With the recently discovered “New Cape St. Francis” somewhere along the African coast (click here to see Cory Lopez’s video footage), I’m reminded of the original Cape St. Francis, as well as a big mistake stemming from the original.

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And seeing how it’s also the 50th anniversary of The Endless Summer, I’m left with a bit of reflection on Cape St. Francis (Check out the California Surf Museum’s Anniversary showing here).

With Endless Summer leading the way for surf travel across the world, 50 years later it’s a different monster, unrecognizable to the first surf travel pioneers. But today things are so simple for surfers to trek somewhere remote and score it good. It’s not even close to what those first guys had to deal with: the weird looks, surfing unknown breaks with unknown bottoms and hazzards, thumbing it along the highway for a ride, the list goes on and on. At least they didn’t have to deal with greedy airlines taking advantage of adventure seeking surfers, or shelling out a few grand for a week on a boat in Indo only to pull up to a prime spot for and get to surf it with a hundred of your best friends.

Don’t get me wrong though, there’s plenty of waves out there to be discovered, as evidenced by this “New Cape St. Francis.” But take a look at Cape St. Francis when Hynson, August, and Brown slid down the dune hill on their boards compared with what it looks like today.

Empty Cape St. Francis circa mid 60’s

Modern day Cape St. Francis

This growth and development in the area eventually ruined “the perfect wave,” turning it into a mediocre spot at best. Surf resorts can have amazing benefits, but they can also have their downsides, as exemplified with Cape St. Francis. So let’s learn from our mistakes as human beings and veer away from repeating history with this “New Cape St. Francis.”