The gut busting MAHI MAHI (named after a Hawaiian fish) at the historically festive P.O.P. (Pacific Ocean Park), was a lingering, abandoned old-wooden amusement
pier at Venice Beach, California. Flavored with eclectic personality, it was one of many rides that amused an assortment of thrill-seekers. . .as a quintessential escape into the celebration of life's reality. POP diverged mundane lives into pure ecstatic gratification.
"Sit down and hold on" you were instructed, for a euphoric-spine tingling gymnastic-like experience. The tall base of this mesmerizing ride would rotate, gain enough momentum to raise the three arms with fish-like cars attached, and strategically rise up with increasing speed while the cars would spin at the arms end. Creating one, if not the most nauseously-ecstatic enchantments ever. To ditch school and head for POP was a novel education of it's time.
In 1967, due to a series of destructive fires and yo-yoing bad investments that tortured the park's promoters, POP had terminally closed forever. Many unsuccessful attempts were made to remove POP. . . yet the MAHI MAHI carcass, and it's surrounding pier pilings lingered on as a monument to its former life. Fifteen years of pounding waves created an ideal surfing ambience and terain there. In 1975, the City of Santa Monica's Engineers totally and completly demolished the "Mahi Mahi," a once renowned and familiar landmarked icon.
"The Cove" (aptly named for this naturally sculptured playground by the sea), and it's local surfing culture adopted a "NO TRESPASSING " counter cultured, no-stomping-grounds-attitude toward non-local surfers. Basically, it was a turf warning that stated, for. . . . . . "LOCALS ONLY." This gracefully decaying old landmark was vigilantly surfed and defended by a locally established group know as the. . . . Z-BOYS (abbr. Zepher Surfing Team),
originating from a local surf shop on Main St. in the Ocean Park/Santa Monica areas. While the ocean's surf was flat, skateboarding became an alternative diversion to surfing and eventually evolving as a new sport. After the vaguely bordered "DOGTOWN" (an ambient state of mind) ruled periodically, the new generation of surfers and skaters emerged, sending the old school sub-culture, the Mahi Mahi, Dogtown and the Z- boys to step aside or move on.
