The 5 Best Beginner-Friendly Surf Beaches In Central America

There are many tropical beachfronts dotting the map between Mexico and Columbia. If warm weather, hammocks, and coconuts are all you're looking for, you can likely just drop your finger on a spot of coastline and head there for a beautiful trip. However, if you want to learn how to surf, the destination list shrinks dramatically.

You can't surf on just any old beach. It takes a strange and wonderful combination of bathymetry, winds, swell windows, and perfectly placed shorelines for the magic to happen. To make it even more complicated, many surf spots are not beginner-friendly. Take Hawaii's Pipeline as an example; most surfers agree that it's the best wave on the planet, but if you tried to learn how to surf there, you would probably die.

Luckily, for every Pipeline, there's also a Waikiki, and Central America works the same way. There are tons of gnarly spots in this part of the world — outer reef breaks that snap boards in half, crocodile-infested river mouths, and beautiful point breaks guarded by vicious stinging urchins. So before you paddle out in dangerous waters, head to the beaches listed below to start your journey in a better, safer place. I have personally visited and surfed every beach on this list and countless others that didn't make the cut. The keywords here are "beginner-friendly." We're not talking about the best beaches in Central America, nor are we talking about the best waves — we're talking about a very specific combination of traits as I show you my favorite places for beginner-friendly waves.

Playa Avellanas is where I learned how to surf. Back then, I wouldn't have dared mention this beach online, but lately, this secluded Central American surfing sanctuary has gained notoriety as people look to get out of crowded Nosara and Tamarindo and enjoy a better class of wave. This beach is home to several distinct breaks. My favorites were the rocky left in front of Lola's beachfront bar; a fast-breaking beach break marked by a group of dead trees; a sometimes glorious/sometimes chunky river mouth wave; and Little Hawaii, a point break marked by Jersey shredders who have come down to Costa Rica for dental work.

There are waves here every day, and, most importantly, there are waves for everyone. The best beginner-friendly waves are right out front of both entrances and are within an easy walk of several board rental canopies. If you need lessons, call Julio at Avellanas Soul Surf School. He isn't just the best surf instructor in Avellanas; he may be the best surf teacher in Costa Rica. Avellanas is a great place to stand up for the first time and learn how to catch green waves. On many days, especially during the January-March range, you can walk out past the break. The waves are rarely big, but something magic in the air almost always gives them a great push.

The one fault in the star of Playa Avellanas is its grocery scene. I recommend renting a vehicle or staying at a surf camp that covers your meals. I used to do surf guiding for Rapture Camp, a newly renovated, all-inclusive hotel totally geared towards learning how to surf. If you bring your own wheels, park them at Cabinas Las Olas, a charming spot with an in-house restaurant, all owned by one of the town's original settlers.

Playa Venao's great infrastructure makes it an awesome spot to set up shop for a few months of online working and learning how to surf. There's a healthy smattering of beachfront bars and board rental shacks, high-quality restaurants like La Hummuseria Venao, and a great grocery selection thanks to Super Venao. This supermarket, one of Venao's defining features, is full of American, European, and Middle Eastern foods you might not expect to find in a surf town on the edge of Panama. It also means you can spend a month in Venao without ever having to get in a car, and if you're just learning how to surf, you'll find great waves right in town every day. This infrastructure is extremely important since Venao is about a 5-6-hour drive from the Panama City airport. You can get there via bus, hire a private driver, or hop on an Air Panama flight from Panama City to Pedasi.

The trip to Venao is a bear, but once you arrive, you'll have everything you need to elevate your surfing, so add an extra week to your trip and start working on your paddle fitness now. The beach works best around high tide, when large, chunky waves crash across the entire beach and create plenty of whitewater sections. Once you've got the rhythm down, Playa Venao is also a decent spot to learn how to surf green waves. I was there for about a month during September and October, a typically busy time during the Pacific's South Swell season. There were waves every day, but never any massive, destructive sets that would make you feel in immediate danger of meeting Davy Jones.

Ever since the iconic surfing classic "The Endless Summer II" showcased Californians ripping Witches' Rock and throwing back Guaro, the center of the Central American surfing world has been a place called Tamarindo. The beach is so consistent that one of the original "Endless Summer" subjects, Robert August, spent decades here, hosting movie nights where he discussed the film and encouraging the area to build an empire out of its surf documentary notoriety. The progress has ranked the town as a stunning, highly rated Central American destination for surfers and non-surfers alike. 

There are now two reasons people come to Tamarindo: to surf, party, or both. For us surfers, that can be a good thing — if everyone else parties the night before, there will be nobody in the lineup at first light. Unfortunately for surfers, Tamarindo's tourism success has also translated into incredibly high prices. The Post Office UK's annual Worldwide Holiday Costs Barometer ranked Tamarindo as the most expensive place to vacation on the planet, with higher estimated holiday costs there than in New York City.

