Santa Barbara Area Surf Reports

Comments:

The buoys showed up smaller than yesterday but the session was perhaps better. The sets were not as big but perhaps more frequent. The angle got roped in to 305 from 320 which may have helped, and there also may have been a touch of SW in there for added boost. Who knows, but it was fun. The rights were certainly holding up much better than yesterday, yet again a few really long rights, something you'd expect from a point break where your legs are a little tired towards the end of the ride. Even though many waves pitched out I continue to get denied on any barrels on the central coast. My lefts were fast and fun, with some solid cutbacks that felt great.

Perhaps the best display of dolphins in my surfing career. A small pod anchored itself outside of my position for some 15 minutes. They showed up during a mini set on the outside but did not drop into any of the waves. Instead they played on the outside, jumping out of the water and splashing each other with their tails. I caught a mid sized wave inside and was paddling back out and got caught inside by a set. I was paddling out toward a large set wave, there were 5 or 6 dolphins embedded in the open face coming straight for me. Just as I was starting to push my body up to get some momentum for my duck dive, their active sonar detected the presence of a kook in front of them, and they all straffed left and continued down the line. Awesome. They then proceeded to beat me back to the lineup and claim priority on the next set. This time they tookoff real early on a wave, outside of us all. They were heading straight in, towards a woman paddling out and from my profile view I could see they were now not really in the wave but a few feet in front of it, and 1 or 2 of them had risen up and were half way of the water, propelling forward at mach speed. Awesome.

The guy with the Zinca all over his face was out there again. The first time I saw him out was Thanksgiving and I thought it was his Halloween custome, but I saw him yesterday and today with Zinca again, so it was no custome. He dominated the lineup and seemed to be a friendly guy to boot.