black hole, oh man.

Hey Nate, epic adventure. Just some sharky stats for ya: there has been about 120 attacks in New Zealand since 1840, of which only around 20 have been fatal. So that's less than one attack per year, and a fatality about every decade. There are plenty in our waters, especially with seals in the area, but extremely unlikely to have a human snack. I surf in NZ and know how spooky it can feel at times though, almost like you're being watched 👀haha. The blue summer waters of the north feel a lot better, although ironically summer is the sharkiest season.

Welcome Nathan and friends to New Zealand. I hope you make it to Taradise, head down the coast

I’m just in awe of you and everything you do Nathan honestly man, massive respect to you and your good lady, Ivan and John and the whole team for the sheer hard work and next level skill it takes to make these vids, big love from uk

You are a content creation monster! And we love it. Thanks for keeping the masses entertained.

Looks like you’re still enjoying kiwiland. Sick! Murky water is what we’re used to. Keep in mind that In Aotearoa you’ve got more chance dying while driving to the surf than being sort after by an upper end grey suit.

Sweet edit, seriously enjoy these. Great ability in bringing the feel of the place to us.

Fascinating report. The whole experience shown in detail with commentary allows the viewer to feel the thrills, fear and other emotions.

that was awesome. Just take heart that our Kiwi sharks are better fed than our cuzzies cross the ditch. You seem to be traversing our wild terrain like pros.

I know somebody who petted a seal once, that seal clamped it jaws onto his hand and proceeded to drag him across the rocks. Really messed him up. It’s not a good idea to pet the seals, as cute as they are. That wave is like so many places in NZ we always considered unreadable back in the day. Where is it? Brings back memories of biting winds, booties, made a helmet once from an old wet suite stitched together using wool. Southerly wind coming from the Deep South and blowing hard. Oh yeah those were the days.

I loved all of the different video angles. That was sick editing!

Amazing Nate, the front view makes the inside pov view way more enjoyable to watch. Slabs are my favorite to watch and to me you are the slab finding GOAT, I will never forget that perfect 20' footer you made definitely one of the best of all time. Love it dude be safe.

Thanks for visiting NZ. Your more than welcome back. Dinner plates are clean

One of my good friends was not so lucky. North of Scott Creek. A group of guys already out. He jumped in and was paddling out.,,, WHAM! 185 stitches and an airlift. He still surfs up there. There is Always some kind of Food Chain in surfing. The Lineup, the environment.

Thanks nate.....the only surf footage pov or anything surfing these days exciting to stop and watch....keep up the good work 👏 🙌

Bruh , i watch your videos because you are and inspiration !! To go every time out there and chargeeeee, I particularly…don’t care about the angles, thanks for taking all the time to create videos for us around the world to enjoy 👊 pura vida ! Aloha !

Looks very much like most "up North" breaks along the Northern Santa Cruz County Coastline. Waddell, 3 4 and 5 mile, Davenport, Ano etc. Murky cold and deep water paddles are the norm outside the cozy confines of the Monterey Bay. Nathan keep on doing what you do best, ripping waves, making stellar content, and living the life! Stay well always!

Yep sums up west coast nz surfing, sitting in the car with the heater on watching for one makeable wave to convince yourself to go out. Chuck on the wet wetsuit with a plastic bag over the feet to help get it on. Breathe on your hands to warm them up before you start the 30 minute paddle out getting smoked by set after set on the head. Take off on the first bomb that closes out and get held down and pushed way out of position as you head back out. Waters cold, waters dark, waves are heavy. Mauri ora

So grateful for the drone footage, seriously the footage you get from overhead mixed with your mouth cam is what makes these vids so great to watch. That water is murky due to recent rains I'm going to assume ? on a clear blue day and clean water that wave would be something else to watch. A lot of bait fish move in really close to shore when it's murky like this so you get a lot of predators coming in looking for them, lucky for you I'm not talking about sharks. On a clear day it might be sharky is there are seals there there will be sharks not far away.

Dark water, dark skies and big waves = spooky surf session! Beautiful wave though. Nice score!

Madness! That wave was sick! Reminded me of a paddle out I had.at The Farm on South coast Oz one time. Brown water frothy as and no one out. I went in after accidentally grabbing the side of a big arse fish in the paddle stroke. Freaked the living shyte outta me and the fish..eerie stuff Love your vids

Hello Nathan. I hope you are enjoying your visit to New Zealand, I'm in the North Island. The South Island is pretty cold, remote and gnarly. Mahia peninsula has some gnarly slabs and rocky point breaks if you are traveling the North Island. Also Cray Bay and Stingray Bay in Hawkes Bay are awesome Breaks. The North Island is alot warmer than the South Island especially the Winterless North, with places like Shipwreck Bay right up the top which is an awesome long point with insane Slabs and barrels wedging all along the point when going.

