Blowing the location on Slater's wave pool
After seeing the perfection unveiled by Kelly and his team at Kelly Slater Wave Pools this morning, my first question was: Where is the test facility and how did they keep it secret for so long?
Theories were already starting to fly across the internet, but a single rural satellite image with an interesting long, black rectangular shape was the starting point for my investigation.
The clues were easy enough to follow: Central Valley California, with a clear Route 41 numbered along with 18th Avenue.
The address pointed to what looked to be a single ski water park over 110 miles from the coast (the same distance mentioned by Kelly in the clip). Was this the secret location that the KSWC had been keeping under wraps?
With all the tools freely available to us in this day and age (Google, Google Earth, Google Streetview) it only took an hour or so to confirm the likely location of the test facility.
Firstly, a check of the history of the location revealed that the dual lake setup has been there since about 2004, way before Kelly was likely to have been looking for land to test his experiment on.
If the lake had just popped up in the last year or two - easily verifiable via Google Earth history - it would of been easy to confirm this was the location. This was a slight curveball that needed to be clarified, but which could also yield more information.
So, the question begged: What could a large, rectangular lake possibly be used for?
The only option I could think of was wakeboarding or water skiing. So I Googled the address along with the term 'water ski' to see if anything appeared. This brought up an interesting article stating the "Ski Lake Home" was sold in January 2014, right in the middle of the public battle to get the first wave pool up and running.
A couple of other interesting tid bits from the article: the real state agent is Jim Knoska of Beach Cities Real Estate, a "local resident of the Newport Beach" who "goes out of his way to help find the perfect property for his clients. Jim normally works in the Newport & Huntington Beach area with a focus on beach front properties."
The property is "approximately 3 hours to the beach which is normally where Knoska performs most of his real estate transactions. Jim had a client who was interested in lake property and he was able to locate this incredible deal out in Lemoore."
"The biggest feature of the sale was the private lake that was attached to the land. It's rare to find such a large parcel of land that covered nearly 20 acres and included the large lake that is ideal for water skiing."
So, an Orange County Real Estate agent centred around the Newport & Huntington Beach areas, with a client looking for a lake property three hours from the coast? The clues kept adding up. According to his LinkedIn profile, Jim is also a surfer. Tick, tick, tick.
Going back to the history view on Google Earth back before the acquisition of the property in January 2014, two clear lakes can be seen. However the most recent image in May 2015 has the eastern-most lake filled in, along with the construction of a cement structure running the length of the remaining lake.
Was this the mechanism that would create the waves, or was it the construction of a cable tow Wake/Ski park?
Looking closely at the promotional video, there are clearly visible telephone poles in the background looking towards Jackson Avenue, which look very similar to the ones shown on Google Earth.
But this wasn’t enough.
The final clincher was a pulled-back shot showing a corrugated iron shed with a slight pitch, two doors on its side and an additional white box on top.
A quick check back to Google Street View, and boom, there it was clear to see.
Conveniently, Slater’s new wave pool shares a back fence with the Phoenix Sunrise Golf Course. No doubt this was a key selling point for Slater who would appreciate the proximity of a round of eighteen.
So while Kelly and his team have tried their best too keep this location a secret, it lasted less than one hour. Flights are now booked for a strike mission to California. //CRAIG BROKENSHA
If you missed the first vision of Kelly Slater's Wave Pool, watch it here.
Comments
Missed your calling as a detective there Craig. Nice work. The inland bf nowhere location may provide a whole lot of spin offs for for local community too; losmen, warungs, surf camp, tshirt selling , the next Ments maybe?
Dont forget to pack the drone. Although I am sure you wont be the first. Well done Shirlock.
You beat me by a little there agent Brokensha......as soon as you posted that first google earth pic I was right up your clacker.....cruising the streets of Lemoore and the council DAs
Lemoore connection with Slater and Pristine Shilajit.
Haha nice one Udo!
Credit to your detective work Craig, obviously there is nothing worth surfing around here today! :-)
reckon the guy 3 doors down has a crop going craig, any chance of confirming that?
