Surf: 4.6 ft at 10.0 s from NW at 308°
Windy, waist high and closed out. Ehh. I’m still grumbling about how I’ve been surfing like crap lately. Oh well, sunshine.
North end
Surf: 4.3 ft at 16.0 s from the S at 182°
Ran into Jessie in the parking lot. Always nice to put a name to the face. 🙂
Caught a few mid-north, but there was a bit of a crowd and north north was looking a little interesting. Watched Jesse get a few, watched a bodysurfer get a really nice long one yeeeeew. But other than that, the waves were a little funky. There are days when it seems the waves are ONLY breaking in the rip. It’s weird.
Ahh well, sunshine!
Vaquero
Surf: 6.9 ft at 10.0 s from NW at 296°
I hit the beach early to borrow Mike’s 8’7 Vaquero. I’ve been wanting to try a hull for a while, but hadn’t been able to get the stars to align to be at the beach on the right day when a friend had theirs for me to try.
It was pretty fun. The board paddled as easy as my 9’4 and cutback smoothly. As it was crowded (and I was worried about dinging Mike’s board) I got mostly short waves. I managed few longer ones where I could see more of the swoosh factor in action. I’d probably need to change up my stance to surf something like this regularly. I’m a little too…braced for impact. I’m digging in when I should be squiggling.
When Mike was packing up, Chris said he was on his way, so I hung out in the lot a while. A dude in the lot was teasing me for taking pics of the meh surf and offered to take a picture of me instead.
Eventually Chris showed up and I took out my 7′ to pick up inside waves as the crowd thinned. I got a few slow ones, nothing fancy. We moved to a larger area of the beach, but I was too tired to get anything decent. After 4 hours of surfing, I opted to belly one in and finally get to work.
Raw Fall Swell
Surf: 8.9 ft at 17.4 s from the W at 280°
Folks had been hyping this swell all week. I get that people are swell starved, but man, people were frothing. I had a suspicion it would be big, but rough around the edges. Reports were bouncing from 6ft to 14ft to 8ft… I figured Chris and I would check out our usual big day spot and if it was too snarly, get donuts and hit work early.
It wasn’t epic by any stretch, but it was rideable. Things were raw and a little ragged, but I still got a few really fun ones. There was the occasional cleanup set that was a good reminder the seasons are changing.
Kinda weird thing, even tho I got some decent ones, I was getting really frustrated. Ugh. Not sure if it was the crowd or conditions making me edgy. Ahh well.
Sunday Closeouts
Surf: 4.3 ft at 8.3 s from NW at 305°
Andrew was looking for some water time this weekend. Bolinas sounded like it was barely breaking so we tried Lindy. As usual, it was crowded and closed out. There was plenty of whitewater for him to practice on, but only a few shoulders here and there for me to grab. I got a couple closed out waves and spent the rest of the time bellying around, cheering Andrew on.
Clean Lefts
Surf: 4ft @ 10s from NW at 318° Calm.
Caught a few lovely later-shift waves this morning. The crowd was focused on a little stretch of fairly log-like waves, but Chris and I headed North for another peak. We found a nice bunch of clean, mellow waist high peeling waves.
Our quiet spot soon attracted attention and a small crowd formed. A group of guys camped out right infront of me on the inside. I heard one of them say: “Are you sure we should sit here? That girl is getting like, every wave and we’re totally in her way.” My first thought was “well yeah, you _are_ totally in my way” but feeling generous, I decided to wait a set out. One they got a couple, everyone shifted around nicely and folks were sharing waves peacefully with minimal drop ins and chaos.
I spent some time working on sneaking up the nose. Nice to have some smooth waves again. 🙂
Buffet Style
Surf: 5ft @ 8s from NW at 307°
Nice little morning sampling various breaking waves along to beach. Also nice to see lots of folks I haven’t in a while, usually because they headed to Ocean Beach or I headed to Montara on the small summer days. Little bit glassy with plenty of mush on the incoming tide (plus plenty of closeouts as per usual), BUT plenty of actual waves too.
I got a few swoopy little squiggly waves and one mostly hilarious cutback. I put so much rail in I was nearly laying flat on my back. Just when I thought “I _might_ make this turn!” I blew it trying to come back around. So close!
Towards the end of the session, I was furiously trying to paddle back out for one more. Things were starting to get a little more mixed up and I Was huffing and puffing. After about 10 minutes of paddling and making no progress, I heard HEY! Brien had swam out to me to let me know he and Chris were going on. I sheepishly turned around and bellied in. Gotta get back into paddle shape before winter.
Midmorning
Surf: 4.3 ft @ 14.8 from S at 187° and peeling
Snuck in a little bit of surf time between my morning meeting and my afternoon meeting. It looked long and loggy at the first spot a checked and short and smooth at this spot. I watched from the cliff a while before deciding I’d rather work on my cross step than rain on the shortboard party with my log.
Plenty fun on the loggier waves. Waist high and long enough to try and work on some moves. Nice to see the later shift folks stoked and happy. 🙂
Back in California
Surf: 6ft @ 9s from the NW at 308°, light wind.
Nice to come home to fun, fair waves after a few weeks of travel. Sure, there were plenty of those familiar mush bombs and close outs, but friendly folks and sunshine (and those one or two fun waves that held up) made it a lovely morning.
Also nice, got a few kind words from someone who’d read this little surf journal. It means a lot to hear folks are reading. I’ve gona back and forth with wether or not to keep this site going. It was originally a way to share my surf photos with my very tech savvy grandmother and a fun way to learn css and php. It’ll admit, it’s a little embarrassing sometimes and I occasionally have trouble keeping up with my surfing habit. Still, it’s nice to scroll through pictures of surfy days.
For the handful of folks that do read my little site, is there anything you’d like to hear more about? or anything you’d like to see done differently?
Thanks! 😀
August
Surf: Thigh to Waist+, poorly organized. Light to breezy sideshore wind. Low Tide. 5.3 ft at 7.1 s from NW 309°
Shuffling into the low tide shallows I saw a big ole orange and purple crab. It scuttled off pretty quick.
The surf was better than Sunday, but still not so hot. I got a decent wave and a handful of drop and washy waves, but nothing great. Lately I’ve been feeling like I’m surfing terribly. I’d love to blame it on conditions, but I dunno. I’ve been blowing quite a few waves on the take off, missing waves…it’s a little discouraging.
After splashing around a while, I took one in. While bellying the last bit into shore, I saw what was probably the same orange and purple crab shifting around. Dude was probably spending the morning bodysurfing.
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