Santa Barbara Area Surf Reports

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Longboarding Poles again with Rio but no Greggory. Another long mid-day session that tired us out. Long lulls continued but glorious sets in effect too. A lot more crowded than last Poles session. We caught a lot of fun, workable waves that have escaped my memmory some 2 weeks later.

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Longboarding session out at Poles with Greggory and Rio. Pretty uncrowded so we caught a bunch of waves although the lulls were painfull. The sets, when they came, were fun chest high at most waves, with lots of length to them. We caught a lot of these and had a real long session for midweek working stiffs.

It's hard to remember all the details when writing about it 2 weeks later though.

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Deveraux still had some swell in the water but there was some junk out of the SW that was confusing it. Some long waves but quite often ruined by peaky, sectiony, windswell garbage. Fun longboard session nonetheless, but left me wanting after many days of fun shortboarding on big and/or fast waves.

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Paddling out next to a jetty, pier or rock is a nice experience. Especially when the lineup is a lot of closeout waves in quick succession. The paddle out was quick and had me out the lineout quick. A bunch of fun fast lefts and a bunch of slower rights with more opportunity for turns. Some big sets coming in on occaision. Had a tough time paddling out after catching some waves and had to use the express paddle out area. Seriously got stuck paddling for what seemed like 10 minutes twice after successive waves. Arms were noodles.

The left had insanely fun drops that would bowl up and hurl down the beach before closing out at the next peak. No barrells or successfull floaters. Tired.

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Another quick session, this time for convience sake on the south side of the pier in Pismo. The north side of the pier had a CSA contest going on. Water seems super warm, at least in the 4/3 it was uber toasty. Paddle out wasn't bad at all, lulls were long enough. Waves could be fun takeoffs with a nice section or two before mushing out into a pile of crud. Surprisingly fun consider the location, crowds and wave conditions. Only had 1 hour so it was a mad dash for many waves and then over to the Fruit Tree clinc at Farm Supply.

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Afternoon session in a sheltered part of the coast. Tide was super low, I saw the rocks I'd been surfing over and it wasn't pretty. Must be more cautious there from now on. Lots of rocks inside of one of the lineup spots I hang out at. Waves were kinda sucky, waist to chest high with some bigger sets, but they were chunky and messy and too shifty. It was crowded, the low tide shutting down the alternate breaks and focusing everyone at one peak.

A short 1 hour session before getting the VPN going again at the coffee shop.

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Yesterday was such a blast I had to go again, and Pete managed to wiggle out of work early to join me. Felt a little bad for leaving longboard friends out of the loop, but this was no place for that much foam. When we got to the spot I surfed yesterday, Pete was impressed with the size but thinking it was too fast to be much fun. He, being smarter than I, realized those bombs I kept trying to make yesterday were nearly umakeable. He was right. We found another peak that was much more makeable, although not pitching out as much and paddled out thru the backdoor. During a set, of course.

We took a minor drubbing but made it out pretty quick considering. The heavies were heaving outside and to the right, but the really makeable stuff was inside a bit. I sat out the first set, trying to get a feel for where to be. Luckily there were enough folks out there to give a good indicator of where to be. Heavies kept coming in and surfers of far superior ability were effortlessly stroking into them. Someone needs to invent a surfboard cam because these were cover quality moments, now burned into my memory. I'm pretty sure my mind expelled my entire 7th grade experience in order to fit these images in.

The timing is mostly a blur, but it was a repeat of my last session in that I floundered on the first couple of attempts. A few missed waves, a few late drops in unmakeable sections. Then the switch came on and I started to get into makeable waves. The drops were not as gracefull as yesterday, some poor foot placement made for some poor manuvering. The drop had a racing section after it that was both fast and furious then a smaller inside section where you can relax and do some turns. The wave went forever and you had to decide when to kick out depending on your arms.

Towards sunset the crowded lineup was just Pete, I and two other guys. A big set came in, looking feathering outside and looking big and mean. Pete and another guy were stuck inside while I and 1 guy traded looking down into the abyss of what were closeouts. Finally a big one came in that was makeable and he was off. I watched the next 2 come in to closeout. In retrospect I should have tried one of those, they would have become my new biggest wave of the winter even if they went nowhere.

We surfed until the sun was down, caught a few smaller ones and once again that sense of calm and peace was overwhelming in the warm dusk air.

