Santa Barbara Area Surf Reports

Comments:

Super warm, must get out. Almost trunked it, glad I didn't since the water was uber cold thanks to our gusty wind of late. Took out the longboard, although it was small a shortboard would have been a better call. Peaky, shifty and short rides. Often eating it on drop ins, having too much board, not too good.

Comments:

On the drive down to VTA last night the cove at Rincon looked good. I decided to try to hit up the indicator or rivermouth at dawn patrol. Only a couple of other guys out, super clear out, with an occaisonal real fun set. Waves were real small in between sets, but the sets would be chest high and picture perfect. Lefts much faster and longer than the rights. I blew a million takeoffs not being fast enough for the pitching peaks. Surfed and chatted with a friendly guy who was peforming better than I.

Comments:

Another rare session at Pipes, this time towards sunset with the wind quite stiff sideshore. You know you are in trouble when kitesurfers are getting their gear together. I ended up not seeing any kitesurfers out there and the waves although bumpy were also getting groomed by the sideshore wind. Shifty peaks would sometimes be A-Frames and sometimes be mushburgers. On the thinner 6'6" I pretty much sucked out there.

Comments:

Rare session down at Pipes in Ventura. A mix of NW and SW swell in the water which was shifting at different peaks along the reef. Amazing amout of wood and bamboo on the beach. It's going to be a good summer of hut building and bonfires at the beach. Short session of working on the top to bottoms on the my thicker 6'6". I've all but decided that the other 6'6" that's 1/8" thinner and getting waterlogged just ain't doing it for me anymore.

Comments:

Surfing a beachbreak along the central coast. Only a few people out. Closeout sets outside, I walked down to a makeable peak. A really nice left was coming in, a longboarder was on it. I was shortboarding and hung out to the right of that peak, and caught mostly rights. A big rip formed north of me and took work staying out of and in the right lineup spot. Practiced big turns off the bottom and trying to hit the lip with confidence.

Comments:

Quick session along the central coast around sunset. Was sunny at the ranch but out here on the coast it was socked in. Paddled out on the south side of the pier to use the current. Waves were breaking out past the end of the pier so I paddled in front of the pier to surf the northside. Just me, a wahine and one other shortboarder. Current was pushing north. Big sets would break way outside with no shape, we were catching the ones that would break right at the pier. Rights would form and go towards the pier allowing for a nice fast ride.

Comments:

A morning session centered around a 6.0+ high tide doesn't sound smart, but when the swell is this big, it manages to push through despite all that water. The parking lot at Campus was a zoo yesterday. The university has unwittingly made the lineup better at campus by only offering a few coin operated spots and no more free parking before 8:00. Luckily for me, Greggory had 19 hours left on his "G" pass for the month and was willing to burn as many as he could for this swell. Even with that pass though a lot of faculty and staff park in that lot and then head off to campus. Can't there be some rule, you can't park in that lot and then head inland? I hope when the new lot is built more parking is available. Although it'll be more crowded.

I had the LB and the SB and in the spirit of surfing with Greggory and took out the LB. The point was firing: fast, sectiony and spitting barrells at times. Where G and I sat was not as big nore as consistent but we did have an impressive record of sharing waves in the semi-crowded lineup. A current was pulling people away from the ideal takeoff spot and with a bit of triangulation we found we could take off in the sweet spot leaving bewildered people stuck in whitewash. In the crowds willingness to go deeper and deeper on each other it wasn't a problem to sit in what looked like a submissive position but end up raking in the sets that would swing in outside.

Waves were fast and fun. High tide was giving them lump and bounce, this made for wipeouts and other problems but also made for fun mini lips to go up towards. My best wave of the session was a head high screamer where I felt like I was on my shortboard, dropping in, ducking down into a never froming barrell, coming up with a big cutback to the wash and then more racing. I was heading down towards the big boil with the submersed rock. Greggory just passed over the shoulder, I was heading way faster than I thought, came off the top and saw a guy on the shoulder. As I was computing which way to go around him I was instantly thrown underwater and actually heard my neck or back crack. I popped up, confused about what happend. The guy on the shoulder said that right after I saw him and starting to change direction, I hit the boil and went down, hard. My neck still hurts.

After that Greggory had two nice sets in a row, and I gathered in a lot of sets too. We were trading more waves than possible and we weren't complaing. We surfed down to the stairs at A-bay and then timed our paddle into shore and our run up the stairs before the next wave came in. Craziness.

The tide was supposed to drop which meant afternoon sessions would be better than this. At 5:00 I drove up to a point on the Gaviota Coast to go out and it was waist high or so. Weather or not the swell was gone or this place just wasn't getting it, I don't know, but a lot of shortboarders were still surfing in as close to the rocks as they could. I took a few photos and left, glad I went out in the am.

Comments:

How often do we get a 20 second period swell in from the West? Not often enough but this was all time. A few factors were making it not so perfect, the first being the extreme tides which made some windows not as good as others, condensing surfers together during ideal time frames. Greggory and Rio and I went to Deveraux because Campus Point parking was a zoo. I shortboarded while they took out the logs. We choose the wrong time to paddle out, right during a set that was easy to duckdive but not easy to turtle roll for those cats.

