My Own Surfing Thread!

[Baz]

Another local pic from the 80's taken by Pat. Poker going left and RP going right. At our inlet. No wasted waves!

[Baz]

Another local pic and description in Charlie's own words:

This board was a 6'10" Harold Iggy single fin, single wing pintail that I brought back from Hawaii in 1976. The board was great a Rocky Point and it worked great in NSB.

Charlie Baldwin

[Baz]

Another local pic of JL......he said he broke his board two waves later.......

[Baz]

Recent air brush by JL (the guy above).....

[Craig T]

Originally Posted by Baz

Recent air brush by JL (the guy above).....

Love it! ^^^^

I have a paddleboard in the colors of a killer whale. Hoping it keeps the great whites away when I'm down-winding a couple miles out.

[Baz]

TODAYS COLUMN IN THE OC REGISTER

MISSING DOC
By Corky Carroll

In November of 2014 the surfing world lost one of it’s most unique and colorful characters in, then 93 year old, Doctor Dorian Paskowitz. Through the years there have been zillions of stories and tales about Dorian and his surfing family, some with a degree of fact and some with whatever “facts” that were needed at the time if it had something to do with putting money in the kitty and food on the picnic table. Dorian was a true surfing vagabond, a gypsy if you will. Even though he had a degree in medicine from Stanford he choose packing his wife and nine children into a used camper van and spending his life surfing and generally avoiding steady work and refusing to subject his kids to any kind of formal education. “Home schooled” to the ninth degree would be putting it lightly. I loved the dude.

Let me regress a little bit. I first met Dorian when I was a young kid coming up in the surfing ranks. I think Mickey Munoz introduced him to me at Malibu one day when I was a young teen. Over the years we grew to be good friends and he in fact became my family doctor. When ever I, or my first wife Cheryl or our son Clint, would get sick we would send out smoke signals to alert “Doc” Paskowitz. They hardly ever had a phone. He would pull up in the family camper and the whole crew would come in while whoever was sick was getting tended to. He was a very good doctor. He would never take money as payment from us so I would pay him in used clothes for this kids. I was always one of those clothes hoarders who never would let go of something I liked even if it was in rags. So there was always plenty of stuff to pass along to the Paskowitz kids. For years I would see them around town, this was in the years I was living in San Clemente, wearing my old shirts or pants. He always gave me the best health care and would come over at a moments notice.

But my favorite memories of Doc were the afternoons I would spend hanging out with him on the beach at San Onofre Surfing Beach during the 1970’s and 80’s. I was working at SURFER magazine at that time and was also doing a lot of music. My neighbor was a great musician who turned surfer named Chris Darrow. I was helping Chris with his surfing and he was working on my musicianship. Most afternoons we would head to “Sano” to surf and maybe barbeque. Doc was almost always there with is family and we would spend hours chit chatting on the beach about all kinds of things, although mostly surfing. His kids were all good surfers; some of them grew into great surfers. He had a beautiful wife named Juliette who was the ultimate surf family mom. Every one of those kids was really smart and really talented in different ways. With no real schooling it is amazing at how great they all came out in the end. There is some controversy over this that came from some movie done about them, but I knew them through all those years and I can honestly say that they were living a pretty cool, different yes, but cool none the less, life surfing and learning about the world through day in and day out practical experience. Doc wanted them to see life through the eyes of surfers and they did. Is that good or bad? I don’t know, but they are all super good human beings.

One of my favorite “Doc” stories was when he was the official Doctor for the San Onofre Nuclear Plant. His job was to be on call in case somebody got hurt working at the plant. He got to hang out on the beach all the time surfing and being with his family. I guess he had a beeper in case they needed him. From what I understand they paid him a really solid amount of money for that. Juliette had an air horn or something to get him out of the water if he was surfing when he got a beep. I thought this was a great gig and one afternoon I mentioned that to him. He reaction surprised me. “I hate it,” he claimed.

“Why? Do you get beeped a lot?” I replied.

“No, never.”

“Then what’s the problem?”

“They might beep me. It’s way too much stress and I hate it.”

You can see that this dude was a kindred spirit to me. Coming from the Alfred E. Newman school of “What, me worry?” I had to love that about Doc. He eventually bailed on the Nuclear Plant job to get some peace of mind. I am not sure if he ever actually treated anybody or not during the years that he had that gig.

So today I was thinking about him, I think a saw a post on Facebook from his daughter or something and it triggered some good memories. He always made me feel like an honorary Paskowitz.

