Cars and surfboards are like peas and car-rots. They just go together. Give me a board, a wetsuit, a couple cans of beans and an old beater car and I'll be set for days, combing the coast on the hunt for waves.
But while a shitbox '85 Corolla with moldy towels in the trunk is a good enough surf mobile for someone who can't afford better, you can strap your boards onto any car. So if you had the means, you'd probably want to make a statement with something unique and/or stylish. Chances are good that you'd have a tough time deciding which car and which board(s) you'd want to commit to.
That's why Kevin Butler drew a whole bunch of cartoon surf wagons. Apparently, he couldn't choose. There's probably one or two cars in this collection you've thought about owning at some point in your life, and if you're a surfer, you'll definitely lust over some of the boards he drew, too.
I've used everything from a '73 Volkswagen Beetle to my '86 Subaru GL wagon to get me to beaches in California, Mexico, and on the East Coast. Like me, Bruce Brown's characters always drove old beaters with falling off doors in his 1950s pre-Endless Summer films — because those dudes were flat broke.
But when pro surfers started making money at contests during the latter half of the '60s, they bought nicer cars. Greg Noll, famous for bombing huge waves at Waimea Bay, splurged and bought a Volkswagen Type 2 van. David Nuuhiwa, a flamboyant sort, began arriving at contests in a Jaguar, his board strapped to custom roof racks.
If you were about to hit the road to score some waves, what would be your ideal car/board combo? Let us know in Kinja!
(Above: 1960 Fiat 500 & 2 Logs, 2 Hulls, 2 Fishes, 1 Mini Simm, and a T&C thruster, circa 1981)
1951 Studebaker Champion & 7'7 Lightning Bolt Pipe Gun
1972 Ford Econoline E-100 & 9'6 Anderson Brothers Marshall Model
1979 Pontiac Trans Am & 7'2 Jeff Ho (Circa 1978)
1954 Ford Ranch Wagon & 11' Robert August Glider
1955 Dodge Pickup & 8'0 Bing "Good Karma"
1961 Fiat 2100 & 5'3 Channel Islands "Sperm Whale"
1972 Toyota FJ40 & 10' Cooperfish V2 Malibu Foil
1954 Chevrolet Bel Air & 9'4 Thomas Bexon Log
1970 Porsche 911t & 5'10 John Wesley "TFP"
1966 Shelby Cobra & 5'8 Greg Eavey Mini Simmons
1960 Volkswagen 21 Window Deluxe & 5'10 Channel Islands Retro Fish
1964 Plymouth Valiant & 9'4 Gordie "Pig"
Image credit: Kevin Butler