Santa Barbara Area Surf Report

April Overview | 1996 Overview


Date/Time:
Wednesday, April 10th, 8:00 am
Location:
Rincon Point
Weather:
Sunny, mild winds at Rincon. Onshore flow further north (Goleta) and howling spring NW winds in the channel.
Conditions:
Windswelly and mixed up.
Swell:
Windswell dominant, also a small NW groundswell and SW groundswell. Highly variable sets from waist high to overhead.
Comments:
Windswell should improve with size as the day goes on, but conditions could become marginal to victory-at-sea. Local water temperatures have dropped a few degrees due to upwelling from the spring winds... today at Rincon was about as cold as Saturday up north of Pt. Conception.

Paddled out at the Bates beachbreak due to a lack of booties and a lack of desire to mangle my feet on the rocks. The beachbreak was closing out, no good summer sand profiles yet. Best waves were rearing up on the low-tide rivermouth sands and crumbling to the cove. A lot of false starts as waves piled up atop each other, jacking the peak and then bottoming it out just as fast.

After a few smaller sets, got one good one with a steep drop and a couple of nice bowls through to the inside of the cove. Conditions in the cove were much worse, with a lot of reflection off the rocks. A good opportunity to take a wave in presented itself, and I took it.


Santa Barbara Surfing -- Last updated 6/17/96.