SWEET HARMONY

Mark Walker on the inextricable link between VWs and surfing

BORDER PATROL If you’ve been part of the VW scene for any length of time, you might have noticed that VWs and surfing appear to go hand in hand. If you’re my age (49) or older, you’ll probably remember Billabug and the surf fabric interior craze, too. But how did this link come about in the first place? Well, like most things in the air-cooled scene, it originated in California. Surfing began to gather pace as a hobby in The Golden State in the early 1960s, and by that time the state was flooded with Volkswagens. As Jim Douglas put it in The Love Bug, VWs were “cheap, honest transportation.” But we all know they were a lot more than that. California developed a reputation for counterculture, and that really…

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VolksWorld (Digital) - 1 Issue, August 2024

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