Professional longboarder Sam Bleakley details a decade of extreme global surf travel.

From the author of Welcome to Paradise, Now Go To Hell, a finalist for the PEN Center USA Award for Nonfiction One of Pearl Jam's Jeff Ament's Top 10 of 2018 It's no surprise that surfers like to party. The 1960-70s image, bolstered by Tom Wolfe and Big Wednesday, was one of mild outlaws--tanned boys refusing to grow up, spending their days drinking beer and smoking joints on the beach in between mindless hours in the water. But in the 1980s, as surf brands morphed into multibillion-dollar companies, the derelict portrait began to harm business. The external surf image became Kelly Slater and Laird Hamilton, beacons of health, vitality, bravery, and clean-living. Internally, though, surfing had moved on from booze and weed to its heart's true home, its soul's twin flame: cocaine. The rise of cocaine in American popular culture as the choice of rich, white elites was matched, then quadrupled, within surf culture. The parties got wilder, the nights stretched longer, the stories became more ridiculously unbelievable. And there has been no stopping, no dip in passion. It is a forbidden love, and few, if any, outside the surf world know about this particular rhapsody. Drug use is kept very well-hidden, even from insiders, but evidence of its psychosis rears its head from time to time in the form of overdoses, bar fights, surf contests, murders, and cover-ups. Cocaine + Surfing draws back the curtain on a hopped-up, sometimes-sexy, sometimes-deadly relationship and uses cocaine as the vehicle to expose and explain the utterly absurd surf industry to outsiders.

This title brings together work on embodiment, action, and the predictive mind. At the core is the vision of human minds as prediction machines - devices that constantly try to stay one step ahead of the breaking waves of sensory stimulation, by actively predicting the incoming flow. In every situation we encounter, that complex prediction machinery is already buzzing, proactively trying to anticipate the sensory barrage. The book shows in detail how this strange but potent strategy of self-anticipation ushers perception, understanding, and imagination simultaneously onto the cognitive stage.

Sam Bleakley and the surf EXPLORE team take us on a roller coaster ride through Gabon, India, Vietnam, Algeria, China and Haiti, drumming up a tropical beat. Combining 'Deep Travel', John Callahan's incredible photography and Sam's performance writing, they capture the spirit of these turbulent coast scapes, blood racing, running on salt water fuel. The wide belt around the Equator - the tropics - has become an alluring path for travel, but a region often steeped in war and environmental disasters. Sam and surf EXPLORE go off the regular route, carving a niche, collaborating with locals, documenting the occasion poetically and with precision. Where 'waves transform from green glass to white foam, the surfboard is the frozen double of that transition - a rainbow bridge that allows you to step in the blink of an eye from inertia to adrenaline-fuelled ecstasy to the fear of the water-wrestling hold-down.' The paradoxical red hot and cool blue of surfing, and the often icy logic of preparation for challenging travel, form a matrix from which springs a distinctive kind of writing as performance. By turns, surf EXPLORE gather their wits at the cross roads where 'lovers part and souls get taken by the lost high way, lured down the wrong route.'

The Longboard Travel Guide is the first surf guidebook written specifically for longboarders. Loaded with mouth-watering lineup photos, the book describes 100 of the best waves in the world for loggers and offers insider tips on how to ride them. From the Maldives to Australia's Gold Coast, from Costa Rica to Fiji, from Samoa to Sri Lanka, all the classic destinations are here. A smorgasbord of less-well known areas are also included for adventurous surfers who thirst for uncrowded waves. This book covers every aspect of surf travel for longboarders: where to go, where to stay, what gear to take, how to get in shape for your trip and how to stay healthy abroad. Longboarders of all ages and abilities will benefit from the practical advice offered by a writing team of seasoned travelers and pros. Whether you're thinking of doing a road trip in Australia, a coldwater exploration trip in Iceland, or a boat trip in Indonesia this books has plenty to soak on up. A selection of real-life traveller's tales illustrate the pleasure and pain experienced by loggers searching for the elusive perfect wave, and the joys and frustrations of life of on the road. The Longboard Travel Guide features more than 200 color photos by some of the best photographers in the business including Chris Burkard, Alan van Gysen, Simon Williams, Tim McKenna and John Callahan.This book also includes a comprehensive directory of travel resources where readers can find information about the best surf camps, travel agencies and operators around the world. Packed with sublime photos, up-to-date info and real-life traveller's tales, The Longboard Travel Guide is the essential handbook for all longboarders who yearn to find perfect waves.

Lonely Planet explores the world's most righteous spots for riding waves in Epic Surf Breaks, the latest addition to its popular Epic series. From Java's G-Land to Hawaii's North Shore and on to Bells Beach in Victoria, Australia, surfers of all levels are sure to be thrilled. With stunning photography and gripping first hand accounts, there's no denying this ride will be epic.