Dave Rastovich

Liz Clark's been doing it forever.

Rasta's on board.

And it just features the world's best surfers hitting the high seas with nothing more than a, like, a companion, a couple of packs of, uh, I don't know, freaking long-lasting, uh, Weet-Bix or, or baked beans or whatever.

10 minute noodles.

these free, you're a free surfer, you just, like, mate, get in a boat and, and just disappear.

Yeah.

So it's, and, and it's, it's funny that those, those guys that embody that, um, like John, John John, Torren, and, you know, Rasta now as well, it's like that's what they're all doing.

Um, it's with various varying degrees of success and-

Um, also goes to show that, like, some people aren't perfect for these projects and some people really are.

Like, um, it's, it's quite funny how Dave Rastovich is quite a recluse, and, like, off the internet and stuff, and he was amazing at it.

And Ethan Ewing is famous for not speaking a lot, and his stab in the dark was incredible.

Who would you like to see next year on these boards?

Welcome to Water People, where we talk story about the aquatic experiences that shape who we become back on land.

I'm your host, Lauren Hill, joined by my partner, Dave Rastovich.

Join us as we gather stories, insights, and useful skills from some of the most outstanding water folk on the planet.

We acknowledge the Bundjalung Nation, the traditional custodians of the land and waters where we work and play, who have cared for this sea country for tens of thousands of years.

Anyways, salvaged the series in the end.

I think in the pantheon of electric s- acid surfboard tests, you know, it's nowhere near, uh, the Dave Rastovich kinda series, but it's certainly, uh, not the, you know, certainly still has mer-

That one cut, they did that one cut, [laughs] that one brilliant cut where Harry Bryant just throws the board away, and they cut to Rastovich looking down at it like, "Dude, what are you doing?" [laughs]

It was a broken board, and they took a frame grab of Rasta from a previous, from the, his series, and they just superimposed Harry's throwing of the board on Rasta's TV screen, and R- Rasta looks dismissingly at it.

Yeah

... tying it up.

I love Dave Rastovich's surfing, and so his throughout the series maybe competes as well.

But that wave that Harry's surfing is just so critical and gnarly that it's kinda like traditional surf films end with a bang.

Yeah.

Somebody said, um, Dave, an email came through.

Dave and Scott, "Pipos come in many flavors.

Do the Wegners have fins?" They didn't previously.

Did yours have a fin, or fins?

Um, I wanted to ask you something.

I was interviewing a guy, he's an Australian surfboard shaper, Daniels Surfboards is his label.

His name's Luke Daniels, and, um, you know how we see these different surfboard constructions come up, fleck- they started using flax in that, uh, Electric Acid surfboard test based on Dave Rastovich's suggestion.

Welcome to Water People, where we talk story about the aquatic experiences that shape who we become back on land.

I'm your host, Lauren Hill, joined by my partner, Dave Rastovich.

Join us as we gather stories, insights, and useful skills from some of the most outstanding water folk on the planet.

We acknowledge the Bundjalung Nation, the traditional custodians of the land and waters where we work and play, who have cared for this sea country for tens of thousands of years.

heaving slab he moves to bali starts a fashion mag then uh goes uh and becomes a war correspondent in the syrian civil war for a bit and then uh you know he's just a happily married uh family man in bali these days he's bali's wife and child but um just a surreal like surfing character like one of the great characters and um his take on it's pretty interesting in this film like uh you know he He had the same internal struggle as Dave did, but ultimately, like, when a wave is that good, it demands surfing at a high level.

Like, you want to see what's possible out there, and he kind of caved into that a little bit, you know, because he was surfing at a high level, but it's a different ballgame when you're taking Rasta and Margot down there, Rasta in particular.

Like, this is what I love about the film too, man.

Like, you have... gone back through the archives and found the footage from these early trips like in the surf films where uh i think it was in uh gaining one of gainey's films pulse and uh there was eradica this uh american film where they had that same footage um they syndicated it across and you only see a

couple waves you see snippets of what was called fluffy tonka back then but you have actually uh gone and told the entire story of That first

trip down there, the first properly filmed trip, and it's fucking every bit as crazy as you'd think.

Rasta's like, what, 18, 17? I don't know how old he is.

He looks like a child.