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Santa Barbara Area Surf Report

  
    
Date/Time:   Tuesday, 26 November 2002, 4:00-5:00  
    
Location:   Gaviota Coast  
    
Weather:   Some High Clouds which made awesome sunset  
    
Conditions:   Clean, Pitching out  
    
Swell:   4.9ft @ 12s 295°  
    
Tide:   3.0 and dropping  
    
Surf:   Thigh to Waist with Chest high sets  
    
Board:   Progressive  
    
Comments:   I did a lunchtime check and it looked small and no one was out but it was high tide. It was showing potential and my plan was to go back to work and come out around sunset during a lower tide. while I was checking it there was this pod of about 5 dolphins just chillin right past the surfline. Typically when i run into dolphins they are crusing up or down the coast but these guys were just chillin, looked like they were barely moving as if they were sleeping. Every now and then one would kinda move around, but more or less they were hanging tough. I also saw what looked like a sea otter swimming on it's back in the surfline, but it could have just been a sea-lion.

So I made it out around 4:00 and the conditions had improved a bit. The sunset was an incredible display of colors on soft, high level clouds. The waves were pretty fun. Somewhat inconsistent, if you had checked it for only a few minutes during a lull you would have thought there was nothing out there. The sets were more like sets of sets. It would be pretty flat for a 10 minute spell and then there would be about 10 minutes where there would be many 3-4 wave sets spaced out by about 1-2 mintues of lull. The bigger sets had some power and were closing out like mad. I took off on a few and managed to head down the line for only a short while before heading towards the flats only to have the lip pitch down right on my tail. Guess I should have stuck it out. One of those lips broke right on my back during a futile duck dive. No ride really stands out in my mind, mostly worked on milking long rides out of short lived waves. As the sun hit the horizon and did it's compression thing I had to get out and get back to work.
 
    
   
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