Can we get a satellite wave pool crowd pic asap.........fuck half of California will out there for a look.
Nice work Craig! A fun read.
Now Swellnet needs to come up with some free passes to the joint.
Had Slater had sold some advertising for this vid.....logo on the wetsuit, board ,background wall or whatever ,what $ could he have charged ? Could someone of his stature demand the property purchase price $US575k for a few seconds of advertising here and there ?
Well done on scoping the location. We can see how there is room for expansion-
not into his neighours Golf Course (life membership surely already established) -
but across 19th Ave (westward) and northwards toward Vine St.
So water reticulation - including maybe a Flocculator ! which settles algae and other fine particles- could be expanded and kept in tune with the growing needs for water quality and waste minimisation.
For starters, the older pool, in place for the previous Water Ski park- if not reserved for left-hander waves- could be partially shaded and serve as a source pool for water-treatment, shuffling the main wave-pool surface water out during use, into the back-up one or an underground intermediary- whatever best-practice treatment applied- then the best of that water gets re-circulated back into the main pool.
I doubt the net usage of water will be as heavy as the Golf Course opposite.
I think it is unfair to go at Kelly on environmental grounds: one would need a packet of case studies to diminish his positive contributions, surely. And why bother gathering such an attack, is he not a good fellow?
As for the wave monotony, for regular users, or for surf comps, Ben said it, shiftable floor under the water, surely in-place already.
On investment, the licensing would cover the huge initial series of outlay campaigns. Compare to Hollywood, especially old days, domestic would cover some costs, then residuals (from overseas sales) would bring in the net (profits).
As for access, any decent team with PR skills suited to the new social media century we are in would formulate a package of community-friendly programs that offer Surf Camp scholarships, local discount cards, Staff & friends sessions, School Group hour every week-day...stuff like that. Then sponsors could pay for further subsidies to local Cali surf club comp winners, for example. Night surfing? They could set up a solar array next door, power the site by day, maybe get sponsorship for battery storage and use excess for night-lights...then Events while a lucky few surf, so the place becomes a hang-out not just an elite acrobatic slide zone.
Yeah whatever...
Size? Can he up the size? Imagine that wave at double overhead. I'd pay a lot of money for that experience. Mmmmmm. Flawless stand up barrels.
That price, $575k, seems cheap for what was already there. And the location. Great location. About mid way between San Francisco and LA. Only a short hop over the hills in a chopper from Vegas too!
Is it always offshore ?
Fuck let the clowns have it..in fact build millions of them...let the kooks have the parks and leave the coasts alone...perrrfect!!
Pretty sure there were more than "theories" floating on the internet. You just copied from reddit. who actually found it. Nice try though
https://www.reddit.com/r/surfing/comments/3xe46t/is_this_kellys_wave_cen...
http://imgur.com/a/HI2Ng
Nice! Didn't see this at all, but some unbeatable evidence right there!
There's no such thing as 'would of' buddy, its would have/could have. Other than the weak comparisons of telephone poles and sheds, the poor writing of the article makes me not want to trust you.
Lol, beautiful sentence criticising grammar:
> It's - not its
> need a comma after 'would of' and buddy - ie 'would of', buddy
> comma after buddy isn't the right choice - fullstop, dash maybe?
Craig, swellnet is great and I credit everything you have done. Possibly it has become bigger than you could have ever imagined and possibly it's gone down a path where there are no secret spots anymore. Recently I did a trip when forecasts suggested not much on offer, it was the best 5 days of surfing I had - not epic at all, but no-one frothing around the place. You keep an effort to keep some places secret, why didn't you allow Kelly that same respect. Was it so important to discover someone's secret spot? Surfing, where I come from, is based on secret spots. There's nothing better than the lineup to yourself and maybe one or two others. Of course Kelly's wave pool will be announced "officially" but in his time hey. It's hard to not spill the beans when curiosity overcomes the heart. Peace dudes.
It's not a secret spot mate. It's not a spot at all, at least how we know surf breaks. It's a flat lake that creates a wave when the owner presses a button. So what do you expect people to do? Fly and drive to Central California, jump a fence and paddle out into a flat lake? C'mon man, get a grip...
