Luxury surf community surfacing amid southern Utah sand and sagebrush

[Read more: Utah’s first private surf community wants to get the details right, like hiring a surf instructor]

Hurricane • “If everybody had an ocean, across the USA … Then everybody’d be surfing, like Californi-a,” the Beach Boys sang in their 1963 signature hit “Surfin’ in the USA.”

Six decades later, few would likely envision the construction site atop a bluff 410 miles east of the Southern California coast as a surf community. There are no “bushy, bushy blond hairdos” or “Huarache sandals.” And the area, which is often shrouded by blowing sand, more resembles a set fit for a “Lawrence of Arabia” sequel than the ocean.

Ask anyone on the site, though, and they’ll assure you that change is in the wind — that the construction site represents a sea change in southwest Utah. Welcome to Southern Shores, a private, luxury “surfing community” surfacing amid the desert sand and sagebrush in Hurricane Valley, about 20 miles east of St. George.

Jason Christensen, president of Immaculate Homes, is clearly stoked about the project he and his wife, Brittany, and Cody Larkin have been working to bring to fruition for the better part of a decade.

“This will be the first surf community in Utah,” Christensen said. “It will have the second-largest standing surf wave in the United States. And the new technology that goes into that probably makes us unique in the world right now.”

But can a private, luxurious surf community in the middle of a wind-swept desert be rad enough to be successful? Christensen insists it can — and he’s banking on it. He and his partners have poured millions of dollars into the resort thus far.

Life of luxury

Once it is fully developed, Southern Shores will sport three lakes. The main boat lake, which measures 500 feet wide and 2,400 feet (eight football fields) long, will be used for water skiing, wakeboarding and wake skiing. The 100-by-700-foot surf lake is reserved for surfing, paddleboarding and swimming. The third is a cable lake that is the same size as its surfing counterpart and will have cables to tow wakeboarders over floating rails, ramps and other obstacles.

Southern Shores will also feature 56 luxury homes situated on lots ranging in size from just under half an acre to 8/10ths of an acre. Prices for the 34 lots fronting the main lake — for just the land alone — cost as much as $2.5 million. The remaining lots adjacent to the surfing and cable lakes range in price from about $622,000 to $1.1 million.

Owners of lakefront lots will have their own private boathouses. Each lake will be stocked with largemouth bass, perch and other fish for anglers. Parks and tennis, pickleball and volleyball courts will round out Southern Shores’ recreation regimen.

However unique Southern Shores is, it is not the first private residential watersports community in Utah. A few others are already in play, including Last Chance Lakes in Tooele County, but they lack a surf pool.

The perfect wave

What sets Southern Shores apart is its floating UNIT Surf Pool, which creates a consistent, almost perfect standing wave that can be adjusted in height to accommodate surfers of all abilities and is deeper and more technologically advanced than the sheet-surfing waves on cruise ships.

“On the surfing waves of a cruise ship, you are riding a small board without fins over an inch or two of water that’s being propelled toward you,” said Jessica O’Leary, co-founder with wakeboarding legend Tony Finn of Waves & Water. “It doesn’t require any skills … UNIT Surf Pools enable surfers to use boards with fins on them and to hone or acquire skills that can translate to ocean surfing.”

Southern Shores’ standing-wave surf pool was manufactured in Germany, cost more than $1.5 million and is one of the most advanced in the world. At 52 feet in width, it is one of the nation’s widest, second only to one recently opened in Hawaii. Christensen said the UNIT Surf Pool is water, energy and cost-efficient.

“The water keeps getting recirculated,” he said, adding the hourly cost to run the surf pool is “cheaper than running a boat for an hour, and we can cycle 20 people through the surf pool in that amount of time.”

As enthused as Christensen is about Southern Shores, he said he is well aware of the optics of opening a luxury water-resort community in southwest Utah, which until recently was mired in severe drought and even now remains abnormally dry.

To that end, he notes all the water rights for the lakes have been secured from private sources — property owners in the area — and the deals have been approved by the state water engineer. The only water coming from the Washington County Water Conservancy District will be for the custom homes built on the resort, each of which will be landscaped with artificial turf rather than natural grass.