Really liking the adventure/off the beaten track aspect combined with the heavy slab surfing. Think it resonates with a lot of people in this part of the world cause getting to the spot is always part of the story you tell after.

I've surfed this wave. It's sick. You really need to backdoor the peak to get in there.

One of the best wave exploring videos Ive seen in a while.

Incredibly great Nathan. You remind me of an updated "Endless Summer" (though as the title suggests they didn't even take wetsuits). Awesome to visit these nuts spots/waves

love it Nate that wave is sick

Well....that spot was indeed super spooky....Just from watching, i also had that sinister feeling that you guys been stalked the entire sesh 😬. Great call you didn't stay longer... I think 90% of the time when you get this vibe, it's probably there, and it's probably a good idea to paddle back. Shout-out to the local paddlers too ! balls of steel. And shout-out to Zord and Mahina , the content is just getting better and better. I love the filming, edits, all the house the jokes👌🏻, packing, gears, surf checks. Don't change anything 🙏🏻 Your content and channel is unique guys❤

That is literally one of the scariest movies of our time😂 just watching you guys paddling in and then especially out. I knew this video wasn’t a shark related one and I still had the hairs on my neck standing up watching with nervous anticipation!!! No lie. Awesome video man keep up the good stuff. Keeping surfing fresh!! Many thanks to you all.

I've permanently replaced my Chuck Norris jokes with Nathan Florence jokes. Stay safe Nathan!

Gloomy and spooky session with miss Sunshine at the end😊🤙

Nate, your vids make my day! best thing to watch after coming home from an exhausting day at work. Love your work

Great spot that one...pity you didn't have a jet ski woulda made it safer for all....yes very sharky looking an they are probably there being not far from their breeding ground...awesome adventure an filming...hope you get to Papatowai..

That seal is like 'Dude, pleeease don't make me go in the water🥺' Looks a lot like the UK / Ireland.. but with sharks🤙

Love the respect you are showing towards our home Aotearoa. Keeping the spots un named is huge bro, im sure the locals where you're visiting massively appreciate it. So close to making that wave at 8min16, if only that boil up off the rock wasnt as funky. Your a beast Nate, keep charging!

These recordings are amazing, good job!

your videos are such good quality man. no wonder your channel is blowing up

Always dig this channel. But dang that was some scary water. Cold too hahah. Cold water big animals lol. That was gnarly as ever. Even though you didn't make one. You were deep in that one. Awesome gopro clip. Way bigger than it looked from land huh?? Awesome video brother!!!

Sickness! Best content on RU-vid. So much potential in the land of the long white cloud! 💯💣💥

Awesome video Nathan! Nice to see you're in NZ, my wife and I live in Christchurch, would be sweet to see you around that area. In case you're looking for the next wave, this weekend (25-26) there's a massive swell incoming to Banks Peninsula, so you might want to check out Magnet Bay or Te Oka :)

Really stoked to have the Nate Slab Tour come to Aotearoa New Zealand! Nau mai haere mai ki Aotearoa. It's awesome you're in the best region for surf. You could've easily went to Raglan and called it a trip, but you've gone to the most hardcore and consistent place in the country. There's a legit world class slab you'd love in the North Island (prob the best wave in NZ) but it's super fickle so you're in the right spot to score heavy slabs in a short time frame.

Best video so far. Great spot and the drone views are killing it

Exactly how it is in Florida. I grew up in water like this surfing New Smyrna and on super rare occasions the clear water would make it to the beach. Those days were always special.

Enjoyed the 3 camera angles. Helps put things in perspective for us. The mouth gopro is very deceptive on what the actual size of the waves you're riding. Its nice to see the same wave from the other angles so we can appreciate the size of the waves. Thank you.

Use this comment as a like button for raw audio no music edits.

Great idea to test products with the test pilot program. One time payment of $20 to join? I just might do that. This spot was just GNARLY!

You definitely see how much skill you have when the conditions arent perfect and theirs normal surfers out,

Love the drone and POV combo! So sick!

I don't like how when you catch a wave POV, as soon as you drop in it switches angles to the drone. I prefer to see the whole wave start to finish! And thats why i like your videos too

Reminds me surfing south Taranaki when the sun was going down and something bumped my ankle paddled in straight away...good advertisement for your booties 3 seasons. Love to see you here in NZ try many breaks around taranaki great place to surf. I live here in Whangamata we have the Whangamata bar that is epic as well

We are taking him home , he’s gonna love the tropics My man

you've become a pioneer mate - thankyou , respect

NZ's best "pinching closeout" (if you know, you know). Very Isolated spot. Shame the windy bay beachbreak wasn't doing it, thought that might be your guarantee for barrels. You'll definitely score around there, just need to be onto it!

