Aug 21, 2004

Ventura Surf Shops, Part II

So I continued on my quest of surf shops, and thought I'd better mention a few more.

Located in the Albertson's Center on Telegraph, pretty far inland, Ohana Kai Surf Shop seemed mostly geared toward girl's clothes. They do have one cool logo, and the counter guy was friendly, but not a lot of t-shirt variety.

Next was the shop around the corner, Ventura Ride Corporation on Main by Seaward. It's the place closest to my house, and looks to have a fine collection of skateboards, as well as some surf and motocross gear. They're friendly, and probably the place where my kid'll hang out when he's old enough, but nothing that I had to have.

I also looked at Proctor Surfboards, which is on Goodyear behind the Mervyns. Friendly place, (I once met the owner's Dad, who was minding the store one Saturday morning) and the main shaper walked out of the back and said hello. They have some Christian paraphernalia about, which isn't a bad thing, but I did find it unusual for a surfshop. If I were buying a board, I'd go there. But since I was looking for shirts, this wasn't the place.

The place where I found the best surfshop shirts so far, though, had to be Walden Surfboards, on Front Street. Besides Steve Walden having a long history in surfboard shaping, the shop itself was pretty cool. A large space with a section devoted to Walden's work with the longboard, and several vintage boards on view, the shop had a wide variety of Walden t-shirt designs. They were also having a sale the day I went, and I picked up a nice Hawaiian shirt for under 20 bucks.

So at this point, if you're looking for a surfshop shirt with a little bit of Ventura, I'd have to go with Walden, followed by Ventura Surf Shop and Anacapa Surf 'n Sport.

Let me know what you think.

Back to Ventura Surf Shops, Part I

Back to Rick's Ventura

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