Santa Barbara Area Surf Report

2003 | October Reports | Latest Report

Date/Time: Sunday, 19 October 2003 6:30-9:00am
Location: Gaviota Coast
Weather: Sunny with wispy clouds
Conditions: Clean but slow
Swell: 10.4ft @ 14s @ 305°
Tide: 4.0 @ 7:18
Surf: Waist High. Some Sets to Chest.
Board: Walden
Wetsuit Sessions: 015 ($16.67/session)

Comments:
My cell phone goes off at 6:00am. Unkle was driving up from Ventura and picking me up at 6:30 but apparently he forgot what time and was in front of my house. Got my stuff together and we trudged north in his gurgling goverment issue white diesel truck. Unkle is a big fan of a Gaviota break and we thought maybe the swell be good enough for it to break. As we were suiting up it didn't look so good out there. It was much smaller then we thought it would be, waist high on average with some bigger sets. There was a guy and his two sons out but besides that just a lovely sunrise.

Caught a handful of waves before the crowd came. Tried to catch the ones with more substance that swung wide. Would paddle out to get them, drop in and do a big fade to the cliffs. Once safely inside the cove would cutback for the fast inside section that on occaision would pitch out in the shorepound.

People soon started streaming in from the woodwork and it got highly unsafe out there. More people per square foot then Costco. A guy trying to learn on a shortboard was about to drop in on me on a set wave, instead he got pitched while I had to pull the rip cord on my ride. Later on I had to dodge between people paddling out, people sitting around, people standing up, people with scared looks on their faces. It was looney.





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Created by Tim Maddux. Continued by Pope

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