Small S Swell; NW Building; Good Wx Ahead

I'd be out this morning at dawn even if there were NO waves, but there were some decent ones so...Life is Good!

Paddled into another beautiful morning sunrise, even better than yesterday's, at 0632. I wasn't expecting a whole lot from the small, steeply angled, southerly ground swell, so I wasn't disappointed by the fun, but somewhat subdued waves I got. You could definitely tell they were south swell waves by the way they lined up more in front of the stairway than the point. But they didn't have the punch to carry them through the soft spots with much speed. Tide wasn't real high, being within prime parameters for Sarges at between 2 and 3 feet, but it just felt like there was a lot of water moving, and it was kind of mushy. GDubs looked better, but had a dozen people on it super early. Joanna surfed there early and said it just pumped for about a half hour, and then just kinda stopped. I elected to surf Sarges by myself for 45 minutes in decent waves. Steve and Mike paddled out on their SUPs, but by then things were fading, and the rising tide wasn't making it any better.

Conditions couldn't have been better. A brisk offshore was holding up the faces and blowing spray off the tops. Around 0900 the winds died down and it went dead glassy. I drove by the point after surfing and it was drop dead, photo shoot perfect, gorgeous, even though the tide was swamping the surf. Wx is just supposed to keep getting better over the weekend and into early next week. Hallelujah!

The south is forecast to start fading, but coming on is the northwesterly swell that blew up last week off the Kamchatka Peninsula in the Gulf. It started showing on the farshore buoy yesterday evening at around 4PM. Although the south is still the primary swell showing on the farshore buoy, the nearshore buoy is picking up the northwesterly swell. Looks like another dp for tomorrow.

Steve was SUP surfing on MikieB's borrowed Surftech 10-7 Takayama and learning the hard way about the trade-off between a SUP that paddles well, vs. a performance SUP that surfs like a longboard. On a SUP paddling and surfing are in inverse proportion. The easier it is to paddle, the harder it is to surf and vice versa. Heck of a workout though!

Since there were no surfing pics today, I put in a paddling pic of Brother Mike doing some stand up in Haleiwa. Now THAT'S how stand up should be done...warm water, mellow breezes, glassy conditions and trunkin' it. I could even do that!
Sept 19, 2008 (F)
In: 0632
Out: 0900
AT= 47F to 60F
WT= 60.6F at the nearshore buoy
Wx: Sunny, partly cloudy
Tide: 2.3 Rising to 3.0
Wind: Offshore 1-5mph
Sea Surface: Light offshore wind rippling
Buoy: NWS
0600: 3.9 feet @ 16 SSW
0700: 4.3 feet @ 16 SSW
0800: 3.9 feet @ 16 SSW
0900: 3.9 feet @ 14.8 WSW
10'4" Angulo SUP with Infinity Ottertail paddle
Fin set-up: Thruster with K2D2 4.75" center fin and FCS Occy sides
Bathymetry: Rock reefs
CDIP: (0800 hours) 4.4 feet at 14 seconds from 285 degrees and 2.5 feet at 17 seconds from 185 degrees