A-frame

Aaberg, Denny

Aaberg, Kemp

Abberton, Koby

Abbruzzi, Sid

Abellira, Reno

Abubo, Megan

academia and surfing

Adler, Tom

advertising and surfing

Aeder, Erik

aerial

Aguerre, Fernando

Aichner, Scott

Aikau, Clyde

Aikau, Eddie

Aipa, Ben

air-drop

airbrush

Airshow

Ala Moana

Alabama

alaia board

Alaska

alcohol and surfing

Alexander, Kala

Allen, Chuck

Alms, Paige

aloha shirt

Alter, Hobie

Alvarez, Pepe

Ancell, Kevin

Andaman Islands

Andersen, Lisa

Anderson, Craig

Anderson, Simon

Andino, Kolohe

Angel, Jose

angle

Angola

Angourie

Antarctica

Apocalypse Now

Arabian Sea

Aragon, Janice

Arakawa, Eric

Archbold, Matt

Arena, Eduardo

Ashton, Juan

Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP)

Atlantic Ocean

August, Robert

Aurness, Rolf

Auster, Ken

Australia

Avalon, Frankie

Azores

backdoor

backside

backside attack, Pipeline

backwash

bail out

Bain, Rob

Baja California

Baker, Bernie

Baker, Grant “Twiggy”

Baker, Tim

Bali

Ball, John “Doc”

Ballard, Bill

Ballard, Rochelle

balsa

Baltic Sea

Banks, Jim

Barbados

Barilotti, Steve

Barland, Michel

Barreda, Sergio “Gordo”

Barry, Michael

Bartholomew, Wayne

Baxter, Jackie

Bay of Bengal

Beach Boys, The

Beacham, Debbie

beachboys

beachbreak

Beachcomber Bills Grand Prix

Beachley, Layne

beavertail

Becker, Phil

Bedford-Brown, Stuart

Belgium

Bells Beach

Bendall, Ma and Pa

Bennett, Barry

Benson, Becky

Benson, Linda

Bermuda

Bertlemann, Larry

Beschen, Shane

The lightly populated Baja Peninsula extends for 780 cactus-filled miles below California, is made up of two states (Baja California and Baja California Sur), and has been long regarded by American surfers as a vast, adventurous, often frustrating, and occasionally frightening surf destination. 

With the exception of Baja's southernmost tip, and the 65-mile north coast between Ensenada and the California border, Baja surf breaks are for the most remote and widely dispersed. As much of the Trans-Baja California Highway is located miles from the coast, getting to a beach often means a long drive on rutted and sometimes washed-out dirt roads, with no emergency services. 

 newsletter said in 1997, "you enter a refuge in which time has stopped and you can be left entirely to your own devices. This means both freedom and danger. It is vital that you plan a Baja trip carefully and take all essentials with you." A serious uptick in Mexican narco-violence in the mid-'00s included attacks on surfers camping in central Baja; that said, surfers have always viewed the area as a place to slow down and relax, and a typical Baja jaunt will often consist of equal parts beer drinking, fishing, napping, reading, and surfing.

North Baja was probably first ridden in the late '40s or early '50s by visiting San Diego surfers. Mike Hynson and Bill Fury rode waves about 75 miles south of Ensenada in 1963; two years later the Windansea Surf Club boated out from Ensenada to ride Todos Santos Island; in 1967, Steve Bigler visited San Jose del Cabo, at the tip of Baja. San Miguel, a pointbreak just north of Ensenada, was the most popular Baja wave in the '60s, and the Baja Surf Club Invitational—held at San Miguel from 1966 to 1969, directed by local surfer and 1966 World Surfing Championships competitor Ignacio "Nacho" Cota— was attended by most of the top California surfers. 

After the two-lane Trans-Baja California Highway opened in late 1973, California surfers began making longer, more in-depth forays down the narrow peninsula; new discoveries included Scorpion Bay and Abreojos, both first-rate pointbreaks. Isla Natividad, a tubing beachbreak located on a small island off Punta Eugenia, became popular in the '80s, as did Killers, the ferocious big-wave break on Todos Santos Island. The warm, easy-to-ride surf breaks in and around the resort towns of Cabo San Lucas and San Jose del Cabo also became popular in the '80s.

The Cabo-area surf breaks from May to October, and is otherwise all but dormant; portions of Pacific-facing Baja are open to waves all year, although summer waves are often small to nonexistent for days or even weeks at a time, and spring winds can be relentless. Cabo can be unbearably hot in summer; the Pacific coast is cooler, with strong, dusty offshore winds in winter, and an average water temperature five to 10 degrees below that found in Southern California. 

As of 2012, Baja was home to over 1,000 native surfers and about 10 surf shops, most catering to visiting surfers near the California border, and around the Cabo San Lucas area. The Baja surf is detailed in 

 (2012). "Baja" was the title of the Astronauts' 1963 reverb-heavy instrumental hit; the Con Surfboards Baja Model was introduced in 1966; part one of Allan Weisbecker's 2001 surfing/drug smuggling memoir 

Subscribe or Login

Encyclopedia of Surfing

History of Surfing

Interviews

Features

Videos

Contests