One wave, an insider at that, figured it'd be a good warmup, and it was. All the way from atop the indicator to the top of the cove, well-shaped and reeling, overhead and a bit difficult to see in the midmorning glare. Kicked out of it pretty amped, right into a streaming down-point longshore current, the water surface all choppy and all heading towards the freeway. Homes passing by in a blur and the granite coming up fast, turned and proned some whitewater in before having to merge with southbound traffic.

Hobbled back up the point, no beach on the inside either. Southeast wind blowing at my heels as I rounded the top of the point, and the chop was following soon after. Blast! Whitecaps forming in the indicator lineup. My all-time shortest session here. Went home with just one wave under my belt and feeling like I'd just gotten started.

Surfer Bob came to my rescue by noon with an email -- "I'm back, let's surf" -- and after some surching and confusion about just what the hell the wind was doing... offshore at the Jack 'n' the Box in Goleta, light onshore in Gaviota out of the west, southeast winds at Rincon... we finally started seeing some clean waves down Ventura way. Robert had never surfed Stables, so that was the call...

After a quick look at the fast-fading parking lot by the illegal riprap revetment extension to the Ventura river groin... 10 feet more lot reclaimed by the ocean since my last view of it... we proceeded to take a pounding tour of the stables lineup by way of trying to paddle out through the top of it.

Big waves coming through, with easy takeoffs and broad shoulders ripe for lots of carving and S-turns, the largest breaking really wide and expiring in deeper water. Clean and uncrowded worsening slowly both in quality, size, and crowd factor as the afternoon wore on, but we both got plenty. Dropped the latest and largest that I can recall in recent memory on my 6'6" and didn't feel a bit undergunned despite the largest waves pushing beyond 10' on the face. A great day for building confidence and getting the heart pumpin'. Last wave held up really well, like Stables oughta, and took it from the rivermouth all the way through to even with the showers. Robert took three waves and got the grand tour of the whole point, all the way to the second staircase by the hotel. A nice introduction, I think.