I love surf fishing and spent many days and nights fishing from Mission Beach up to Del Mar. Blacks to Torrey Pines has always been my favorite!
I have fished shark, halibut, etc. but honestly my favorite is spot fin, yellow fin and corbina. Great fighters and good table fare.
My main setup is a spinning combo with a shimano sahara and 8lb mono. Classic carolina rig with 4-8 lb. leader.
I also have a micro-lite setup with an old penn z set up with 4 lb. mono.
I once caught a 6-7 ft leopard that took 30 mins on 4 lb. test!
I will typically bring two rods down in a back pack and bucket.
Here is a trick that I came up with about 10 years ago. I take a
stainless steel utensil holder from IKEA and use this like a sand crab rake.
Scoop it into the sand, collecting crabs. Spin it a few times and it sheds all the sand out. Then I hand select the quality crabs. You are looking for crabs that are molting (soft) and with eggs. Discard the others. Then place the keepers in a quart cup. with some water and you are good to go. The quart cup can pack back into the utensil holder when your done.
Then careful placement of the hook into the crab, so you still have good movement and don't paralyze the crab.
I hope this helps!