Back in the late sixties or early seventies we had the body surfers verses the board surfers wars in Newport. That was eventually solved with the institution of the "blackball" flag system. When the beach got too crowded with swimmers the lifeguards would raise the blackball flag (a yellow flag with a blackball in the middle of it) which meant that all hard boards had to leave the water. I can remember similar wars down at San Onofre before they established the "kayak zone." Once I was down there running a class when a burly boardie approached me and tried to start a fight right there on the sand! It was pretty ugly. Of course it was just a few of "them" causing all the trouble, but they were a persistent group. A letter writing campaign was began by the local paddlers which led to discussions with the park service and the kayak zone was the result. Like Geoff, I can't say that I am entirely happy with the outcome - but I guess it's better then getting beaten up :-) Several years ago I was on the sand between sessions down at San Onofre when I ran into an old high school buddy that I hadn't seen in twenty or so years. We were having a really nice chat catching up when it came out in the conversation that I was in a kayak. My buddy, a boardie, stopped in mid sentence and turned and walked away! He didn't want to be seen fraternizing with the enemy. :-) Scott So.Cal. *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************Received on Mon Jul 09 2007 - 15:00:49 PDT
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