Santa Barbara Area Surf Reports

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6ft+ high tides courtesy of our full moon shot the dawn patrol sessions around Thanksgiving. Both on Thanksgiving Day and the day after Unkle and I couldn't find a time during a good tide to make it out, and the waves looked so small we weren't rushing to get out anyway. Today we went during high tide anyway, just to keep up the tradition of the Thanksgiving weekend sessions. Paddled out just West of Emma Wood into a peak. A few people out at the next peak down the coast but mostly people stopping by and hoping there was some reason we were out there. There wasn't. We caught what we could, about a dozen waves or so that had any shape at all. Water was cold, makes me wonder what it was like up on the Central Coast.

Clouds were around, starting to gather for the showers that would show up in the afternoon. It's a bummer to not have an epic swell on Thanksgiving. Looks like Christmas will have a repeat of the high tides during the dawn patrol making it once again difficult to sneak sessions in early while down in Ventura.

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Temperature at the house was 33 degrees at 5:30 am and 37 by the time I woke up. Good call on keeping the wetsuit inside. The swell was back down to 5ft, and the wind had switched from NE to NNE and a river of sand was blowing down the beach and in the water. At first it was about as windy as yesterday, still surfable with some good peaks. Only half dozen folks out but I paddled out at the same time as a dozen others so soon we had 1.5 dozen out there. Within a half hour the wind came on so strong, and started tilting so much to the North that all of us but 3 were out of there. There is a certain camradrie with your fellow surfers when you are in the parking lot after surving conditions that blew a kayaker out to sea. I caught maybe 6 waves max, only 2 of which took me anywhere but down.

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Too much offshore, bringing everything on land out to sea. Including Kayaks and their captains. Paddled out anyway into a sea of believers like myself. We thought being out here, heads freezing from the spray being thrown off the faces, would somehow help us earn our coffee afterwards. We were rewarded. In between the overhead rogue sets that sent spray 50 feet out to sea were head high waves that developed into nice and workable lefts and rights. Perhaps a dozen waves were good enough to have stood by themselves as worth going out. Wind was pushing us out to see, a struggle to stay out of wind and rips out to sea. Nearly impossible to stay in one place so I drifted South, making sure I didn't drift West. Super Fun.

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Time for a new spot, this time even more North, and again I don't know it's name. Saw it off the highway, a nice peak breaking near some rocks near some houses. Took a few minutes to discover access to the spot and weather my tyres would get punctured or what the situation was with locals. The Surf Country racks certianly don't help fit in on the Central Coast, but it's not like I'm driving around with a Zuma Jay sticker or something.

The offshore wind was perfect, maybe a little too much on the heavy side but these waves may have needed it. The longshore current was heading south, I paddled out 100 yards north of a rockpile and ended up right in front of the rocks when I made it out after an ice cream headache or two. There was a pro foto looking guy out there snapping pics, and there were 6 of us on a peak that split both left and right in front of some hairy rocks. Being my first time I hung off to the side a little, trying to get the wave wired and learn the rocks and the currents. I was rewarded with a few quick rights, that sucked up and tried to go over my head. This was followed by 2 blown takeoffs in a row. My excuse is the offshores were making it tough to see. I then had my wave of the day, an overhead wave that I waited awhile outside for, took off right in front of the rocks. I made the bottom turn and tried to shoot down the line but wasn't quick enough, it sucked up and instead of the barrell of my life I jumped thru the back, almost dis-locating my shoulder in the process. I popped up a lot closer to the rocks than anticipated but luckily there were no waves behind it. Awesome session, I will be back.

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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.

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It's been around 40 degrees at our house up the canyon in the morning, and this has led to difficulty motivating for the dawn patrol. Which is OK because thus far the wind has held off until noon or so (even offshore often), and the crowds aren't quite the issue up here. The water temperature on the other hand is supposed to be at 57 degrees, just 2-3 degrees shy of the lowest SB winter temps and it's only November. Which led me to purchase the 4/3 RipCurl Ultimate Fireskin. The warmest suit by Rip Curl, it is only 50% elasto as the mid-section is polypropylene (think:fleece) which limits it's mobility. I should do a suit writeup soon. Very, very warm, yet you sacrifice mobility both in the arms and the legs. However what I hope to gain is the ability to motivate on cold overcast mornings. Along with the new suit, I tired out the Rip Curl 357 booties which make you feel like you are some kind of deep sea diver but warm nonetheless.

With my newfound confidence in the warmth department I was able to pull a longer sesson than usual and caugth a ton of waves. Perhaps the best one was a set wave that formed outside that I manged to be far out enough to get. Most were caught inside letting out a hoot before they got crushed by it. Somehow I managed to catch it, make the drop and head down the line until I bowled up real quick like and I did a wusslike duck out the backdoor. Should of stayed in, it would of been the best barrell of my life.