It's a business, Kelly Slater Wave Company and that is its first theme park. Sure, MapBox and Google Earth give mug punters (like me) and journos access to an overhead view- which is jumping the gun a bit- but a business seeks mass attention. The article is more buzz for the eventual opening of the park; it may even be quoted. And as for others being onto the location before Craig, so what? Dozens of people could have been doing the same thing independently, at the same time yesterday, scoping which part of the inland was the place.
As for environmental net cost, compare that to a massive skate park. Inland communities deserve access to summer fun sites too, and if free-range surfers want to try the controlled conditions, to complement what's available, then fine. I'm with Rabbit and the others who see this as the start of a long story (see other thread).
Re the comment by Peace - "Surfing, where I come from, is based on secret spots. There's nothing better than the lineup to yourself and maybe one or two others".
Oh how that idealistic comment brought a tear to my eye. Surfers have been dreaming like that since day dot and then when "blow-ins" and "touros" happen upon their idyllic scene localism and aggro soon sets in. If you can't get waves to yourself or at least without too much of a crowd you aren't trying hard enough. In this day and age with all the i/net info you have at your disposal it's so much easier to find uncrowded waves. It just involves getting up early and travelling a bit - not just sitting at your local "protected" spot. But then 'real' surfers having been doing that since day dot as well.
Other than the fact that you are an internet grammar nazi, by referring to the author as 'buddy' and being a first time poster to these forums makes me not want to trust you either.
hi stunet, that would be funny, heaps of people paddling in a flat lake. I'm sure it will happen, now how to turn on that button ...
ATT: Craig Gary Jubelin Brokensha,
I really need to know the Engineering of this wave pool, power supply, pumps etc etc
can you do some research ?
Haha no middle names Udo.
I was hoping to get some info. But media who were out there this morning were restricted with these type of shots as the area is fenced out to the public.
Cool.
Anyone bring a drone?
According to the neighbors, they have seen people operating drones around the property.
I was at the location in Lemoore, CA this morning. I was there with another surfing publication. I took photos and interviewed people living in the area, who knew about the top secret project over a year ago, but did not know what was actually happening or who Kelly Slater was.
For those planning to go there, the place is fenced off and there is security during the weekday. Next door is a lake where Wake Boarding competitions take place. Don't drive your vehicle to the side as I saw one got stuck in the mud and had to be towed out.
I'm calling bullshit on kndy.
If you're gonna make stuff up on the internet, at least make it believable
Nah, he was there. Emailed through a bunch of photos to us.
I was just trying to make a joke that surely there's no one anywhere who doesn't know who Slater is. Probably would have helped if the joke was funny.
Whoops! Seems I didn't take my irony pills today.. :D
Haha. Reckon I could do with a pack of those sometimes!
I'll volunteer my services for the 18th Ave Back Block surf report. Pretty sure I'll be very accurate! Just need to talk terms. PM me Ben.
Isn't there, like, some kinda water thing going' on yonder in California? I mean, like, a drought????? I mean ... ironic!?
Its fucking filled with Guiness !$#!
I would like to know is this wave lake fresh water or salt water as the dynamics of buoyancy would be totally different to the real ocean.
I think there would be at least 10% less float but could be ideal for PU foam boards Vs Styro - Also the location has very similar temp averages to Melbourne so would need wetties majority of the year - Anyone know of a ski lake near Benalla or Albury thats gone bust? How are the Goldy ski ponds surviving?
Funny anybody is worried about blowing Kellys "secret spot" location, how many people's waves did Kelly expose in his career? At least he can control and profit from the flow on.
All this secrecy is an effective marketing tool as evidenced by above comments. When Apple's $600B empire can not fully hide details of its next iPhone - and that's a very small product compared to KSWP:) - who would expect location of a wavepool of this magnitude can be kept secret? Anyhow, for those with some speculative drive in you, maybe time to buy some land in that area....
He's quite welcome to come and build one on my property. Should have all the bugs ironed out by then and increase the size. All part of the R&D of course. Clean water & warm weather.
can you throw some barra in the pond too Fitzy?