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After the frustrating dawn patrol session with Pete at a filled to the brim Deveraux I needed an afternoon session to get some real waves. I could hear the waves before I could see them, big bombs snapping offshore in fits. When I first saw the sets come in, it was breathtaking. Giant multi-wave sets were coming down the coast, almost like one huge point. The waves looked BIG, dwarfing the surfers on them. I'd classify the average set wave as well overhead, and even go out on a limb and risk my credibility and say the bigger set waves were 1.5X overhead and more.

The waves were fast, very few surfers were able to stay on the sets thru all the sections. Most had a very nice drop in and pointed down the line until they got swallowed up in a barrell. I started to paddle out, and somehow made it out without too much incident. I sat off of the pack at first and tried to grab a shoulder to warm up. This didn't work out too well as it was tough on the timing and too stressfull double checking that you weren't snaking some guy buried deep in a tube. I headed over the main pack and started to earn my stripes by taking off in the thick of things.

My first wave was the biggest wave I'd ridden all winter. It was a hairball drop, one of those drops where the water is coming up so fast you really think you don't have enough board under you. It didn't feel like I was dropping into a cylinder, but more like a 10' skateboard ramp with 4' of vert at the top. I am even surprised I made that drop, and every drop after that. Water was coming up so fast, and the lip was starting to pitch out so quick that it was complete instinct. Scratch for a wave and stand as quick as you can.

Naturally i was so slow getting up on my first few waves, that although I made the drops, I got left behind in the caboose of this frieght train. An angled drop next to a wall of water, when it was clear I wasn't going to make the first section I should of tucked in for the barrell of my life but instead straigtened it out as the wall of water went WHAM a few feet behind me and exploded in the air taking me down soon after. Power.

I pretty much repeated that for the next 6 big waves. Every drop being the drop of my life, every racing down the line had my heart going, fight or flight being the only thing keeping things going forward. These waves seemed like short rides, but really they were just fast long rides. My last wave of the day was the longest, it was much smaller and offered an oportunity to shake things out, make some turns and have some fun.

When I got out of the water I stuck around to watch a few sets as the sky grew darker. Everybody on the beach completely wiped out with a zen like calm in this, the most memorable session of 2005. So far.

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Pete and I met at 6:15 at Deveraux, suited up and went for a shortboarding session at the point. It wasn't that crowded at first but got to be as crowded as Rincon in the next hour. This session is mostly completely erased from my memory after the great afternoon session. It was so crowded I only got a few waves, none of them being set waves. Crowded. Give me smaller waves with less people and I'd be happy.

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Some long period swell trickling in. Tide perhaps too low, wind starting to come on strong and begin to make a mess of things towards the end. The angle of the swell was more westerly than usual for Deveraux and Bill and I sat way down from the point, so there were actually lefts and rights. Some of the lefts were extremely fast for such as slow place and offered much speed and power for fun longboarding. The rights were typically slower and took more work with the cutbacks and keeping in the sweet spot.

Bill caught a nice right hander, some of the sets were coming in bigger than waist high and looking to pitch. His didn't last long though. The long period swell left us with long lulls with not much to work with. The sets were long, multi-wave affairs breaking in many configurations and many spots as water filled in.

Sunny and warm in the air and cool and starting to cleanup in the water. Got snaked by a guy, he looked back at me twice and kept going. No retaliation from my camp.

The beach down at Deveraux was looking good. No mass carnage from StormWatch, and not littered with tree trunks and homes like up along the beaches of the Central Coast.

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First session since the day after Christmas. That day started out mostly sunny with some clouds in the sky. Later that night it started to rain. For the next 16 days we would see some sort of rain on every single day but one. A few days of waves in that stint, but weather, trees in the water, or scheduling kept me out of the water. Today it didn't look that great, but it was my Birthday and I had to break this 20 day spell of being out of the water, so I headed out to the rock with K-dog's Longboard.

The wind was perhaps 5 knots offshore and the water was real choppy paddling out next to the rock. The waves were confusing at first, a few ok sets came in outside but the wind was holding them back. A lot of missed waves at the get go. Twenty days out of the water didn't help with the wave count at first either. Things started improving though, I caught a few waist high rights that had some length to them and started to get some skills going again. Then over the next half hour I caught a string of unbelievable lefts that made my day. 3 or 4 of them, uber fast takeoffs, straight down the line, grabbing the rail hoping the offshore combed lip would come over my head, then straightening out a little and playing with the lips. Long waves for a beachbreak. That my backside skills had kept so sharp with 3 weeks out of the water was mind boggling. If you have surfed in this long, it's an epic session with you get some fun backsiders like that.

Afterwards it was breakfast at Kitty's Kitchen on Main Street.