Old Pals Still Surfing After All These Years

The spot that the young California surfers had staked out at the old Tin Can Beach was perfect. About two miles north of Huntington Beach Pier, it was really a no-man’s land, where the gang could surf until dark in uncrowded conditions, then party amid the flickering glow of campfires.

It was the summer of ‘65, when the group of carefree teen-agers spent days on their longboards trying to do radical tail block turns like those of Phil Edwards, a legendary surfer and board designer.

Today, surfboards are shorter, the style more aggressive, Phil Edwards’ name has been replaced by Tom Curren’s, and these guys are still in the water. What with arthritis, bad backs and paunches, some members of this aging bunch are fortunate to be surfing at all.

“It used to be that as kids it was important to see how good we could become as surfers. Now, we’re lucky just to stand up,” said Kim Smith, 42.

They are known as the “Second Outhouse Gang,” and whoever added the term salty dog to the surfer lexicon must have had this eclectic collection of about 50 middle-aged men in mind. Almost daily they travel to Bolsa Chica State Beach and park at the second public restroom on the southern end of the beach.

They inhabit a spot called “Beer Belly Point” by those less respectful of the finer things in life, like beer before breakfast and a good primal scream.

“Hey, what we do here is dead serious, man. It’s our lifeline to sanity,” said Steve Simonia, who makes the jaunt to Huntington Beach from his home in Montebello.

Simonia and the others have forged longtime relationships with the ocean, but they cringe when someone suggests that they are part of a graying generation of beach bums once predicted