Tag: california

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Wild Wildlife

Surf: Knee-Waist High. Junky.

Pretty low expectations once again exceeded. Spent about 4 hours paddling around catching waves here and there, running in to friends. In the last hour or so of the session I was looking out to sea and saw a pretty big something jump pretty far away from us. Something big with a white belly and some serious heft.

Since it’s shark week on discovery, I’m not going to speculate. The ocean’s plenty wild and this season’s been rather active for animals of all sort. It spooked a few people, the rest of us kept on surfing. Seeing a quick glance of something very far away isn’t enough to know what is was. Dolphin, whale, big fish. Whatever it was it was far off and doing it’s ocean wildlife thing.

To put it in perspective I’ve surfed over a hundred times, once seen something like this and once been in the water when someone else had experienced something like this. It’s their ocean, the fishes, the mammals, the critters, and the plants. I’m doing my best to be considerate of them and I certainly hope they return the favor.

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Sunset Monday

Surf: Knee high with some pretty strong sideshore winds. Rideable.

Snuck out for another afternoon session before the brunt of this week’s work is expected to hit. There was a small group just tearing up this peeling wave at the middle of the beach. Nose riding, all that fancy stuff.

I drifted more to the north, getting some decent rides in. One right in to the sand. One left on the outside wave, then jumping back for a peeling right on the inside. More barefoot surf time in. Good way to kick off the week!

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Another Sunny Friday

Surf: Knee high waves, inconsistent and a little crumbly.

Work this week was pretty brutal. After finishing my project I race out the door and on to the waves. Little crowded out there but catchable and offering a few good rides here and there. The mellow waves this summer has offered up are proving some long rides and a great connection to the inside waves. Nearly all my rides were right to the beach. More barefoot surfing. We’ll see if I can hold out all summer.

Didn’t eat anything all day. Thoroughly DEMOLISHED some tacos after.

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Knee High in Bolinas

Surf: Knee high waves, occasional waist high set. Warm water!

Aaron, Ralph, Pierce and I hit up Bolinas to take advantage of the nice warm water and get Ralph’s board out of his buddy’s garage.

Waves were small, but fun enough. Got in plenty of sectiony little rides and got to goof off in the sunshine. More barefoot surfing.

The changing tide made for an exciting moment when I mis-calculated a belly ride in and found myself being swept into the lagoon. Wheeeeee. Nice practice for learning how to safely remove oneself from a rip current.

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That’s more like it

Surf: Waist high, surprisingly well shaped given the wind, warm water FULL of jellies.

Headed out after work with low expectations. Water was still warm and the waves had shaped up since the day before.

Plenty of fun rides. Lots of nice little lefts and sections to chase. I managed to somehow park myself in a complete swarm of little jellies just as it was getting darkish and hard to see. Yick yick. Surfing barefoot with jellies is a littler slippery.

All and all, pretty low expectations were exceeded. Grabbed some Pho after to round out the night. Score!

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Funky morning

Surf: Knee high and junky.

Not every surf session can be awesome. This one was pretty meh. Tide was too low, waves were closed out. All and all a disorganized mess. However it was a very successful “get up WAY earlier than normal to paddle out at 6am” attempt. I got up way earlier and paddled out for sure. Heard rumors of some wildlife activity in the water. All I spotted were a few dolphins playing, but always grateful to the SRC for their updates.

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Sunset



Surf: Waist high waves. A few chest high sets. Warm water.

It’s amazing how warm water can really brighten up a surf session. Had some pretty low expectations for this post work surf, but man was it worth it.

The air and water were so warm I skipped the booties for a barefoot ride.

It was pretty dang fun out there. Managed to get a little air on one wave and stick the landing. It was a total fluke so I laughed all the way in to the beach. Also got a nice long ride on a pretty sizeable wave compared to what I usually pick up. Head High according to Max.

I paddled back to Max and Chris hooting that I’d made it. I tend to go for the little waves no one else wants but was perfectly set up for that one. It was bumpy, a little funky, and I wasn’t sure I was going to make it, but I got it. 😀

We surfed till sunset and packed up in the dark.

I love summer and I’m having a lot of fun rocking the single fin.

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Nice little morning

Surf: Knee/Waist high with a few chest high waves.

One thing I love about summer is these small wave mornings is most folks sleep in allowing me to camp out on a tiny little peak and pick off tiny little waves to my heart’s content.

I’ve taken the side bites off my 9’4 to try riding it as a single fin. It’s actually pretty fun and (I think) helping me pull a tighter bottom turn on my lefts. Those lefts are getting better and better all the time. Yay.

Not too shabby for my 100th time surfing. (At least 100 according to wordpress, I’m too busy goofing off in the water to count) 🙂

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Wakeboarding!

Surf: Flat, like it was a lake or something.

Went up to Lake Shasta for the 4th. Camping, goofing off in freshwater, and a great opportunity to learn to wakeboard.

I watched a few friends try it. Lots of faceplants! Figuring out how to get to your feet while a boat is taking off is not easy. I was pretty nervous about trying it since I’ve never really done any tow sports, but I got the hang of it pretty fast.

First attempt, got up to my feet, maybe went a few feet before faceplant. Second attempt was about the same with extra faceplant. Maybe 4th attempt in and I was up, riding the wake, and hanging on for a good half lap around the lake!

The basic idea once you’re up is pretty similar to surfing. It’s a lot of fun and really puts to use all those leg muscles I don’t really work out that much as a longboarder.

Can’t wait to try it again.