A Tale of Two Swells - W and WNW

A solid long period swell mixed in with a NW wind swell to put up some decent sized fun waves this morning. Again it was cold, 35 degrees at launch. But the water is a nice and toasty 54 degrees so who can complain?

I headed down to White House to paddle out from there, then down coast to the Brown House sand bar, betting that it could be good with the additional juice. Tide was a bit low but coming up. There was a nice bar at White House but I wanted to get to Brown. I spend two and half hours surfing solo in some on again/off again fun waves. It was smaller where I was than up coast. There were five or six nice bars working and conditions were better there than where I was. But there were still plenty of chest to head high waves, although it wasn't as consistent as it could have been.

I switched out fins last night and put the 2+1 9.5 inch cutaway and Future quad 340 sides in. I slid the center fin two inches back in the box. The difference was amazing. Much, much stiffer. I really had to romp down on the tail to bring the nose around, and the board was much harder to turn and as a result, felt sluggish. All because of the fins. Live and learn. When I got home I put the Pivot fin back in, only I moved it a couple notches back. It'll be interesting to see how the board responds. Hopefully it will still be really loose, but the tail will hold in better on hard rail turns. The cutaway worked fine, I just really like the feel of the other fin. I think the cutaway would be a good choice in double-o size surf where the additional stability would be appreciated, and longer lines would be drawn.

Conditions were bizarre at Brown House. Often sets would arrive with all the waves in pairs, separated only by about 15 feet. And there was a big rip that ran down coast, then up coast and finally right in the line-up. Winds were offshore all morning, and then very light onshore until I left at 11:30A. All in all conditions at the up coast bars were pretty near perfect. I was less fortunate.

The Angulo 10-0 CSC Stand Up paddle Surfboard (SUpS) continues to impress. It's light, strong, very maneuverable and is truly an all-around board. It is a surfboard I can paddle. It's fast and reliable in the white wash, capable of riding the energy in front of the foam with stability and without bogging down. It's fun to nose ride and has a sweet spot that once you find it, just picks the board up and puts it into trim, all in the front two feet. Highly versatile would be a good description. It would be hard to get bored on this board. It does so many things that it takes a while to go through the bag of tricks. Hard to ask for more than that from a SUpS.

Tide is low in the morning, but there still might be a few out there for us early birds tomorrow.

Mar 11, 2009 (W)

In: 0810
Out: 1040
AT= 35F to 46F
WT= 54F
Wx: Partly cloudy to partly sunny
Tide: 2.4' Rising to 4.6'
Wind: Light offshores to calm to light onshores
Sea Surface: Some light bump, double waves and rip
10-0 Angulo EPS/Epoxy Custom SUP with Infinity Ottertail carbon fiber paddle

Fin set-up: 9.5 Inch Future Cutaway with Future 340 quad sides
Bathymetry: Sand
Deep Water Swell and Wave Face Heights CDIP Archive
Buoy: NWS (Nearshore)
0800: 3.6 feet @ 16.7 W (3 to 5 ft. faces)
0830: 3.0 feet @ 16.7 W
0900: 3.6 feet @ 16.7 W (4 to 6 ft. faces)
0930: 2.6 feet @ 15.4 WNW
1000: 3.0 feet @ 16.7 WNW (3 to 5 ft. faces)
1030: 3.3 feet @ 16.7 WNW
1100: 3.3 feet @ 15.4 WNW (4 to 5 ft. faces)
1130: 3.3 feet @ 15.4 WNW