Santa Monica. We lived in Burbank / NoHo area, about 30 miles from the beach. I remember my mom taking us for beach trips. (I also used to ride the buses through Hollywood, with an inflatible raft, by myself when i was just a little kid. Not in today’s world!)
It had a different smell back then, like fish and seaweed combined. When you were close you knew it by the smell. The beach was always magic to me. I too remember the sand crabs tickling underfoot. Time stood still. My mom would yell that my lips were turning blue, time to get out if the water, but i never wanted to.
Not pleasant at all, surprising I ever started surfing really. Huntington pier area early 50’s was there w/ parents and I was probably about 4 years old. In the shallow w/ my father and a bigger set wave knocked him down so he lost his grip on me. I was rag dolled by the likely actually tiny shorebreak and was certain I was dead. Fortunately he found and grabbed me in just a couple seconds and once the screaming hysteria stopped I was fine. YOIKS Wadda trauma HAH!
Fishing with my father a few miles off Bass Point , on Kevin Seckolds charter boat , out of Shellharbour…I was fine until the boat stopped…10 yrs old…first and last time I got seasick…never forget it…old man couldn’t stop luaghing .