Holiday, Sunny Skies Attract 1.2 Million to Area Beaches

Beating the warm weather with a cool dip in the ocean isn’t such a hot idea on a holiday, thousands of Los Angeles beachgoers discovered Monday.

A crowd of nearly 1.2 million jammed beaches from the Palos Verdes Peninsula to Point Dume and beyond as the three-day Independence Day holiday ended, authorities said.

Lifeguards were kept busy handling surf rescues, lost children and bruised skaters, but no serious injuries were reported.

“Our parking lot is sold out and I’m looking out at a gridlocked Pacific Coast Highway,” said Malibu lifeguard Capt. Jim Doman, whose Zuma Beach was filled with about 120,000 people by mid-afternoon. “It’s a very ugly sight.”

The largest crowds descended on South Bay beaches. About 600,000 staked out patches of sand for beach towels and umbrellas in the Manhattan Beach, Torrance, Redondo Beach, Hermosa Beach and Palos Verdes areas.

“It’s a lot more crowded than it was on the Fourth,” said lifeguard Cosmo Flynn. “It was overcast until noon on Sunday. Today, it was bright and sunny from sunup on.”

Minor riptides caused by underwater holes carved by winter storms kept lifeguards hurrying to rescue swimmers near piers in Venice and Santa Monica.

Lifeguards in the Venice, Santa Monica and Topanga Canyon areas rescued about 90 people Monday, contrasted with 130 rescues Sunday. Monday’s crowd totaled 450,000.

They retrieved about 20 lost children, compared with three dozen rounded up Sunday.

Forecasters said today will be an even nicer day to go to the beach for those able to stretch the three-day holiday into four.

“It will be a little warmer in some areas,” said Guy Pearson, a meteorologist with WeatherData Inc., which provides forecasts for The Times.

“It’s looking like we’ll have pretty much the same conditions: sunny skies, but with some likelihood of patchy fog along the coast that will probably dissipate at 10 or 11 at the latest.”

Temperatures today will range from the 70s to the low 80s at the beach, to the mid-80s in downtown Los Angeles and “maybe even approaching 100” in inland valleys, Pearson said. Water temperatures should be about 68 degrees.