Now 2005, so a couple years ago i reminded myself that growing up in California i had promised myself that i would learn to surf before i became a senior citizen, and not by getting away with cutting friday class in San Jose in high school and driving over 17 to Santa Cruz. So i chose one of the 2 or more surf schools at Santa Cruz's safe beach with sandy bottom on the right side of the pier,opposite the famous Boardwalk amusement park, at Cowell Beach. Club Ed gave me an excellent Hawaiian college student age surf instructor and i was standing up repeatedly, with difficulty as it is not as easy a child's play at 50, in less than a full 8hr day!!
I was jazzed, or as they say "stoked",so i signed up for the Baja surf camp week in Mexico and this is were my consumer experience went "south", in a big way !! We were to caravan drive down and i was talked into driving one of the trucks,since i had a chauffeurs commercial limo and bus license and a much better safety record with the state DMV than the college kid who was going to get extra pay for driving after finishing a commercial driving course,,,in exchange,i understood at the time ,for a new surfboard of my size and a wet suit,as i was a pro limo driver and wound never have agreed to the risk and work during my expensive paid vacation of driving to and in Mexico for any thing less, period. I make $400-300 a day,just in tips.
So in November of 2001, i drove from Santa Cruz on Monterey Bay down to the Mex border,scary TJ, and down thru the federales-over armed thugs of Baja to a place south of Ensenada, i believe called Erindira Beach. This is NOT a safe place for beginners to learn to surf, in my humble opinion !! The beach is rocky and so is the wave break area bottom and we had one athletic guy jump instead of buttflop off his surfboard and shatter his ankle !! Yes, there was a very nice guy as pro EMT but he failed to immediately or even near term treat the victim for shock as you learn in basic and advanced first aid by taking him off the steep incline head up beach position for a horizontal position,,,basic bonehead stuff,,,and the guy almost went into SHOCK plus having to be driven fast in the back of a pickup all the way north to a good San Diego hospital.
Also the instructors were not available,but seemed unhappy to work for so little,as Ed had told me he was into making a quick fortune-killing and buying a new bigger house and lots more land in expensive Santa Cruz. The college kid who i aced out of the driving job certainly was not happy about losing that additional income. And usually the instructors would be available the first few hours of the first day and then only the first hour of the day after the beauty led the option beach yoga class,so that they could get their surf time in. At first the waves were under 6 feet but then a tropical storm offshore brought higher waves and we were told to go in and try,,,as in pee in your wetsuit scared stiff try,,,!!!!!
The other members of the paid staff and paying guests were a good mix:we had a young family ,rich,from Piedmont with a beautiful french- speaking wife and 2 great kids,and a young pretty blonde from Long Island,NY,,,and some single men like my self,and the paid and excellent cook, and Ed's nice wife and 2 brat kids. The weather was awful:sweltering hot in the black rubber wetsuits during the day and cold foggy damp bone-chilling cold in the provided small tents and our sleeping bags at night. We usually had a guitar for someone to play at the nightly campfire and lots of Mexicans ready to steal any loose stuff from our campsite right on the beach. If you stlll insist on going there ,there is a good clean cheap hotel at the far north-one mile-end of the beach,which is where i wish i slept,,, every,,, night,,,, of the trip, tho i have backpacked and horsepacked in the Sierra Nevada's all my life. No showers, i seem to remember,either at the beach.
On the drive back norte i asked Ed what kind of surfboard and surfing wetsuit he was going to buy me in compensation,,, and he said i had misunderstood,not in writing, that he would only give me his pro surf shop discount of about $200 on both. Shock,,,again,,, i said i did not misunderstand as i had restated his offer for a full wetsuit and new board on the ride down. So i was screwed, and probably not the first or last. Beware!! And there are other surf schools.
