This was my third year missing out on booking a room directly at the Golden Sails Hotel. It takes a while for me to get my calendar in order. The previous two years I had gone for whatever cheap motel I could find on Hwy 1. I gotta say though, it's a pretty boring area. Trust me, I walked like 3 miles from my motel to the Golden Sails one year. So this time I thought I'd nestle myself a little more into Long Beach, and stayed at the Beach Inn, which was within walking distance of the Beach and the Queen Mary. It was about 4 miles away from the Golden Sails, still not a huge distance. I could either check out the town or head to the Golden Sails because this year they had breakfast and music from 9:30 to 11am at the pool.

There are a lot of surf festivals. I try to pay attention, but it’s hard to keep track. But the biggest most significant of them in the US is the Surfguitar101 Festival. Even if it weren’t a big ol’ 3-day event with multiple groups from all around the globe, it’s at the epicenter of surf music in Southern California. Put on by Jeff “BigTikiDude” Hanson, Art Bourasseau, and (as Jeff put it) a lot of cool friends, it’s not only a fantastic opportunity to see the best surf bands in the world, but it’s a chance to meet and greet with other surf nerds.