Everything you need to know about Huntington Beach. To add to the OC Beachapedia, e-mail us here. Click here for a list of hotels along Orange County’s beaches.
Intro
Huntington Beach includes 8.5 miles of coastline, a pier and a harbor surrounded by homes. Bolsa Chica State Beach, the city’s northmost beach, stretches south from Warner Ave. to Seapoint Drive. Huntington City Beach stretches from Seapoint Drive south to Beach Blvd. Huntington State Beach, the city’s southmost beach, stretches from Beach Blvd. to the Newport Beach city limit.
Basics
Hours: Bolsa Chica State Beach: 6 a.m.-10 p.m. Vehicles are not admitted after 9 p.m.
Huntington City Beach: Curfew is enforced from 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. Pier closes at midnight.
Huntington State Beach:6 a.m.-10 p.m. Vehicles are not admitted after 9 p.m.
Parking
Bolsa Chica State Beach
Daily flat rate: $10/day.
Huntington City Beach
Lot near the pier: $1.50/hour, $12-day maximum for parking near the pier. Mid-June to mid-September: $12 flat day fee.
Municipal lots: $10/day flat fee.
Street parking meters:$1/40 minutes.
Main Promenade parking structure:$1/half hour with $9 maximum. Price is increased during events and holidays.
Huntington State Beach
Daily flat rate: $10/hour.
Information
City beaches: 714-536-5281 or city Web site
Bolsa Chica State Beach: 714-846-3460.
Beach restrictions
Smoking prohibited on the city beach and pier.
Public access to the majority of the Bolsa Chica Wetlands restricted. A walking loop trail and guided tours are available.
No tent camping on any beach.
Board surfing is prohibited when “blackball” signs are posted.
Riding bikes or skateboards is prohibited on the pier.
Possession or consumption of drugs or alcohol is prohibited on all beaches.
Dogs must be on a leash and are only permitted on the service road and at Dog Beach.
Culture
Huntington Beach prides itself as California’s premier surfing town. Main Street is lined with surf shops, and the sand is booked year-round with surf competitions. The city’s visitor’s bureau has led a push to brand the seaside community as Surf City USA. Adding to that clout, the city hosts several surfing competitions every year, from the US Open of Surfing to a national paintball tournament to Boardfest, a surfing event just for girls. Each competition transforms the sand on the south side of the pier into a mini-city, complete with bleachers, vendor tents, live performances and thousands of fans.
Surfing in Huntington Beach is popular near the pier and at a spot known as the cliffs, north of the pier. Beware on a crowded day, because local surfers are territorial.
Anchoring Main Street at Pacific Coast Highway are surf industry behemoths Jack’s Surfboards and Huntington Surf and Sport. Both businesses host individual hall/walk of fame ceremonies each year, bringing big-wave surfing pioneers such as Greg Noll and top competitors Rob Machado and Kelly Slater to the thoroughfare to leave hand and foot imprints in the concrete. Dining options include everything from Sugar Shack Cafe, a local breakfast favorite, to high-profile Duke’s,where you eat while watching beach volleyball games and people cruising the pier. Young people pack the bars lining Main Street throughout the weekends and on some weeknights. Many show up riding beach cruisers from their homes and apartments in the downtown neighborhood.
The drag shuts down to traffic several times each year, including for a Fourth of July Parade and the Surf City Nights locals event on Tuesdays. The beach also is a popular spot for RV campers.
The Bolsa Chica Wetlands public loop trail is often packed with walkers, joggers and bird-watchers.
Huntington Harbour is in the northernmost part of town and is quieter than the downtown area. Kayakers can be seen paddling through the channels, past boats and million-dollar homes, most weekends.
Recreation
Surfers from all over the world paddle out on the south side of the pier — into Huntington Beach’s super-consistent surf — for the biggest surfing competition on the coast, the US Open of Surfing. Surfing not your style? Beach volleyball games are on all summer. Bring your pooch to the dog beach or take a stroll (or run) through the Bolsa Chica Wetlands. Don’t want to leave? Get 
a room at a high-end resort or sleep in your RV at the beach.
Stuff to do:
Surf:
Surf Spots
Bolsa Chica and Sunset Beach – Dawn Patrol spot for both breaks. Sunset is a consistent beach break with all swells. Bolsa is also consistent with any swell direction but is best in winter with northwest swells.
The Pier – One of the most consistent, but crowded, beach breaks in the world. South swell is best, with great lefts. Localism can be fierce.
