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Surfing Santa Cruz
I have had a lot of fun surfing Santa Cruz. There are many surf spots in and around Santa Cruz but these are a few of the most popular ones. Steamers Lane - very good, crowded, high performance wave, Cowells - near Steamers Lane but smaller with slow rollers for beginners, and Pleasure Point (and the series of breaks adjacent to it) - Good waves especially popular with longboarders.
Just south of Santa Cruz in Capitola is Pleasure Point and the nearby breaks. Just follow 37 ave to the coast and look down on these spots all next to each other. Pleasure Point, 38th Ave, the Hook, Privates, Sharks...there all good. Back in my single longboarding days I used to frequently drive down before work (in San Francisco) hit these spots for a couple of hours, and roll in to work at my latest possible start time with blood shot eyes and screwy hair. Surfing Santa Cruz is nice because the area seems blessed with geography. Not only was there less wind and fog many days than what I would see in the SF Bay Area, the Kelp beds also help keep things glassy. Beautiful reddish sunsets and cute sea otters (don't see them around here) add to the effect. It was crowded then and more crowded now so I rarely go anymore since I can't hit it mid-week anymore. 
Cowells is actually the most inside break of the several leading out to Steamers Lane. Just North of the Santa Cruz Pier the place is perfect for beginners surfing Santa Cruz. The waves are similar to those Waikiki slow rollers. After an aborted attempt trying to teach my wife to surf a local spot with not so ideal conditions, I took her to Cowells. She stood up and surfed the first day. This is the place where you can basically go straight in on really big softtop surfboard and start to learn to trim. Yup, crowded like the other popular spots but if your a beginner you'll see lots of other beginners and you can take a lesson and rent a board from the beach. Go at low tide.
Some nice waves around Santa Cruz
A guy on a stand-up paddleboard riding a tiny wave in Santa Cruz
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Steamers Lane can be found near the Santa Cruz Surf Museum. You can walk over to the bluff and look down on the wave. It is a great place to surf if you can take the crowds. I haven't surfed there very much because when I used to frequently make the drive to Santa Cruz I had only a longboard and felt I was better off (skill and crowd wise) with other longboards at Pleasure Point and nearby breaks. The last time I was at Steamers Lane I took off on a wave but saw another guy coming out of curl - basically I dropped in...woops! I had room to pull off. But wait..somebody dropped in on me..and them somebody in front of him. I had nowhere to go, it was ridiculous. Multiple F bombs later I went one of the "zones" closer in...not quites as crowded. As I said, surfing Santa Cruz can be a crowded experience, but still an excellent place to surf. 