Al Perlee may be the dean of Northwest surfing. From his perch in Westport, Wash., a fishing village with 2,137 people and 18 miles of beach, Perlee has surfed for 26 years. For the past 17, he’s owned one of the state’s earliest businesses devoted to the sport, The Surf Shop.
He came to the area on a whim, after hearing Delta Tau Delta fraternity brother Mike Carrigan, ’70, describe it. It was a fortuitous location for a man who first rode a surfboard at age 9. “It happens to be the most consistent surf break on the Washington coast,” Perlee says. “It was like a gift from God.” The surfing is comparable to any hot spot on the West Coast, although, he concedes, “It’s windy here a lot. It’s cold.”
For several years after graduation, Perlee made Santa Cruz, Calif., his home base, always returning to it after months on the road working, traveling and surfing. At first, it was the ideal place, with rents running just $150 a month. Then, when rents inched to what he thought was the stratosphere—$350 a month!—he made his exit.
“There are those who say I was a nomad,” Perlee says. “I bounced around the West Coast—San Diego, Santa Cruz, Alaska.” His initial weeks in Washington were inauspicious. “For the first two weeks, it rained every day, hard. Then one day, it just lifted up. I drove to the jetty and there were these perfect waves.”
Perlee—who played defensive line for the Stanford football team, including two Rose Bowl-winning years—learned to surf during a classic California childhood. His family split their time between their home near Los Angeles and Huntington Beach, where his father rented a trailer that sat on sand. His father, also named Al, was—and remains—a devoted waterman who passed on his love of the ocean to his son.
In turn, Perlee passed on that passion to his own children. Dane, 25, is an internationally known longboard surfer, and Hana, 21, is a former junior women’s champion.
The Surf Shop, run by Perlee and his wife, Kathy, is crowded with gear and heated by woodstove. A sign at the door asks patrons to leave their dripping wetsuits outside. As a gathering place, the store has influenced the region’s young athletes, who previously considered only traditional sports like baseball. “There was a vast experience here waiting to be tapped by the local community,” Perlee says. “Since the day it opened, it’s been a blessing . . . it’s a vessel. What’s inside here is the spirit of the people who come through the door.”
