Hard to say whether this is paradise, or heaven, though it probably falls under both...

Photographic proof that at one point in time Southern California wasn't all concrete, condos, and too many people. Thanks, Ronnie, for the goods

Awesome, Totally awesome

A nice view of the harbor and town taken by an occasional crew member just after the end of the race. We didn't do too bad, but then again when there's no surf it's arguably the best view in town...

Naturally, my mind always drifts back south. "Its those changes in latitudes, changes in attitudes, nothing remains quite the same..." Kelso with a more than happy attitude somewhere in-between San Diego and Lima in a spot he's most comfortable in.

Up north summertime is often much better. With the right place and timing and a good captain (and a longtime on the water herself...) Leslie hooks, and lands a nice one. To say the least. A month prior in that same northern third of California I landed one myself, but since I decide to not to show off that picture, its suffice to say that I'm a bit jealous....

It seems as though I forget about surfing this time of year, simply because of where I live. Of course my mind is always somewhere south of the border where the waves are crashing as good as they always have and often as lonely. At least I have my sailing mates. Once we leave the harbor my phone doesn't leave my sail bag, so hence the shot from the cockpit of our J92. Still, I think its a neat shot from the cockpit at harbor level, post-rigging ready to head out, beer in hand of course...

The Chairman of the Board...

Some cats are cool...Any cat that's a fan of Hunter S. Thompson is good in my book....

BK, flying high and tight, as usual at what I believe is Velzyland

Peter Maguire is an interesting and smart cat. Part surfer, military man and historian, his life has been seen from many more angles than most ever get to see. Because of his wide perspective his knowledge base makes for many interesting thoughts. His book Thai Stick on 70's smuggling and his TSJ profile on SEAL Ivan Trent are just a couple highlights of his work. The except below takes a great look at the change in surfing from a historians viewpoint. Having a history degree myself, I cant help but love this excerpt.

     Compliments of Kyle DeNuccio, and The Surfers Journal


I went to Snakes [Scorpion Bay] for the first time in 1979 and it was a rough crowd down there. Now it’s unbelievable. There are people who can’t even make the wave who are saying, “Well I have a house here.” There seems to be a greater sense of entitlement among people who just buy a surfboard and can ride to the beach—especially in California. It’s an everyman’s sport. You’ll hear, “Oh, on Sundays me and the guys from the law firm go surfing and have a big breakfast afterward.” But surfing was never a social activity to me. It was always kind of clandestine. We had our secret spots and we didn’t break with them easily.

A new bit of good work from our Saltwatery world. Creator Brandon Hayward and one hell of an editor in Scott Hulett of TSJ awesomeness deserve full credit here, Because lets be serious Surfers and Fisherman (and Sailors) are all pretty much the same...

I don't like the beer, but marketing works, and it works even better with a creative twist. This couldn't be a truer statement for me...

Passing down a now clean Hynson (with thanks to a Junod restoration)...Bjorn on the right was one happy cat. And finally has a real longboard....

Here's what I say to summertime flatness in my corner of California...Lawn sailing mid rigging with a Yacht club friend and were near ready to go...

Who's more badass? The one you would want to be, or the one you would want to f--k...
 Sometimes good pics don't have to come from the surf world

     I've just learned that we've lost another one.
     This man however was different than most, as very few came even close to a master of big waves and a master of science and a master of a person.
      And he was the most casual and unassuming in all of his pursuits. I never knew him, but I've always known him, and admired him for just those qualities. What made a surfer and a man before it mattered to make a point of it, Ricky did it...
     Ricky Grigg equally elite surfer oceanographer and human, one of the finest,  R.I.P

...

BK in his Sunset backyard in 71' doing exactly what he did best and what we like to see him do. Betcha cant lay your board on rail like that, most cant. BK can. Photo credit to Art Brewer

Jack and Flaca enjoy the scenery more than anyone else which is saying quite a bit considering David and Jimmy’s past adventures in this zone. It’s the Conejos, the rabbits, that catch their eyes, and while Jack is 18 years old and only watches these days Flaca turns into a Mexican jumping bean when the cottontails come into view between the cactus and scrub. They are two of the best dogs you could ever travel with. ---From Jesse Ferris' "El Dedo"

        Old Jack in the earlier days in that same countryside, the place he loved the most. Rest in Peace big guy, you were loved by many

R.I.P Hobie, one of the greats, you will be missed

Another Cat... We're Dora fans around these parts, even when he's not carving up Malibu...and is that a Hynson RedFin punching through the lip?

