The marine layer drops a light coat of mist on the cars at the Tourmaline parking lot. The break just off shore is familiar territory for San Diego’s surfers.
“Tourmaline is a longboarding spot; it’s been a surfing park since the mid-1960’s,” said Jess Ponting, a professor at San Diego State University.
The gray conditions may be unappealing to swimmers, but not people looking for a wave. Surfers gather offshore nearly everyday. They sit on their boards, just outside the break, until they see a good swell.
“Then you paddle like hell and catch the thing,” said Ponting. “You’ve got to get your board up to the same kind of speed as the wave that’s approaching, and jump to your feet and ride the thing.“
The professor came to the school to teach a sustainable tourism class.
The Orange county publication, Surfer’s Journal, documented the connection.
“Our readers, and we just did a survey on this and our readers travel out of the country to surf two times a year in the majority,” said Ross Garrett, director of operations and development at the Journal. “So 70 percent of our readers travel outside the country twice a year, so I think that’s probably more than the general populace.”
Lifelong San Diego resident Beth Slevcove has made a habit of traveling to surf.
“Being from San Diego, I love Baja, California, and have traveled extensively all over Baja to surf down there,” said Slevcove. “Just camping along the beach and finding dirt roads, and finding great little treats and waves down there. It's just wonderful.“
Ponting’s research has him looking at the impact of surf tourism at Uluwatu, a busy Indonesian surf destination.
“And we figure that there’s somewhat in the realm of a quarter of a million surfers visiting to surf that wave each year. And that’s just one break on one island in one country that has over 2,000 islands,” said Ponting.
Studying an industry that’s scattered around the globe is challenging, but rewarding, and there’s a chance for Ponting to study bigger issues.
“Seeing how the imagery that surfers carry around in their head of that perfect wave, that perfect location. Which is the imagery that drives most of the surf retail industry. What does that image mean for the people who live in those destinations. We carry this dream around with us when we travel and we overlay it on different destinations,” said Ponting.
The new surfing research center will offer SDSU students a study abroad program next year. Ponting also hopes the research generated at the center will help governments around the world manage and preserve their surfing resources.
