Video: 15-Foot Waves Unload on LA's Most Notoriously Localized Surf Spot

Originally posted on SURFER | By Dashel Pierson | Last updated Feb 21, 2024 2:00 PM ET

In the halls of surf history, Lunada Bay is most known for its localism.

Native surfers to the posh Rancho Palos Verdes community fiercely defended their spot – throwing rocks at outsiders, inciting altercations in the water, slashing tires, waxing windows, etc. They even had a throne (read: a stone fort) from which they reigned.

However, Lunada Bay is also known for something else: It’s one of the only surf spots in Los Angeles County able to hold relatively sizable swell. And on Sunday, February 18th, that’s exactly what happened – 10-15 foot bombs detonating on Lunada.

It’s been a nonstop, somewhat epic, potentially historic winter season in the Pacific Ocean, in terms of surf and swell. Surfers, who have the memory of a goldfish paired with nostalgia levels bordering on obsession, have been heralding this season as one to remember, one for the books.

Valid claim? To be determined.

As for Lunada Bay, this wasn’t the only swell of the season that sent double-overhead waves to the LA County medium-wave surf spot. During the massive, much-discussed December 28th, 2023 swell, Lunada was one of the only spots manageable during such magnitude of surf – aside from Mavericks, just south of San Francisco.

But Lunada, today, looks different from the localized days of yore. The Lunada “Bay Boys” went to court; the fort was demolished; the lineup got more crowded.

Now, a new spot has taken the crown as “Los Angeles’ Most Localized Surf Spot” – Topanga, a few clicks south of Malibu. The tense crowds, and the documented surf fights, have earned that spot a new nickname: “Topangry.”

Long live Lunada?

This article first appeared on SURFER and was syndicated with permission.

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