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

@Nathan, dude, I gotta say that I am enjoying these videos you've been putting out over the past year or so and have been insanely interesting. Pipe is all over the internet. Everyone has seen it. But these sweet nuggs you find and your big nuggs is a perfect combination and is what is separating you from these rest of the uploaders!

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

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

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!

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

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.

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.

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.

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!

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

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!

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

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.

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.

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

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

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

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.

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.

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.