River Surf Road Trip: Tulsa Wave Park & WOKA

Between the bamboo shoots growing along the edge of the skatepark and the humidity at 8 a.m., I had a moment of confusion about where I was. Was this a tropical destination or the American Midwest?

As I walked down the trail and the Arkansas River came into view in downtown Tulsa, Oklahoma, my bewilderment faded and was replaced with excitement about surfing our hometown river...700 miles downstream.

If you're going to be a river surfer, you get used to taking surf trips to some pretty nontraditional destinations. As more communities around the country discover the opportunity to build accessible whitewater parks, surfing is showing up in places that would have seemed unimaginable just a few years ago.

This week, the Badfish crew was headed to two of those places: Tulsa Wave Park and WOKA (Waters of Oklahoma and Arkansas).

Tulsa Wave Park: Surfing the Arkansas Far From Home

The Tulsa Wave Park is a bypass channel around Zink Dam on the Arkansas River.

The Arkansas in Tulsa is a completely different river than the one we know near its headwaters in Salida. Instead of a narrow mountain river, it's a wide prairie river flowing through the heart of the city. Zink Dam stretches nearly 1,200 feet across the river, while the whitewater course flows along the river-left bank.

The setting surprised all of us. A bike path follows the river, a skatepark overlooks the course, a beautiful pedestrian bridge crosses just upstream, and across the street sits Gathering Place—one of the coolest public parks I’ve ever seen.

With one of Colorado's worst drought years limiting opportunities back home, Tulsa turned out to be the perfect road-trip destination.

The course runs almost every day of the year. Adjustable gates feed roughly 600 cfs into the whitewater channel during normal operation, and the park only shuts down during flood events or periods of exceptionally low water.

On our first day we met up with the local crew for a surf session. Zack, Brayden, Laura, and I were joined by longtime Badfish ambassador Hannah Ray J, who drove down from Iowa and our good friend Lane Ruotsala. Our Oklahoma ambassador, Tyler Harris, showed us around, introduced us to the local surfers, and made us feel right at home.

A Fast, Steep Wave That Loves Performance Boards

The Tulsa wave is simply fun.

It's fast, steep, and a bit narrower than the Scout Wave back home, so the Colorado crew had to adjust the timing of our turns to avoid the walls.

Every board we brought worked well, but I spent most of my time on the 4'10" Wave Farmer. The wave's steep face matched the rocker profile perfectly, reminding me that even with all the incredible new shapes Zack has designed over the past few years, the Wave Farmer still absolutely rips.

Other standouts included the Full Throttle, Flat Iron, and ShredTown. From the new 2026 lineup, the Off The Hook, Drip, and Surf Punk were early favorites.

A Growing Surf Community

Our second day was demo day, and the turnout was incredible.

We put dozens of people on the wave, watched first-time surfers catch their first rides, and spent the day talking boards with an enthusiastic local community.

The session ended with pizza at Empire Slice House alongside a growing group of Tulsa surfers.

I'll admit, Tulsa wasn't what I expected.

After just a couple of days, I found myself genuinely impressed. There are great neighborhoods, meaningful investment in outdoor recreation, and a welcoming surf community that's clearly building something special.

One Word of Warning

If you make the trip to Tulsa, bring shoes with good grip.

The rocks along the banks are unbelievably slippery. The local crew spends countless hours pressure washing and scrubbing the rocks around the surf wave, making that area manageable, but farther downstream the algae becomes incredibly slick.

Whenever possible, paddle back upstream and exit at the wave itself.

If you don't...prepare for what we all affectionately started calling the "Tulsa Stripe"—the green algae stain left across your board shorts after desperately crawling up the bank.

A pair of reef shoes or booties is definitely worth packing.

Next Stop: WOKA

After two days in Tulsa—and one bonus dawn patrol on our final morning—we drove about an hour and a half east to WOKA (Waters of Oklahoma and Arkansas).

Although technically located in Oklahoma, it's just outside Siloam Springs, Arkansas.

WOKA offers a completely different experience than Tulsa.

Instead of an urban river park, WOKA is a destination recreation area with gated access, parking, showers, restrooms, rentals, concessions, and miles of surrounding singletrack trails beneath a lush green canopy.

Funded by the Walton Family Foundation, the park has become a major recreation destination for people throughout northwest Arkansas.

Like Tulsa, WOKA was built around an existing dam using a bypass channel. The course winds through shale bedrock, blending natural stone with engineered concrete features over eight drops in roughly 1,200 feet of whitewater.

Drop #2 is the surf wave.

Designed by the same team that built Tulsa, it's another adjustable wave that delivers a playful, high-performance surf at normal operating flows between 300 and 400 cfs.

Every Board Had a Home

The WOKA wave has foamy shoulders that let you bounce turns from rail to rail.

Smaller and medium-sized surfers loved boards like the ShredTown, Wave Farmer, and Full Throttle.

For medium to larger surfers, flatter rocker profiles really came alive. The Bomb Drop, Flat Iron, and Flat Earth all felt fantastic.

For me, the biggest surprise was finally getting extended time on the new Buzz Bomb.

The channel-bottom version of the Flat Iron was incredibly fast while still feeling loose enough to slash turns without giving up drive.

More Than Just Surfing

When we weren't surfing, we broke out every toy we brought—including the new Dingy—and spent the day floating laps through the course.

We even got a visit from some local wildlife when a four-foot alligator gar surfaced in one of the eddies. Despite looking like something from the Jurassic period, they're harmless.

Demo day was another highlight.

New surfers caught their first waves while experienced riders sampled nearly every board in the lineup.

The Friends of WOKA grilled hot dogs for everyone. Their grill happened to be positioned dangerously close to the Badfish tent, and someone who looked suspiciously like me accepted the challenge of seeing just how many hot dogs one person could eat in between sessions at the wave.

The Future of River Surfing

Both Tulsa and WOKA are still in the early days of building their surf communities, and that's exactly what makes them special.

The locals are welcoming, the waves are fun, and the excitement is contagious.

WOKA offers onsite board rentals, while Tulsa's community hasn't needed an official rental program yet because local surfers almost always show up with extra boards and are eager to help newcomers get their first rides.

These parks are a glimpse into the future of river surfing.

Across the country, thousands of aging low-head dams have the potential to become places that reconnect communities with their rivers. Add a surf wave, and something remarkable happens.

People gather.

Communities grow.

Friendships form.

Time after time we've seen the same thing happen: if you build it, a river surfing scene will bloom.

And after spending a few days with the crews in Tulsa and WOKA, I'm convinced the future of river surfing is a whole lot bigger than the mountain towns where it began.