Check out these links for all you need to know about Huntington Beach’s surf spots:
- Huntington Beach – Overveiw
- Bolsa Chica State Beach
- HB Cliffs
- HB – North City Beach
- HB Pier
- HB – South City Beach
- HB State Beach
- HB – Brookhurst (HB State Beach)
List of surf schools:
HB Surf School
Phone: 714-841-6777
E-mail: hbsurfschool@yahoo.com
Location: South of Huntington Beach pier
Cost: $140
Length: Four ninety-minute lessons
Dates of operation: July
Surf Academy Seapoint Surf Camps
Phone: 714-960-8884, 310-372-2790
E-mail: mary@surfacademy.com
Website: www.surfacademy.com
Location: Seapoint and PCH
Open to: Ages 8 through 17
Cost: $200 for half-day camp, $260 for full-day camp.
Length: Five days
Hours: 9 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. for half-day. 9 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. for full-day.
Dates of operation: 6/18 to 8/24
Also available: group, private, semi-private
Beach Kids Bodyboard Camp
Phone: 714-960-8884, 310-372-2790
E-mail: mary@surfacademy.com
Website: www.surfacademy.com
Open to: Ages 5 through 7
Cost: $200
Length: Five days
Hours: 9:30 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Dates of operation: 6/18 to 8/24
Corky Carroll’s Surf School
Phone: 714-969-3959
E-mail: rwalker1@socal.rr.com
Website: www.surfschool.net
Location: Bolsa Chica State Beach, lifeguard tower 18
Cost: $135 for half-day camp, $260 for full-day camp
Length: Five days
Hours: 8 a.m. to 11 a.m. or 12 p.m. to 3 p.m. for half-day. 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. for full day.
Dates of operation: 6/11 to 8/31
Private lessons available? Yes
Billabong HB Wahine Girls Camp
Phone: 714-969-9399
E-mail: freedom@hbwahine.com
Website: www.billabongcamps.com/camp_details.asp?camp_type_id=98
Location: Bolsa Chica State Beach, lifeguard tower 21
Open to: Girls
Cost: $160 for two-day camp, $300 for five-day camp
Length: Two or five days
Hours: 8:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.
Dates of operation: 6/3 to 8/31
Private lessons available? Yes
For more surf schools in HB, click here.
Volleyball
The volleyball culture has been evolving in the past few years as Huntington Beach has become the go-to place to hit the courts. The beach has about 20 courts that sit on both sides of the pier, where pros can be seen practicing on any weekday. The most prominent attraction is the AVP Pro Beach Volleyball Tour that stops here in May. Also new this year will be the U.S. Open of Beach Volleyball in September
About a mile stretch between 21st and Seapoint streets is a canine heaven, where dogs are free to romp in the water or roll around in the sand. Owners must have control of their pets and are responsible for cleaning up droppings.
Bird-watching
The Bolsa Chica Wetlands are famous among birders for extraordinary bird-watching opportunities, though mostly in fall, winter and spring. The newly restored Bolsa Chica Wetlands — open to the ocean for the first time in a century just last year — are still a bit barren, but once native vegetation returns they are expected to provide habitat for birds such as the light-footed clapper rail. Islands built for nesting were already being used by a variety of terns, including elegant, Forster’s, Caspian and endangered least terns, even before the restoration work was complete. Another famous birding spot is more familiar: the Bolsa Chica Ecological Reserve, created in 1978 and reachable by a foot bridge from a parking lot on the inland side of Pacific Coast Highway. Type of birds you’ll see: many shorebirds, including black-bellied plovers, snowy plovers, familiar and unusual duck species such as cinnamon teal, great blue herons, snowy egrets and great egrets. The nearby Bolsa Chica mesa hosts raptor species, including red-tailed hawks and white-tailed kites. Fall migration can begin quite a bit before fall; migratory waterfowl have been known to begin arriving as early as June.
Camping
For recreational vehicles, Sunset Vista RV Park,at Pacific Coast Highway and First Street, is open from Oct. 1 to May 31 and offers a 2,400-space beach parking lot plus additional parking on Pacific Coast Highway and adjacent streets. Cost for camper vehicles, trailers and cars is $45/day. Seniors and patrons with disabilities pay $40/day. Reservations: 714-969-5621.
Bolsa Chica State Beach also offers RV camping. Prices range from $34 to $44 per night. Reservations: 800-444-7275.
