Hi, my husband and I will be visiting Waikiki at the end of October and we want to take surfing lessons. Based on forum posts here and at TA that are 5-10+ years old, it sounds like the best option is to walk up and find someone on the beach to hire. Is that still the case? All the book-in-advance lesson options are upwards of $80/person, but it sounds like the walkup places will be closer to $30/person. Can anyone confirm for me? Thanks!

On TA you need to sort by Date instead of Relevance to get the more current post.

And yes I think walking up to the "beach boys" is still the way to do it.

If you start at Duke's Restaurant on the Beach, you will easily find lessons on the beach by looking for the extra large training surfboards lined up near the shacks... when we were there, Dukes family still had a shack...

there is also a photography company that is right in the surf with you to capture your moments of surf glory... they will sell you a collection of digital pictures on a chip or dvd... ask at the lessons booth before you start... have fun...

My DD did a similar thing on Kauai and it was great (group lesson on the beach at Kiahuna). People on the beach were cheering for her when she "got up".

Hi, just following up to this post now that I can speak from experience - surf lessons are NOT $30 a person anymore. It seems like $60 is the standard rate now. We went through a shop a couple blocks away from the beach that offered a $40/person group rate, but they decided as we handed them our credit card that it would be a longer lesson and therefore the price would still be $60/person. (I didn’t have a watch on me and haven’t looked at time stamps on our photos yet to verify whether or not they actually gave us a longer lesson.) We had a great time and I would recommend it and the shop but I wish I would have been better mentally prepared for the price.

Thanks for reporting back!

Along that line, about a century ago I did an outrigger canoe ride through the surf on Waikiki, between the Sheraton and the Royal Hawaiian, it was lots of fun, but I don't know if they still do that there. We paddled out a couple of times,with some strong cute guys doing most of the work, and then rode the waves in.