Why do we call it "surfing" the Web?

Here you are, surfing the web to stumble on this question. But why surfing? When we actually surf, we paddle out a short distance from shore, catch a wave that carries us back in, then paddle out again to repeat the same process. Surfing the Web is nothing like that. It’s more like sailing the world’s seas to visit all its distant shores. It’s like exploring, browsing, studying, shopping. Sometimes it’s even colonizing, setting up a Web site in a spot we find interesting. So how did the word “Surf” come to represent what we do when we browse the Web?