While you shouldn't head to Tamarindo expecting a cheap or quiet vacation, do come expecting to eat well and score. The used board availability here is awesome, the accommodation options are endless, and the Gallo Pinto is plentiful. The wide-open, gentle beach break that sits right across the street from many hotels will provide you with some whitewater to surf almost every day. Plus, the sheer scale of the development here gives you a safety net; if you start your surfing trip and decide that the sport is not for you, or if you find yourself injured on your second session, there are tons of other things to do around town.

Proximity to the beach is arguably the most important factor when choosing a surf town. If you can see the waves from your front porch, you'll spend each morning sipping coffee until you can't take it anymore and you have to get in the water. It's the best way to learn — with a wave right out front, you can surf until you can't feel your arms, drink a smoothie, sleep in a hammock, and try again. Santa Catalina has decent beachfront accommodations available smack-dab in front of not one, but two awesome breaks. That makes this town a great spot for groups with surfers of all skill levels.

Experienced surfers and beginners alike will enjoy staying at Hostal Surfer's Paradise. This warm and inviting family-run spot is set up on a cliff looking down on Santa Catalina's epic reef break. This wave looks small from the beautiful views at Surfer's Paradise, but once you start paddling out, you soon find that Mother Nature is dropping heavy bombs onto the solid, rocky reef. But beginners, don't worry; there's more to Santa Catalina than tubos.

An easy, ten-minute walk from the hostel is another beach providing great waves for beginners, which is why Santa Catalina is featured in this piece. The beginner's beach, Playa Estero, is one large, wide-open space full of gently rolling waves and soft sand. If you want to stay close to Playa Estero, check out Hotel Oasis & Surf Camp. I've worked and traveled to many surf camps in Central America, but I don't think I've ever seen one closer to the break than Oasis. The resort takes everything you need for a surf trip and places it right in front of a super-consistent, mellow beach break. The trip to Santa Catalina from Panama City is a long one, but the stunning views and sweet surf make it all worth your while.

Pack your Bitcoin wallet and embrace a new era in El Salvador. The country has always had great waves, with 60-plus breaks along only 307 kilometers of coastline, many of which are long, right-hand points. However, it wasn't always considered the best place for a beginner to surf thanks to its rough-and-tumble reputation. In a Surfer's Journal article about El Salvador from the 2000s, the author wrote, "First or secondhand accounts of rip-offs tend to creep into most conversations about Salvador." When I was there in 2018, most gas stations, grocery stores, and hotels were guarded by someone with a sawed-off shotgun. It was perfectly safe, but it didn't feel that way with weapon-bearing men staring you down — but that's all changed now. 

We don't have time to dive deep into the politics of Bukelele, El Salvador's young, hip, and maybe slightly authoritarian leader. The only fact that matters for this piece is that murder rates in the country have plunged since he took over, and El Salvador is officially entering Central America's underrated country era.

 There's no better place for a beginner to get in on the action than El Sunzal. Pan American Games medalist and Salvadorian legend Brian Perez explained to the Olympics press that Sunzal is one of his favorite waves. His father even told him that when it comes to Salvadorian surfing, "everything started in Sunzal." If the wave is good enough to inspire a nation to surf, it's a safe bet to inspire a beginner. El Sunzal is a point break and can be the most challenging of any wave on our list. Beginners should consider sticking to El Salvador's smaller swell season of December-March before paddling out into the line-up of this wave.

I used five main factors to narrow down the potential beaches for this list. Ease of access, wave power, spot consistency, what else is happening in town, and fresh tropical fruit and veggie access. Let's start from the beginning: ease of access. Hardcore surf rats get off on long layovers and complicated itineraries that have them hopping on chicken buses and bouncing over potholes until they get to the perfect wave. But before you head off on strike missions, you should find a spot that makes it easy to surf. For this trip, locations get points for road quality, transport availability, and airport proximity.

Now, let's talk about the towns. Some surfers might prefer a place with more monkeys than people, somewhere with so many unpicked mangos you can eat them off the street. But most of those places will require you to bring your own board, which isn't something that a beginner should have to consider. So, every town on this list has several places to rent surfboards and take lessons. Plus, all the beaches here have a few other things going on that will boost your chances of meeting other beginners. Having someone to go out on the water with will make it much easier to get out of the hammock and slather on the sunscreen.

Next, consider the waves themselves. You want something consistent and comfortable when you're learning how to surf. Every wave on this list had a nice sandy bottom and isn't known as a massive swell magnet. These spots all feature tons of whitewater, which is essential for learning how to stand up on the board, and they're also decent places to tackle your first green waves.

Finally, I factored in my favorite expectation: fruit and veggie selection. What's the point of flying down to Costa Rica if you can't enjoy some juicy, tropical pineapple? Some travelers might not mind staying in a town that doesn't have any groceries or markets, but I think it's important enough to be at least used as a tiebreaker, and if you're gearing up for a longer trip, going somewhere with a variety of food available is essential.