Guaranteed, need to diversify!
And now SMH have picked up on this story. Front page SMH this morning Craig! That headshot from The Project looks like it's going to last forever.
Brutus has a good pic on his insty KS wave pool opening day.
The locations has been sussed. Now, how about the price?
$10 USD per wave.
Interesting watch things roll out across SMH today - they've done a couple of changes since the article went live around 5am.
First it was "Kelly's wave pool mystery", then they dropped the "mystery" and added "Sydney sleuth" and "secret". And they also decided a headshot of Craig would get the punters clicking instead of Slater inside a chocolate barrel. Superimposing Craig's head over an Area-51-looking background image only fuels the story line too.
But it seems those new words weren't good enough on their own, so they've dropped "secret", and added "mystery" back into the mix again.
Is this really how big media works? Gently tweaking headlines all day? What a job...
"Is this really how big media works? Gently tweaking headlines all day? What a job...'
They call it, "programming" for a reason. Very calculated programming mind you.
So Craig gets his 15 minutes!
Nah, we're up to about forty five minutes now. The dolphin story went nuts!
https://www.swellnet.com/news/swellnet-dispatch/2015/06/23/dolphins-keramas
Daily Mail U.K. have got it........free wetties for life .....good exposure for Cheer wetsuits.
Yeah, that's a real nice one for them! Great wetties btw, best short-arm I've ever owned.
Investigative journalism featured in the smh, there's a first time for everything
lol! nice one tim.
I can see some good photoshop coming up.....Craigs head on Slaters body in that wave pool barrel...a bald Brokensha modeling OuterKnown clothing.
So, if Kelly claims the vid is from 2 weeks ago and its the first he surfed it (surfing in steamer and booties), who is the masked man in boardshorts in the opening photo?? Or is this Kelly playing mind games? Or maybe he was doing an ad shoot for shorts later in the day? Temps in Lemoore during Dec range from -3 to 23 deg C. Even on the hottest day, no way the water temp would be warm enough for shorts(unless towed in on a jetski maybe??) So many questions- so few answers____
Actually, I lived in the central valley not far from this location and although this is guess, that water looks identical to the farm irrigation water the central valley uses to water its farms. So them are fresh chocolate barrels, and someone is right about the buoyancy difference it will have. Speaking from experience to the area, that small body of water has GOT to get up there in the temps, being it isn't too deep, its dark and will attract more sun, and the fact that the central valley see's tempatures in the summer well over 100 F. We had a pond on a farm out there, same looking water, and in summer time that thing would reach almost 70 degrees. So the heat of the water may indeed re-affect the buoyance factor.
Yeah that's a great point Lom. We thought the exact same thing.
However, once the planning application made the light of day (see below), it would suggest that they have only had a few months at best to shoot any footage. The Site Plan Review application was dated 21st September, of which it states:
"Before beginning construction of the facility, you must read and comply with all standards and regulatory requirements listed in Exhibit 'A' of this letter."
Assuming they started construction on that date, and then taking a look at Kelly's WSL and other promotional comittments (remember that competition to win a week with him and Dorian in Fiji? That was Nov 28 - Dec 5), I reckon they probably filmed this sometime in mid-late November.
Which means they spent - at most - eight or nine weeks building the facility. Possibly less.
So point being: who's the crazy person in boardies?
Greg Gatzka - the wave pool will run on well water as did the pond when it operated as a ski park .
Gatzka was a coordinater of Sunrise ski park at some stage.
Though a very small environmental impact, that's probably the worst thing given what blindboy raised in the other thread - i.e. the land is sinking in the San Joaquin valley because of over extraction of the groundwater.
Sorry to raise that again. :-|
"We were very surprised when we heard the notion of surfing away from the Pacific Ocean," Kings County Community Development Agency Director Greg Gatzka said.
Gatzka explained Slater's team presented the idea to the county earlier this summer. The project was approved and construction is now nearly complete. Gatska said the wave pool is built on 20 acres, it previously was a water ski lake. The wave pool will use well water, the same well previously used for the lake.
