Rich Haydon looks out to the stone-strewn beach and sees a perfect wave.

It’s Lower Trestles, so he sees other things too – some of the world’s best surfers, crowds, a great view.

But let’s get back to the wave – a peeling, hollow, gloriously ridable wave; a wave that can be found often at Trestles.

Orange County is known as a hotbed for surfing, and there are plenty of decent spots for it. Some, sometimes, can be world-class. But the local surf spot that’s consistently the best – the break where the top level of professional surfing chooses to have an annual contest – is Trestles, just over the San Diego County line.

Now, as state officials and the Department of Defense haggle over the future of the beach extending from north of Trestles through the end of San Onofre, there’s a question:

Could the public lose access to the great waves at Trestles?

“I never want to imagine it,” said Haydon, superintendent for the south division of the California Department of Parks and Recreation. “But it could happen. There’s always a possibility.”

September marks a five-year countdown to the date when the lease between the Department of Defense and the state of California, which lets the public use Trestles, is slated to expire. The deal has been in place since the Nixon-era year 1971.

What will happen to this land, known as San Onofre State Beach, is unknown.

But a lot of people are getting ready to find out.

LONG HISTORY

Steve Long, a historian with the San Onofre Parks Foundation, calls it “the edge of civilization.”

During a recent lecture at the historic cottage that overlooks the ocean at San Clemente State Beach, just north of where San Onofre State Beach begins, Long pointed to a map of Southern California and, specifically, to the line that marks Orange County’s southern border.

On one side of the line, heading north through Santa Barbara, there are about 14 million people. On the other side, and extending south for about 16 miles, much of the land is the way it’s been for thousands of years.

Within that area, Long told his history buffs, is a series of surf breaks considered the “Yosemite of surfing,” seven distinct peaks over about a 5-mile stretch of coastline that produce waves year-round.

“This is coastal wilderness in the heart of Southern California,” Long said.

The area also contains the San Mateo Creek watershed, site of one of the last relatively unaltered rivers in Southern California, and San Onofre Creek. Both have spit out cobblestones for thousands of years, creating the rocky landscape that lines the shore throughout this region.

“Parks are places we give to ourselves as a community to celebrate our heritage – to have a sense of place where we come to connect with natural, historical and recreational significance,” Long said. “It can be said that they are sacred places.”

He shows slides of the road paved in 1913 called El Camino Real and the lines where railroads were installed in 1888, both of which still exist.

In 1925, a fish camp drew anglers and, soon, the area already known as San Onofre became a popular camping destination.

“People were starting to explore the nation,” Long said. “A village started growing around San Onofre.”

It was the Prohibition era, when rum runners would tell people to stay indoors at night. In the morning, if they obeyed, they’d find a thank-you case of booze on their porch.

There are rumors that Al Capone tried to buy a stretch of canyon area because it was a good place to hide his product.

In the ’30s, early surfers were stoked to find San Onofre’s Waikiki-like waves. Boards were big and heavy and clunky in those days, and the gentle, sloping breaks were perfect for the surfers of the era.

The area became so popular among surfers that the fish camp changed its name, becoming the mainland’s first “surfing camp.”

San Clemente incorporated in 1928 and, when World War II hit, private land owners sold San Onofre to the U.S. Marine Corps for $4.2 million.

The purchase saved the land from being sold to developers, who wanted to build a beachfront hotel that would rival San Diego’s Hotel del Coronado.

“Had they been able to do that, it would have spelled the beginning of development all the way to Oceanside,” Long said.

Instead, the Marines kept and maintained the land as a military base, Camp Pendleton.

CREATING A STATE PARK

Technically, starting in World War II, San Onofre beach was closed to the public. The military used the area for training and, during the war, relatively few people surfed.

But after the war, surfers returned to surf, fish and camp. Though that violated the law, Pendleton leaders took a lax view of the practice.

Soon, however, San Onofre became too popular as a party destination, prompting leadership at Pendleton to consider shutting the beach.

“It evolves to the point where there’s a need for a little regulation,” Long said, recounting the area’s history.

That’s how the San Onofre Surf Club started, in 1952.

The beach club became the unofficial caretaker of the area, allowing only club members access to the beach. In exchange, the club maintained the property. The club still exists and, though it no longer controls who uses the beach, it helps maintain the park by sponsoring beach cleanups.

It’s a sense of community that, according to Long, “became legendary.”

That deal – the community – applied to San Onofre, but not the stretch of beach slightly north, known as Trestles.

Though a lot of young surfers using shorter boards sneaked in to surf at Trestles over the next two decades, that beach technically was off-limits to the public. In 1971, largely at the instigation of President Richard Nixon and his wife, Pat, who lived in San Clemente, the state and the Department of Defense signed a 50-year, $1-a-year lease to make the area a public park.

“It is one of the most popular parks in all of California, with 2.5 to 3 million visits per year,” Long said.

“We have a partnership, a wonderful partnership, with Camp Pendleton,“ he added. “We look forward to continuing the relationship.”

When the military needs to use the land for training, it alerts state parks officials, who then close that stretch of beach.

Some areas are always shut to the public, and other recreation areas are set aside for military families and friends.

Technically, the whole deal ends Aug. 31, 2021.

BIG QUESTIONS

Long says the state’s quest to keep the beaches open to the public isn’t about waving a flag or protesting against military use of the area.

“This is not ‘Save Trestles,’” Long said. “This is not ‘Save San Onofre.’”

But the talks between the state and military are starting, and it’s anyone’s guess where the discussions will lead.

“The only thing we got from them is that it probably won’t be resolved until the end,” Long. “We won’t have an answer this year. The Parks are stating our position – that (the beach) continues to be accessible to the public as it is today, hopefully.”

Carl B. Redding Jr., public affairs director for Camp Pendleton, said lease agreements are usually determined about two years before a deadline.

A letter from state parks officials was submitted and received by the Marine Corps Installations West staff this month, and the military is preparing a response. Redding said the Department of the Navy will have final approval of any lease deal.

Among the list of possible changes: Modifying the public beach zone by changing the borders and/or the size of the park.

Dave Ethington, a San Onofre Parks Foundation board member, said there are other possibilities.

“It’s their property; they can do what they want with it,“ Ethington said, referring to the Department of Defense.

“They can take it back and administer it for themselves. They can renew the lease,” he added. “I think those are the options.”

Ethington believes it’s unlikely the land would be sold for development.

“The fear is they would chop it up and change the park,” he said. “That’s our concern, that they would take sections of the park. … Maybe they would want a little more space.

“Not that any of those things are sitting there in a plan.”

They have five years to sort out the details.

“In some circles, it seems like a lot of time,” Haydon said. “In some circles, it seems like not a lot of time.”

Long is hopeful for the future of this area, which he calls “the world’s treasure.”

“Parks are where we come to be renewed, to renew our spirit and to be inspired,” he said.

“And they are to be shared for all future generations.”

Contact the writer: lconnelly@ocregister.com