Malibu: Lord of the Waves

"How do you describe the feeling of looking into a 20-foot tube?" -Surfing legend Mark Foe

When they weren't filming battle scenes or learning an ancient elvish language for the upcoming Lord of the Rings trilogy, due out in December, the sporty young actors who played hobbit friends enjoyed surfing on location in New Zealand. Now that they've returned from Tolkien's Middle-earth, they still find time to relax by catching waves near their Malibu homes. Choose your own setting with lessons from a surfing school (www.surfschools.com), or log on to www.surfcheck.com to montor weather conditions anywhere around the globe. -Caroline Purtell

Billy Boyd, Elijah Wood, Sean Astin, and Dominic Monaghan in Malibu, Insert: Surfing in New Zealand, where The Lord of the Rings was shot.

Photograph by Moshe Brakha