Watch: John Florence Wrangles Unseen Rock Shelves Just North Of Antarctica
‘VELA’ isn’t just about warm water reef passes…
The distance between Fiji and New Zealand is about 1,100 nautical miles.
The distance between New Zealand and Antarctica is about 1,300 miles.
As you’ll see above, John John Florence’s 48-foot catamaran spent a significant portion of 2025 drifting in these vast expanses; sometimes within swimming distance to the shore, other times days away from the nearest landmass.
“I think our goal at this point is to learn how to cross oceans, and to see how many we can cross,” says the 3x World Champion in the latest episode of VELA. “I think that alone will show us a new way of living.
“There are moments during these trips where we’ll be thousands of miles from anywhere in any direction. You don’t know what’s there or who’s there or anything. It’s this surreal feeling of exploration and curiosity.”
In the 19 minute episode above, John ventures throughout New Zealand’s scattered bays, emerald hills, and corrugated rock shelves — riding a handful of remarkably circular waves in the process.
“This adventure isn’t a break from surfing, it’s a modern version of what surfing used to be,” narrates John, as the second half of the edit kicks into latent guitar riffs and backless water caves.
With tide swings ranging up to four meters (13 feet) on New Zealand’s South Island, the difference between dry rock and shallow tube section is an hour or two. Add in the element of relentless year round Southern Ocean storms, and you’ll find that consistently collecting visions south of Christchurch is heavily contingent on local knowledge.
So how’d John know where to look?
We can’t say how we know, but we have it on good authority that the toothless fella at 11:05 may have pointed the 3x World Champ in the right direction.
Click above to watch the best surfer on the planet navigate a handful of waves that you’ve never seen before… and probably won’t be seeing again anytime soon.