Huntington By The Sea RV Resortis across the street from Huntington State Beach and includes a clubhouse and outdoor swimming pool. Prices range from $26 to $65 per night. Reservations: 800-439-3486.
Huntington Harbour
Construction began in this harbor — the smallest in Orange County — in 1963. Visitors enjoy its serene and quiet landscape.
Kayakers watch wildlife in the calm harbor water, and canoes and pedal boats are also available. Rent Malibu Kayaks at 16910 Pacific Coast Highway, 562-592-0800. Sunset Rentals also has kayaks, and is at 16862 Pacific Coast Highway, 562-592-5537.
The Huntington Harbour Boat Parade in December features decorated boats cruising the house-lined harbor and kicks off the city’s Cruise of Lights — guided boat tours of the harbor to view elaborately decorated waterfront homes.
Fishing
Surf fishing is best around 17th Street and Dog Beach (just north of Goldenwest Street and Pacific Coast Highway) for spotfin croaker, yellowfin croaker and barred perch. Surf fishing is also good at the south end of Huntington Beach near the Santa Ana River mouth, where anglers catch halibut, yellowfin croaker, barred perch and, on rare occasions, striped bass.
From the pier, anglers catch yellowfin croaker, mackerel, bonito, halibut, jack smelt, sand and leopard sharks, rays and sometimes in the summer small thresher sharks. Fishing in Huntington Harbour can produce a variety of species, topped by spotted bay bass.
Boat launch: The Sunset Huntington Harbor Launch Ramp is open 24 hours a day in Huntington Harbour. Cost is $7.
Most popular baits: ghost shrimp, lugg worms, blood worms, sand crabs, mussels, razor clams, cut mackerel, anchovies, squid, smelt, plastic jigs, Berkley Gulp. Surf, pier and harbor fishing contact: Let’s Go Fishing on the Huntington Beach Pier at 714-960-1392.
Tourism and Access
Nearly 6.3 million people (6,265,930, to be exact) visited the sand in Huntington Beach in 2006, according to the city’s Conference and Visitors Bureau. City officials are hoping to make Huntington Beach a global tourism destination and have obtained trademarks for the moniker Surf City USA, which they hope will gain the beach recognition and revenue from licensing deals. Lifeguards estimate about 2.7 million people visited the sand at Bolsa Chica State Beach last year. An estimated 10.1 people visited Huntington Municipal Beach in 2006. 
At Huntington State Beach, lifeguards recorded an estimated 2.9 million visitors . For information about access to smaller beaches within Huntington and Sunset beaches, go here
Revenue
The city’s hotels are on track to do some $60 million in business in 2007, according to Conference and Visitors Bureau President Doug Traub. Approximately 80 percent of that revenue comes from hotels within walking distance of the beach, Traub says.
Parking and day-use fees from Huntington and Bolsa Chica state beaches totaled $6 million last year.
Tourism news
Two commercial developments are under construction on Pacific Coast Highway. Pacific City is a 31-acre development that includes a resort hotel, residential and retail center. The Strand, which is being built on 3 acres at Pacific Coast Highway between Fifth and Sixth streets, will include a 149-room boutique hotel, underground parking and retailers such as Urban Outfitters, Johnny Rockets and Ben & Jerry’s. A third project is planned on city-owned waterfront redevelopment property leased by Hyatt and Hilton hotel developer Robert Mayor Corp. The waterfront property is expected to have 210 timeshare units, but plans have not yet been submitted.
Two other luxury hotels, the Hyatt Regency Huntington Beach Resort & Spa and the Hilton Waterfront Beach Resort, are located along Pacific Coast Highway. The beach also is home to popular RV camping spots.
The city’s Conference and Visitors Bureau has trademarked the moniker Surf City USA in an effort to brand the city through marketing and merchandise displaying the name. Licensing agreements include deals to sell Surf City beach cruisers and apparel. Dean Torrence, who was half of the singing duo that made the song “Surf City” famous, is signed on as the Surf City USA spokesman.
Did you Know?
Encyclopedia Americana in the early 1900s gave away more than 400 small lots of land near what is now the corner of Garfield Avenue and Goldenwest Street as part of a sales campaign. People who bought a set of encyclopedias for $126 were given a lot in what was then a swath of gullies and steep hillsides — land that was considered worthless. Around 1920, oil was discovered underneath the land, making many of the encyclopedia buyers instantly rich.
