Windansea Beach

Windansea Beach is a sandstone reef beach in La Jolla, sitting between Marine Street Beach to the north and Palomar Avenue to the south. A thatched-roof surf shack stands on the bluff at the foot of Bonair Street, first built in 1947 and rebuilt by local residents after a winter swell destroyed it in 2015. Neptune Place runs along the bluff above the beach. At the south end, the beach ends at the Palomar Avenue stair-line, which marks the northern boundary of the South La Jolla State Marine Reserve. Windansea Beach itself sits on the legal side of that line, with the reserve and its take prohibitions covering only the water south of the stairs.

The bottom is sandstone shelves at the waterline with submerged rocks just offshore that build the surf break, and that bare reef structure makes the site a rocky reef biome.

Surfing draws most of the use here because the reef produces a powerful, well-shaped break, and the same shorebreak makes conditions for any other in-water activity vary sharply with swell. Hook-and-line fishing from the rocks at the upper berm is occasional. Spearfishing, snorkeling, and scuba are uncommon at Windansea Beach because the inshore rocks hold limited structure compared to nearby Marine Street Beach and the kelp beds off La Jolla; the productive kelp beds off Marine Street sit to the north, with their own separate entry.

A 16-space lot sits on Neptune Place between Nautilus and Bonair Streets, with residential street parking along Neptune Place and the surrounding side streets. Spaces fill before 9 a.m. on summer weekends. Fishing and spearfishing are legal at Windansea Beach under standard California regulations. All take is prohibited inside the South La Jolla State Marine Reserve under California Code of Regulations Title 14, beginning at the Palomar Avenue stair-line at the south end of the beach.