In addition, Christensen said the lake beds have been covered with a synthetic Geomembrane lining and other materials to prevent water loss due to leakage or percolation. And cement powder has been mixed with soil to create a cultured sandstone-like material that covers the shoreline to prevent water erosion. Moreover, a narrow island covered with stately palm trees, oaks and glossy privets bisects the main lake to act as a windbreak and reduce the amount of water lost to evaporation.

“We are trying to do everything we can to keep our water use down to a minimum and to ensure we are not wasting any in the ground,” he said.

Christensen estimates the total amount of water that will have to be replaced each year due to evaporation at 135-acre feet. An acre-foot is nearly 326,000 gallons, which is enough water to cover an acre of land about one-foot deep.

Water worries

Edward Andrechak, water program manager for Conserve Southwest Utah, credits Southern Shores developers for their conservation efforts but said losing 135-acre feet of water to evaporation is a major concern.

“That’s 44 million gallons of water just to make up for the amount of water lost due to evaporation,” said Andrechak, adding it doesn’t account for the amount of water needed to fill the lakes or the water that will be used for the homes built on the site.

Andrechak said the Southern Shores community flies in the face of Washington County officials’ focus in transitioning from a water waster to a water-conservation culture. Equally egregious, he said, is that the water footprint for the development is excessively high, especially when it will only benefit just a few people.

“We live in a desert,” Andrechak added, “so we should start acting like we live in a desert.”

Location … location

While acknowledging water is always a worry, Southern Shores developers are confident their conservation efforts and water rights will ensure they have a reliable supply of water for the foreseeable future.

As a homebuilder in the St. George area, Christensen said he is as invested as anyone in ensuring there is enough water for future homes. He and his family will be living at Southern Shores, and he said the last thing he wants is to do anything that would harm the environment.

“We’re invested in the community,” he continued. “We’re not going anywhere, and we have zero desire to see it get ruined.”

For Jason and Brittany Christensen, Southern Shores is a labor of love. The family spends all of its vacations engaging in water sports on lakes as far away as Florida, and two of the couple’s children are professional wakeboarders.

Apparently, a lot of others share the Christensens’ love of water. Even though most of the news about Southern Shores has been by word-of-mouth, all but one of the development’s pricey lakefront lots have been sold. Most of the buyers are from northern Utah.

Location, perhaps ironically, appears to be a major factor in Southern Shores’ popularity. Far as it is from the sea, it is only 30 minutes away from Zion National Park and even closer to Sand Hollow State Park, Copper Rock Golf Course and scores of hiking and desert biking trails.

Robert Bolar, a top luxury real estate agent with Summit Sotheby’s International Realty in St. George, views the surf community’s location as a major plus.

“Luxury homes for sale in Hurricane Valley are highly sought after due to its majestic beauty and abundance of outdoor activities,” Bolar said. “Furthermore, the valley provides convenient access to St. George and major cities like Las Vegas, Phoenix and Salt Lake City, making it an ideal place for people who desire a bit of city life without sacrificing their rural peace and quiet.”

Best of both worlds

For his part, Washington City business owner Zach Cutler has not seen or heard anything to dampen his enthusiasm about Southern Shores. He has already bought a lake front lot and is looking forward to building a home on the site and relocating there with his family in a couple of years.

Cutler, his wife Jennifer and their four daughters are avid boating enthusiasts who enjoy spending time together out on the lake. He said lakes are a place where the kids can put down their phones, hang out together and really connect.

Unfortunately, he added, the crowds and reckless behavior of some at public lakes have cramped the family’s ability to do that. Southern Shores provides a safe space for families and their guests, enabling them to enjoy the Utah lifestyle without having to travel to Florida or California to surf and water ski.

“I’m a redneck Utah boy from the mountains,” Cutler said. “This is the best of both worlds. We get to live here in Utah. And [Southern Shores] will be a great community with great people, red rock – and we will have water.”

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