TODAYS COLUMN IN THE OC REGISTER BEFORE THE FREEWAY PART 2 By - TopicsExpress



          

TODAYS COLUMN IN THE OC REGISTER BEFORE THE FREEWAY PART 2 By Corky Carroll This is a continuing series of stories on my growing up in Orange County memories of life along the coast before the freeways connected North and South County. When the route to go up or down the coast was Pacific Coast Highway. Last week I left off at the start of my very first “surf safari” down the coast. It took place with my pals Marc and Mike DeChevroux with their mom, Ruth, at the wheel of her boatish light blue Buick Station Wagon that had some sort of Bull Fight slogan written on the side. I don’t remember exactly what it was, but Ruth was a huge Bull Fight fan, or possibly a Bull Fighter fan, not really sure. She had bought the boys new boards from the Hobie Surfboard Shop in Dana Point. At that time the Hobie shop was a small building on the ocean side of Pacific Coast Highway just before the drop down the hill to Doheny State Park. They actually made and sold the boards under one roof in those days and the chance of talking to, and ordering your board, directly from the builder was very high. The big surfboard builders in the O.C. at that time were Hobie in Dana Point and Velzy and Jacobs in San Clemente. Evidently when Ruth DeChevroux was buying the boards for Marc and Mike probably Hobie, or whoever it was who sold her the boards, had told her that Dana Point and Doheny State Park were excellent locations to take her boys to surf. So one day she loaded them and me up in the Buick and we all took off on our first traveling surf adventure. Dana Cove was one of the most beautiful and picturesque spots I have ever seen. I know that progress sets the pace and now there is that nice boat harbor there which many people enjoy and find wonderful. But before the construction of that harbor that little stretch of coastline was truly breathtaking. The cove was accessed only by a little steep road that wound down the side of the cliff and into a small gravel parking lot next to the little fishing pier. The surf would wrap down the rocky point towards the pier and on a big day could be amazing. They called it “Killer Dana.” In later years that little cove became one of my favorite places to take my High School girlfriends for back seat make out sessions, but that’s another story. On this day the waves were pretty big and the rocky point more than less was a bit intimidating for the three of us gremmies. Did I mention that we were probably about 10 years old at this time? And yes, we chickened out. So Ruth got the Buick back up the hill and we headed down to Doheny State Park. This was much more to our liking. It was a great day with perfect shaped overhead waves and offshore winds. This was also my first experience surfing a “reef” break with rocks on the bottom. Where I grew up, at Surfside Colony, the bottom was sand and the waves broke all over the place. Here at Doheny, where there was a reef, the waves broke perfectly in the same spot every time. What a wonderful concept that was. I mean, who knew? I was in surf puppy heaven. While out there, delighting the daylights out of myself riding wave after wave while taking off in the exact same spot every time, I got to witness a couple surfing tandem. That was kinda unique. But what really blew my mind was when this older dude wearing a straw hat came racing out in an outrigger canoe, with some chicks riding along on the inside, and proceeded to take off on the biggest wave of the day and went screaming down the line all the way to the river mouth. “Holy Hawaii,” I was thinking. THAT was amazing. This, I later found out, was the legendary surfer and waterman Loren Harrison. What a great place this was. I felt like I had just discovered the surfing version of Disneyland. And the day was not even half over yet. Stay tuned for part three of BEFORE THE FREEWAY next week.
Posted on: Sat, 10 Aug 2013 15:50:03 +0000

Trending Topics



Recently Viewed Topics




© 2015