Cant remember where I found this but I sure do like it....A cat on a cat

Beachbreak Fun...sometimes the approach to the nose and the head dip can be the more interesting part

surfing's not a sport it's a way of life, it's no hobby, it's like a way of looking at that wave and saying 'hey bud lets party'

And, back to the temperate zone we go...

Of course, waves in paradise trump it all...

Of course surfing locales are higher on the list but there's nothing wrong with a little Caribbean paradise is there? Add in some Pacifico's and a bottle of Mount Gay Rum and I'm set for a while...

Nice board huh? Board: Michel, Photo: Aaron

It still happens even in 2014, a small solo session out front. Thanks to Aaron Howard for the photo, and the seagulls for being the gracious gallery.

Dave Parmenter has been an important figure in the surf world for a very long time. He's one of those people that when you hear him speak or read his writing, its usually worth paying attention to. Especially his thoughts on Stand Up Paddling...

 It started as a Polynesian thing, Makaha iOS and self-policing on where and when you did it. For me the attraction was solely about getting away from surfing a conventional surf spot. …But after a few years of being a craze it just got away from us and became something else. The dorks commandeered it. It was the same with the leash, same with the modern longboard – where misuse of a tool inflicts yet another plague on the beleaguered surfing population. It’s actually worse than the abuses possible with a longboard because out-of-control SUP boards are far more dangerous. It’s always the same old thing, assholes who don’t know their place. Charles Lindbergh was the pioneer and champion of aviation as a force to bring Mankind together, but he wound up turning his back on it later in life and becoming something of an environmentalist. I just always knew that one day it would be like that, after barnstorming this new sport around the world, but one day forced to turn my back on it in the same way that he did against aviation because it had been used against mankind instead of for it. There are many SUPers out there who have inflicted their own Guernica upon the civilian surfing population

From deep in the archives, some down time, down south, a long time ago

Nuff said

The Leash ruined surfing, agreed the world over ...

No leashes, but goggles are ok...some quality downtime in the beers home country

So we now have a little stockpile of both Leash Ruined Surfing AND Give Hawaii Back Stickers for sale if so inclined.
Keep in mind that I'm not tech savvy and I'm still working out the kinks on this thing. Feel free to contact me, Jesse at jferris_enc@yahoo.com or Turtle at bajaf350@gmail.com meanwhile ill be working on getting a singular email and PayPal up and running to make things easier on both ends
Yew!

A short story from leashless

            A California Story  

                  By Jesse Ferris

            I hate the term California gold. It’s one of the oldest clichés in the book and it’s been overused for decades. I hate it because it works so well that it’s hard to coin a better term. It’s in the lighting and the shadows and the contrasts and the colors and the land itself, it’s all there subtly stark and poignant all at once. California is the land of the endless promise, some dreams realized and plenty dreams broken. The Spanish were lured here only to be disappointed and the Mexicans failed thereafter. California Dreamin’ was on the minds of many long before John and Michelle Phillips dreamed of escaping a New England winter, and the thought has surely endured through the years.

            Some of us are more fortunate than others, with luck often times being the only deciding factor to those of us who are geographically privileged. Thankfully my parents were smart enough to leave the Midwest.  My dad packed up his 1974 Datsun pickup truck on his 18^th birthday in the winter of 1977 and waved goodbye to his folks and seven siblings in knee deep Dubuque snow as he left for a place called Pacific Beach. The name itself just had a beautiful ring to it. To those of us who don’t care for seasons, wintertime on the Pacific suits our temperaments just fine. I’m sure a sunset over the Appalachians or a Nebraska cornfield have their merits but I’ll take a pastel sky as seen through twisting cypress trees any day of the year, finish it off with a green flash and you’re pretty much there. And the best thing about the California coast is that unlike the rest of the vast majority of the country the canvas of the land has an end and that’s a good thing, as the seemingly endless Pacific takes front and center stage.

