Surfer Magazine's Guide to Southern California Surf Spots: Santa Barbara - Ventura - Los Angeles - Orange - San Diego

This is not a technical, step-by-step shop manual for California surfing: it is more of a field guide for your own surf exploration. If you want lil' matrices diagramming where and when to surf at any given moment, save up and get yourself a membership to a certain surf website. All in all, the book is definitely useful when getting outside of your normal haunts. It demystifies the places you have heard about but never surfed, and provides enough practical information to get you there. There is definitely a casual, caustic tone to the thing, which could possibly grate on some people. At the end of each section there are a few words about neat stuff and local histories or curiosities. At the very least, it's an interesting read for those who surf the California coast or dream of doing so. Get the nor-cal guide too, even if you don't like Surfer Mag.

Awesome book for any first time surfer to S.Cali or anyone interestd in the beaches along the California Coast.

This is a relatively comprehensive guide to Southern California surf spots. The book includes maps and descriptions of the ideal swell direction for each of the breaks it lists. Unlike other guides, however, it often omits crucial information about how tide levels affect many of the breaks it lists. Although some will be upset by the editors' inclusion of "secret" spots like Hazard Canyon and the Indicator at Lunada Bay, the rest of us are smart enough to realize that these spots haven't been secret since about the time surfboards were carved out of balsa wood. One of the best features of this book (and its companion guide to NorCal) is the waterproof paper it's printed on. All in all, this is a fine edition, and a slight but significant improvement over its predecessors.