Santa Cruz surf breaks are free to enjoy but worth millions. That’s one of the key findings in the first report to put a dollar value on this world-renowned surf playground.
The report identified 30-odd surf spots dotted across Santa Cruz County’s 7-mile stretch of pumping waves. One of them, Cowell’s Beach, is among the busiest, partly because it’s a good place to learn.
The faint sweetness of blueberry surf wax drifts through the brisk morning air as Thomas Mendoza preps his shortboard in the parking lot of Cowell’s.
Mendoza has surfed all over the world but caught his first wave here. He remembers the feeling from the front of his dad’s longboard when he was about 5 or 6 years old.
“When you get your first wave and you stand up on it and you're riding it in, the feeling is electric,” he said, “and I knew right away I was hooked and I was gonna be hooked for the rest of my life.”
While the topography surrounding different surf breaks makes them unique, one thing is constant—the pecking order in a surf lineup.
“To the untrained eye, it just looks like a group of wet-suited guys floating mishmashed in the ocean. But to the trained eye, there's intense organization and hierarchy,” said Mendoza.
In the lineup, locals usually dominate the front. Next up is young and scrappy surfers trying to prove themselves. Behind them are out-of-towners waiting their turn.
This dance attracts surfers of all levels but also brings in spectators. In its new report, Save the Waves, a national surf-advocacy nonprofit based in Santa Cruz, found surfing draws in 800,000 people and $200 million to the area each year.
“A lot of people say surfing’s priceless,” said Shaun Burns, a pro surfer who also works at Save the Waves. “Putting a number to it is pretty awesome and pretty groundbreaking.”
That’s the positive. But there are also concerns: the quality and duration of surfable waves is changing with the climate.
The 2-year study—dubbed “surfonomics”—found that as sea level rises, sandy beaches will disappear. As a Santa Cruz native, Burns has seen this happen in his lifetime.
“Even in the 33 years that I've been around, there's been a wave that has gone extinct,” said Burns. “I grew up boogie boarding a place that no longer breaks just because there's not enough sand there for the wave to break far enough out to create a rideable wave.”
Save the Waves intends for the report to inform climate policy. Burns says he hopes their ongoing research will inspire folks to look for ways to preserve the place and sport they love.
Bob Pearson’s been at the heart of this community since he started shaping boards as a 14 year old in the 1960s. Entering his custom board factory in Midtown feels like entering a surfing time capsule.
“We've got hundreds of order forms on all these boards for different people,” said Pearson. “There’s no factory in the world that does as big of a variety as we do. We do everything.”
Pearson has overseen the production of more than 100,000 boards and was one of the first manufacturers to adopt an automated computer numerical control (CNC) shaping machine in the 1980s. His team produces shortboards, longboards, knee boards, hybrid boards and stand up paddle boards or SUPs, to name a few.
He points to a board that belongs to legendary big wave surfer Laird Hamilton. Hamilton pioneered tow-in surfing, helped put SUPs, on the map, and introduced Pearson to SUPing before there was a word for it.
“ So I got on it and the workout was phenomenal. I saw fish and everything. I was blown away. How different it was, how much fun it was,” said Pearson. “It was fresh to me, it was new to me. ”
Today, Pearson’s watching the newest boards take off—they’re called foilboards. Some are totally electric, known as e-foils, others are partially motorized and some are powered solely by natural energy sources like leg pumping or wind gusts.
Dave Waynar started surfing as an 8 year old and raced SUPs as an adult. He took up foiling following a viral 2016 video from Hawaiian pro water athlete Kai Lenny.
When he isn’t working his 9 to 5 job, Waynar’s teaching lessons and selling gear at Covewater Paddle Surf, a Santa Cruz foiling shop. “This isn't my money maker at all. This is a passion of mine,” said Waynar.
While e-foil set ups are a significantly bigger investment than a surfboard, Waynar says it’s worth it because he can ride that many more waves. Foilers can also get farther out beyond the break, which means swapping the traditional lineup for longer distance rides.
Experienced foilers can hug the Monterey Bay coastline starting north of Davenport and ride winds all the way down to Cannery Row and back, for a journey of more than a hundred miles round trip.
“We're just letting everyone know that they don't have to be in the lineup with everybody else sitting there like a buoy waiting for waves,” said Waynar. “They can be out there in a different playground experiencing something that is gonna give them a unique stoke, just like surfing.”
For old-timer Bob Pearson, hooting and hollering with other riders is what makes it all worth it.
“When you get a good ride, they hoot and holler. It makes you feel better,” said Pearson.
And for him, encountering all the new toys on the water dosen’t necessarily mean disrupting tradition.
“There’s more people having fun now, riding a bigger variety of boards, flotation devices,” says Pearson. “ You're out there playing. Pushing the limits. Yeah, I enjoy that…I'm looking forward to doing that tomorrow and the next day and the next day and next day.”