            Hawaiian photographers, especially those focusing on water shots will tend to laugh at their Californian counterparts who do the same thing. And you know what, most of the time that’s pretty warranted. There are exceptions to every rule of course, there always are. All you need is proximity to the coast (walking distance is a plus), motivation to put on a wet wettie when most are bundled up with a beer in hand, a lot of commitment, and a lot more luck. Put all these together and you have the recipe for photographic success, sometimes, maybe.

            If you happen to live in a coastal town with a Spanish name and are motivated, or crazy enough to withstand long periods of flatness, lots of wavestorms and SUPs, sometimes rewards come in golden moments of solitude and beauty.  California Dreamin’ suddenly becomes much more than a thought or a dream or a song, and it’s the temperamental aspect therein that makes it special. Like Mickey Munoz said, “If the waves were perfect everyday it would get boring.” Some people scoff at that notion but I believe it. If everything was beautiful all the time then nothing would be beautiful.

            The west end of the beach town with the Spanish name is good at producing quality and varying moods as Aaron Howard knows. I live with him, I would know. With a view of the ocean through the eucalyptus from the backyard the critical merging of place and timing is pretty ideal. I’m usually one of the folks on the cliff with a beer in hand while half the time he is off in some nook or cove swimming around fiddling with his water housing. The ongoing joke is, “Boy, Aaron you’re getting pretty good with Photoshop.” It’s not a funny joke, not even sarcastically funny it’s just more out of jealousy of the fact that I can’t even take a good photo on my Iphone let alone with a pricy manual focus camera in water housing.

            If you’ve never heard of Aaron Howard, it’s probably because you haven’t. He’s just another stoked surfer from Southern California, a dime a dozen in that sense. But the difference with him is that while most people talk about doing things he just does things, almost always with camera case in tow.

            “Jesse stop and don’t move”, I’ll hear him shout sometimes while were riding bikes out to the point as he tears his camera from its case snapping away at some sight that missed me. Other times he will disappear for five or ten minutes and return all giddy. Some say if you’ve seen one sunset, you’ve seen them all. I couldn’t disagree more, and Aaron laughs at the thought. Say what you will but there is something very unique about a California sunset, and also uniquely as difficult to capture in its full glory.

            In the digital age where every other surfer has a GoPro mounted to their board creativity can sometimes be overlooked. It’s a far different world than when George Greenough was documenting his escapades nearly a half century ago. He had thirty pounds of equipment on his back, while today’s photographer can nearly fit his gear in his back pocket if so desired. The eye however is the critical component that endures and that’s all that really matters. With the right positioning and wave and timing sense it’s not all that difficult to put yourself in the right spot, be it surfing or photography. All it takes is patience and time, two things that most people either don’t have or don’t care to think about.

            Of course living in the small beach town with the Spanish name helps. Jimmy Buffett once said, “Without geography, we’re nowhere.” Very true statement that is, and it goes further than that because without that same geography, wherever you’re at, those beautiful things probably wouldn’t be possible. That’s only part of the story however. It’s easy for someone like me to stare at the landscape around us at a moment in time and be awestruck by the beauty of the golden hour on the edge of the American continent but it’s a whole different ballgame to be able to capture it forever.

            That’s the beauty of the contrast of the place itself. From (occasional) solitude to light turquoise greens and blues of a fall afternoon to the deep pastel reds and oranges as the sun drops behind the Pacific, variety is still the spice of life. Sometimes the magic moments don’t require an overseas flight and boat ride. It may be colder and more temperamental than places of surf resort packages, the spots you see on every other page of Surfer Magazine but the satisfaction of staying at home for those golden moments often resonates that much more. California is good at doing that sort of thing, and Aaron Howard is good at capturing it all. I guess that damn cliché still rings true, because we still love it when it does.  

 

            Cruise on over to aaronhoward1.tumblr.com to check out some of his goods

 

Even some hicks from the sticks like to surf

No Shame self promotion. Thanks to Michel Junod for the board, and Aaron Howard for the photo

Hey all,
   So its been quite the break on my end. Swells have come and gone just like my college career and with no more homework and a job instead I can come home and fiddle around with time on my terms rather than dealing with schoolwork. That's a longwinded excuse for laziness and neglect. So were back at The Leash Ruined Surfing, whatever that means. These days were home-based in Isla Vista but have our roots in Leucadia and friends throughout the golden state. Keep an eye out for pics, stories and whatever other little blurbs and goodies that we seem to like and we hope you like them too.