[Craig T]

My sister just sent me this picture. Me on the right...13 years old in 1973 at Leo Carrillo State Beach. My first surfboard. Infinity 6' pintail. Not an easy board to learn on, but I had it for a couple years. Grew to love it.

[Baz]

Originally Posted by Craig T

My sister just sent me this picture. Me on the right...13 years old in 1973 at Leo Carrillo State Beach. My first surfboard. Infinity 6' pintail. Not an easy board to learn on, but I had it for a couple years. Grew to love it.

COOL pic there, Craig! Always nice to have photos of your old boards. I had a few pin tails and a diamond tail as well, before going to swallow tails as my standby.

I wish I had taken photos of all the boards I had over the years....

Here's one from 1975 - "Big Jim" on the left and me on the right with our fishes. Big Jim and I were roommates in my 3rd year in college. He's an attorney now and lives in Ponce Inlet and has a huge surfboard collection. He also got me involved with cycling and we took a few long distance bike trips together back in the day.

Those fishes were FUN!




Another pic of me with my new Creation single fin diamond tail - probably a 6 footer, like yours....




And my single fin swallowtail I took to PR on my first surf trip outside the US....shaped by Danny Nichols!






Late 70's with another Nichols single fin with wings....fun board!




One taken by my Mom at her house from the 90's......Randy Richenberg 6'6" thruster....

[Baz]

Just found another one taken at the outside staircase of my apt in Gainesville my second to last year in college - 1976.

This one was shaped by Billy Gieger (who we called Doc because he was so technical on board design). Billy moved to PR years ago but he made a lot of boards in this area back in the day....I think this was a plain swallow tail single wing. Clear with one airbrush design on the deck, Clean....

[Baz]

Summer's almost here.....

[Baz]

[Baz]

Another vintage pic of my friend, JL...as posted on FB....

[Craig T]

Originally Posted by Baz

Another vintage pic of my friend, JL...as posted on FB....

Great vintage photo. That's a very short board, but look how thick it is. Close to 3". New short boards are closer to 2" with a ton of rocker. I had a 5'8" Dale Dobson fish that was thick like that. Made for easy paddling, but hard to sink that tail on bottom turns.

[Baz]

Mahalo Dick Catri.......

[tevake]

Thanks for posting that paddle out for Dick Catri, Baz.
He was a pivotal charicter in the early days of surfing in south Brevard County. My roots.
And a good guy, I helped out at his factory, where the board building was happening.
Learned my first tips on shaping from him.

I understand that fishing became his water sport in resent years, glad to know he still got on the water.

Aloha Oe Dick Catri, fair winds Brother.

Richard

[Baz]

Originally Posted by tevake

Thanks for posting that paddle out for Dick Catri, Baz.
He was a pivotal character in the early days of surfing in south Brevard County. My roots.
And a good guy, I helped out at his factory, where the board building was happening.
Learned my first tips on shaping from him.

I understand that fishing became his water sport in recent years, glad to know he still got on the water.

Aloha Oe Dick Catri, fair winds Brother.

Richard

You're welcome, Rich...and thanks for posting your thoughts and feelings.

He was a real institution in the surfing industry....especially as you said in the state of Florida.

And yes, he did get his Captain's license and spent quite a bit of his golden years at the helm of his charter boat.

My Dick Catri anecdote: in 1973 I went to Puerto Rico on my first ever surf trip outside the continental US. The week before we left, I found a discarded keel fin in the trash can of the local surf shop - it came off a Catri. Looked like it was torn off - complete including some fiberglass off the bottom layer even. I sanded it down so it fit into my fin box and took it to PR with me - along with my standard fin. It was just wedged into my fin box - no hardware to secure it. Every once in a while I would flip my board back over and tap it down just to make sure it was secure. At some point - it came out and I left it there. We were surfing at "Pools" at the time. I wonder if it is still there? A little piece of Captain Dick's legacy....

[Geary]

Get it while you can, guys. To quote GL, "Surf is where you find it" ..

[tevake]

Nice little top turn there Geary, guess you have had an epic season there this winter.

Thanks again for your invite to join in Bro.

Cheers Richard

[Heel n Toe]

Click for video... all the way in: This make my day - Album on Imgur

[tevake]

While looking into the foils used on the Am Cup boats, I came across this piece about a multi discipline event going down in N Z.

I really doubt the writer has done much water time with Laird. He is no shoulder hopper.
The man goes Deep for sure.
But some clean footage of foil surfing to be seen.

https://surfeuropemag.com/features/laird-hamilton-foil-board-raglan-new-zealand.html

Cheers Richsrd