Love this video, thanks for sharing this adventure!

That's NZ surfing for you. Cold, murky water. I'm a kiwi who lived in Aus for 20 years and I so miss nice warm, clear water. And the continental weather pattern, where it's more predictable wind.

I come for the spitting barrels, but stay for Mahina's commentary 💯👌😂

Nate's out there going after these creepy crawly waves, while we're all sitting here, with the comforts of home & our tails between our legs. Keep charging for people with broken backs, like me, Nate!!! I'm super grateful!❤🌊🙏🌄 Yewww!!🤙

Perfect place to find some shrooms. Looks like make able in the buggy. How do you position yourself there? Experience, feeling or is there any trick. Good video again!

Eagerly waiting for this to drop. Hyper Notifications Required 🤙🏻

nice liked the whole thing. the trek and the paddle out. seems crazy

Sick to see you surfing this spot, secretly hoping you surf the left your bro scored:) Also a spooky paddle though lol - maybe worse!

Sounds like Florence Marine needs to develop the shark bite proof wetsuit, you might be the perfect candidate for the prototype testing 😎

My favorite video of yours so far cause I used to surf this wave! It's fucken hectic, seen it be this size and all of a sudden 20 footers are hitting the ledge. So psyched. There is another crazy left slab 2 headlands further west.

New Zealand. Nice. Some good slabs there. Love south Pacific waves bro. So much energy comes off Antarctica.

Hey, our little buddy Sterling Spencer gave you a shout out as the smartest RU-vid Surf podcast deal… FYI, love you man

Great vid going to really conveying sketchy,scary atmosphere that vibes one right out being able to surf……EDGY!

Not many shark attacks in NZ. We were at Waihi beach when a shark got a girl just down the road, first fatality in about 50 years. Sad. Correction: about 20 years I think

Cold, dark water. That probably describes more than 50% of our planet’s surf spots. Coming from Santa Cruz, CA I remember the first time I surfed a spot when I could see the bottom the whole time and how freaky it seemed. Perspective is everything.

The clamping door closing at the end of the barrel would be enough for most to say "no, thanks".

Captain Sharky Slabbin Cabin 🦈 🏄‍♂️ 🌊 sketchy Nate!!! 😅

Head to Wellington Nat. Not far away theres super heavy waves on the south,south east, and lower east coast. World class empty waves all around there. Murky water though.

Are you going to do the north island as well? Great video btw!

Best cold water surfing tip from NZ - fill up 2 x 2L plastic bottles (reuse juice bottles from the super market), fill them with the hottest/all hot tap water, put them in the car/boat and use them to fill your wetsuit with warm water and wash the salt off post surf. It's still warm 3 hours later.

Did you actually take the knife out? 🤣 can't imagine how stressfull crossing the channel is. love this adventure sessions in new waves

It’s than not then if I’m not mistaken, you bunch of woozies!!! Just kidding, great episode, see ya on the next adventure. Continuamos…

Awesome slab! Hope you come back to NZ for a cyclone swell. Epic left slab on east coast north island for you.

Probably should get some chain mail for that spot Sir Nathan Florence 🏄‍♂️⚔️🤺 ⛓️🦈

Love the switch pov Really gave perspective to the non surfer. I was scared of everything out there

looks a lot like dillon beach in nor cal. same maximus spook factor...same everything but the kiwi speak and right hand drive

I’m already an (unofficial)test pilot as a captain on the NaPali coast. Rainjackets need better waterproofing. Board shorts need a pocket big enough to hold a phone

Better to be safe than sorry, good choice to leave before something happen

Reminds me of gnasty and gnarly empty Nor Cal lineups. Empty of surfers, that is. 100% charge Nate!

Hopefully, you and JJ will sponsor a sponger one of those slab hounters like yourself.

Liking the format and content!

one of the few instances where Nate & team didn't just show up and make it look like they've known the spot for years...been pretty amazed at all the times that's happened, but as Nate said, sometimes it just doesn't go that way

😂 Mahina, you so funny ... best get that exclusive Florence 24/7 Ice Bath for your new pet!

hahah the seal xD best scene

Nathan just explained validation to non-FDA experts

Big swell up the east coast this weekend, looking forward to seeing some more mutants. Slabs in the Caitlin’s or east Otago maybe…