Santa Cruz

Just south of Ano Nuevo, as the coast highway dips down to Waddell Creek, San Mateo County ends and Santa Cruz County begins at County Line, which is a favorite summer spot. There are waves all along the beach from Ano Nuevo to the first parking lot at Waddell Creek, but most people surf where there is parking. Waddell Creek is several hundred yards of reefs and beachbreaks leading up to a rivermouth, then more beachbreaks with more reefs at the north end. Waddell Creek is the workhorse spot for Santa Cruz watermen. It tends to be best in the morning before the onshore winds come up, and it can be good all day when the winds are blowing offshore. When the wind comes up, the sailboarders take over, but when it's not windy enough for them, the kite surfers are out there, going fast and getting air. Waddell Creek is open to everything and does a good job of handling it all. The reefs love a midsize west or south swell, and the beachbreaks like anything up to double-overhead, from any direction. There's nothing faux about Waddell Creek. This is an industrial-strength surf spot, which also happens to be at the mouth of one of the prettiest valleys on the coast. Catch it on a blue, offshore, head-high day in the fall, and welcome to NorCal heaven. Waddell Creek is also located up current from white shark central, and there have been a number of incidents here. Shark story number four: In the early '90s, Josh Mulcoy was paddling out at the north end of Waddell Creek when he felt something weird underneath him. "I wasn't sure if it was some weird little reef glurge or something else," Mulcoy said. "I got out of the water just in time to see a big white shark cruising in the surf line. I watched it for a while. It even nudged a bird, which flew away. I've seen two other white sharks since then, but that one flipped me out a little bit. My dad [Harbor Bill] showed up a little later, and thought we were kidding. When he saw it, he thought it was two sharks. There was that much space between its front and back fins." Shark story number five: a UCSC student named Jack Wolf was surfing the south end of Waddell Creek with a friend when a white shark molested him. He wasn't attacked, he was molested -- thrashed around but not bitten.

Secret spots? What secret spots? There are a number of breaks north and south of Scott's Creek. These places used to be top secret and it's still not cool to talk about them, so we won't. Scott's Creek itself is visible from the road, so we'll talk about that. Scott's Creek is a right reef that breaks anywhere from 2 feet to 20, mostly in the winter. It can get big and burly, and the place will roll you to within an inch of your life if you screw up. The reef on the north end of the beach is the main attraction, but during the winter, the creek and the moving sand can create sandbars all up and down the beach. Scott's Creek also gets a lot of wind, so if you see sails, you probably won't be surfing. There are a bunch of shark stories attached to this area and the reefs just north. Scott's Creek is also a good place to get fluked by a gray whale in the spring. They like this stretch of beach, for some reason, and there often are pods of 20-plus whales less than 50 yards from the beach, all through the spring.

A rippable right reef/point, four miles outside of Santa Cruz. An out-of-town spot popular with out-of-towners, the Santa Cruz guys have taken to calling this place "Florida Mile" as it has become so popular with visiting surfers trying to escape the heat of town. Breaks all winter, blows out easy and is occasionally a great wave. Parking lot has been misdemeanor heaven for decades. Don't leave anything in your car, unless it's a bomb triggered by the clammy, slimy hands of rip-offs.

The first surf spot in Santa Cruz proper, Natural Bridges is a right reef/point that breaks along a gnarly rock shelf. It's a winter spot, best on bigger swells and lower tides. Natural Bridges can be mind-boggling at times, kind of like Gas Chambers in Puerto Rico on the wrong tides, but it is a little north of Steamer Lane, so it is exposed to northwest winds and blows out easily. Factoid: Ever see the Clint Eastwood movie Sudden Impact, where Sondra Locke blows away the guy sitting on the beach chair? That was Natural Bridges.

Ever see Clint Eastwood's Sudden Impact? That house on the point at Mitchell's Cove is where Sondra Locke was living in the movie. Mitchell's Cove is a right point that loves a low tide and a winter swell in the overhead to double-overhead range. When Mitchell's is firing, it is one of the better right points on the California coast. This place is fickle and finicky, but it can blow your mind on the right day. A few winters ago, Josh Loya rode a wave from Outside Swift Street all the way through to Mitchell's. During the big swell of October 28, 1999, while the nuts were towing in to 50-foot Maverick's, the rest of Santa Cruz got to surf perfect, low-tide, 6-foot Mitchell's Cove.

A classic name for a classic California surf spot, Steamer Lane is geo-strategically placed to sweep up just about everything moving within or just above the surface of the Pacific Ocean and put it to some use. Because Santa Cruz faces straight south, Lighthouse Point points almost directly south, and that weird geography is the secret to Steamer Lane’s success. Swells from the west and northwest that ravage the coast north of Santa Cruz are evened out and groomed as they bend into the Monterey Bay. The same is true for the northwest winds that pound the north coast for most of the year. Because of the bend at the top of the Monterey Bay, those northwest winds blow offshore at Steamer Lane. There are few things in nature as beautiful as a 10-foot, offshore peak unloading at Steamer Lane. Steamer Lane is maybe a little too irresistible, because it is now one of the most crowded surf spots in California. At any given hour, there is probably a wider range of people surfing Steamer Lane than anywhere in the world.

Cowell's Beach is all the way on the inside of Lighthouse Point and Steamer Lane, and the waves are long, gentle, and break for a very long time. Cowell's is one of the most crowded surf spots in Santa Cruz, but most of the people are there to learn and have fun and have a good time.

This is the East Side of Santa Cruz. Once the shy little sister to the West Side, Pleasure Point is now producing its fair share of world-class surfers. Jay Moriarity, may he rest in peace, used to live at Pleasure Point, Chris Gallagher at 41st Avenue. Pleasure Point offers something for every possible kind of waverider, from bodyboarders to shortboarders to longboarders, and this place is very, very popular with all of that and everything between.

Capitola