"Surfin' Safari" is a song by American rock band the Beach Boys,[2] written by Brian Wilson and Mike Love.

The song was inspired by Chuck Berry's method of combining simple chord progressions with lyrical references to place names (for example, in "Back in the U.S.A." and "Sweet Little Sixteen").

"Surfin' Safari" includes several references to Southern California surfing locations (Malibu, Rincon, the Channel Islands, Huntington, and Sunset Beach).

However, the recordings from that session, engineered by Hite Morgan, would ultimately remain unreleased until the late Sixties.

[8] Originally Capitol Records felt "409" should be the 'A' Side, and first promoted the car song (according to Beach Boys biographers Badman, Gaines and Carlin) instead of "Surfin' Safari".

However, as noted in the booklet to the 1993 CD box set Good Vibrations: Thirty Years of the Beach Boys, radio station airplay in Phoenix, Arizona jump-started the B-side into a major nationwide hit (to date no copy of the first Capitol single with "409" as the A side has been discovered).

According to English pop music statistician Joseph Murrells in The Book of Golden Discs, 1978 edition, it placed number 3 on one of the four major national charts then recognised, probably Variety.

In Germany, the World Pacific Studios recording of the song was used as the single release instead of the more well-known version.

The song's appearance on the 1993 Good Vibrations box set is sourced from the original demo tape master, lacking the fade-out added before its release as a single.

A live concert performance of the tune "Surfin' Safari" is featured in the short documentary "One Man's Challenge", written and directed by Dale Smallin.