"It's not going to be an open public facility, it's for research and development purposes," Gatzka said.
http://www.yourcentralvalley.com/news/surfers-local-technology-make-big-...
What are the odds on Slater winning Snapper next year? May have firmed a bit now he has his very own( for R&D purposes of course) barreling right? I can see a few well placed boulders in the pool for behind-the-rock takeoff practices!
Must have used a giant bladder or drained the pool into another holding pond before constructing the bottom. So I'm guessing he re-used all the water blindboy.
Pretty good buy at $575,000, house with your own 600m water ski lake
Can anyone confirm if he's riding an eps foam board cause of fresh water???
Doubt that is the reason, he often rides EPS and Epoxy boards it looked like the board he was riding at pipe was even possibly EPS?
We will most likely see him ride more and more EPS, Epoxy boards now he has bought a large chunk of Firewire and is soon to launch "Slater designs" that i assume will all be EPS/Epoxy.
Perhaps technically EPS has slightly more float, but personally i can't notice any difference in floatation between Poly and EPS.
Development Application : Fish Pond LLC.
Yep , I was onto it , once a fish pond always a fish pond.
Need more specs on water temps to confirm that it's warm enough for the Barrii to change sex and breed.
Sydney Sleuth strikes again...
Bravo Detective Craig. I've waited a little while till wading in.
The surreal thing is I was an exchange student to Lemoore High School in the US school year of 87/88 and lived with my host family 'in the middle of nowhere' out of Stratford CA, a whole 8 mins down 18th from this place. Drove down this road every day of the school year to get to school (in a great redneck pick up may I add). A good mate lived next door to this block (as it was then). Who surfed? No One! It's 'The Valley' - and remains so to this day. MexCali Valley life. Not exactly SoCal.
I am back in CA reasonably regularly and was in May last year (2015). Out of the blue I was asked by my host family, 'you heard of Kelly Slater?' which was odd as they are as far from surfing imaginable. Apparently many of the local farmers had an interest in the water ski property but baulked at the price. The surrounding land isn't great quality and with the ongoing drought - water (pumped from far and wide) wasn't easy to get hold of (allocation). A lot of money for a simple place to put a boat in.
So what's in Lemoore? Not much... A nice little wine bar called 'Famers Fury' a ton of good Mexican (I like Tadeo's - good lunch specials), and services supporting farming. Famous people.....no one from surfing (although a school mate Lorenzo Neal was pretty successful in the NFL). It is a farming community and speaking Spanish will help you a ton around the district. Stratford? Even less. Although there is a (reasonably) new Casino out here, middle of onwhere, operated by the local first nation peoples. The valley is struggling after the longest drought in history and water allocation remains the biggest issue in this district.
Since the article has gone global it's still a long way from everywhere. The nearest wave (as we know it) is Morro Bay, Cayucos, Pismo - San Luis Obispo area. You will find one of the great shapers, Dave Parmenter, back here shaping in 2016. Very, very nice boards and Dave should never be challenged in a triva quiz.
A wave? I was nearly 30 years to early....but I'd still be dead keen to surf it.
Amazing story! What a coincidence.
21,000 public high schools in the USA, around 1,400 in Cali.... and I end up in Lemoore! Before Det.Craig went to work no one would have heard of the place.
Elsewhere, in breaking news:
Well done sleuth and accolades to Thermalben and Stunet - Australian humour wins.
Your sleuthing started w/ a satellite image. How did you find that particular image? Did you have some clues on what part of California to look at?
Stu came across it on Reddit, and passed it onto me and I confirmed from there. There were lots of images/places floating around but this one looked most likely.
Thanks.
I wonder how those on Reddit found it? Just seems like heckovalot of geography to cover...
They've got way too much time on their hands!
Any intel on when they'll open to the public, how much it'll cost, how many waves can you ride and how often, etc.? If you blow a takeoff, do you have to go wait in line for another 2 hours? And will they make a left, for goofies?
I'd like to see them show a very average surfer ride the wave. The pros make it look too good, too easy.