The sets weren't huge, but they packed a lot of 20 second water behind them, and they were pitching out and closing out. Less than half of the set waves had a nice shoulder the rest were top to bottom beachbreak closeouts, at least where we were. Greggory awared me with the spirit award of the session for my takeoffs on waves where I had no chance of making it. After every such wave, where I'd honestly think I could make it, so I'd stroke in, do a bottom turn and the either wait out the whitewash or get crushed, G would comment "good spirit. After once such wave, I took off and managed to get crushed within 2 seconds. I popped up no further than 20 feet away from where I started, right near G and Rio. It was surreal.

It wasn't all closeout bombs though. I had a few smaller rights and lefts that offered turns. Rio got into a few fun ones and G carefully planned out his to much success. What was amazing was how many hacks were out there. The lulls were long so sometimes people, or a group of people would paddle out without incident and then soon realize they were in over their head. My favorite image of the day came after I popped up after getting into a closeout right. As I popped up and started to paddle out again, a set came in outside and a pack of 8 longboarders hastened to make it over the wave. None of them did, so 8 boards got ditched 100 feet in front of me. Over $4000 in nice shiny brand new boards getting tossed aside and strewn in all directions, straining on their masters ankles who were somewhere under water wondering why they were out there. For one of the first times at Deveraux a shortboarder had a leg up over longer boards.

Towards the end I saw a longboarder pull out of a closeout and try to bring his board over the top with him, but it got lip planted and brought down. His leash gave and the board was heading towards me. I jumped off mine, got on the longboard and paddled it out to the very thankful swimmer who was glad I saved him a couple hundred feet of swimming. Good deed done for the day, I caught a few in to meet the crew and recieve the good spirit award.

Comments:

We've had an amazing run of late winter swells. Day after day we've had rideable waves in town. Today the model looked great, long period swell swinging in out of the west. Still, I wasn't beleiving no buoy until I saw the waves first hand. High tide tossed a dawn patrol out the window and it looked like my favorite tide would be towards sunset. Rio, Greggory and Petey were all interested in sessions. In the end I went shortboarding with Pete along the Gaviota Coast. Rio and Greggory went longboarding at Campus Point. Greggorys report was that it was one of his best sessions of the year, super long waves from Poles to the stairs, and one little tuck into a tube.

Pete and I went to a shifty break that had an occaisonal nice big set that was head high + and in between waves that were waist to chest and workable. It wasn't breaking up the beach as far as I remember, I haven't been out at this spot all year. It was petes favorite setup, a low tide pushing into the beach. Big boils were swirling out near the takeoff spot and sand would accumulate on your board. Pete had some all star waves, picking off two set waves early on that he milked in to the beach. I on the other hand was picking off lots of medium side waves seldom got one of the bigger beasts outside. When I had priority in the lineup, I always got way to deep and would have never made the section.

Some guy on a fun board got two big set waves in a row, and continually paddled out past everyone and squatted on priority. Uncool man. Eventually he yeilded to a more dignified way of trading waves.

The sun never set because it was overcast. It did start to get chilly and dark so we headed in. I couldn't talk Pete into a $1.50 polish sausage at Costco.

Comments:

Greggory and I longboarding Deveruax with just a few out. Waves were fun but weird, with shifty peaks that were like windswell. Even going down the line you could see 2 or 3 "peaks" in front of you that you had to make, like sections only more defined. Like someone took a couple of sin wave generators and got crazy. There were 3 or 4 shortboarders that took the most outside peak and Greggory and I held down the second peak, trading waves at an alarming pace. Certainly this peak was superior to the other peak, but as long as those guys had priority on their deeper peak they didn't seem to mind.

Greggory had one great wipeout on takeoff in front of everyone, and one awesome late takeoff where he was sideways down the face, I almost saw fin.

Comments:

Headed to the same reef as yesterday but it looked totally lame, slow and small so I did the worst thing possible, I headed to the Pismo Pier. There it looked too big so I paddled out on the North side where the shape looked better. I paddled right next to the pier figuring it would suck me out but I soon realized I was doing a lot of ducking and working to stay away from pilings. I made a gametime decision to paddle under the pier to get to the south side. Here there was a river that took me straight out to the lineup. The lineup was out past the pier. I've never surfed here when I've been surfing out beyond the pier. I'm glad I didn't get caught in any fishing lines on this paddle out.

Once out, before even assesing the situation I got into a great right that had both size and shape. After that I realized I got an anomoly, most were dumping top to to bottom and offered no shelter. A few short rights and lefts that closed out and I drifted down to a peak that looked makeable. I got a few dream rights, with easy paddle outs afterwards. Yet another anomoly. Our pack soon drifted down to a rip current and it looked like we were out too far. Most started to paddle up and in, as did I. Then one of the biggest sets came in, a perfect right that broke where I was not 2 minutes ago. I was paddling right next to some guy, and ducked under the wave as it was breaking. When I came up, he was gone and I was very impressed he spun around and caught that monster. After the 2nd wave I looked inside and he was half way to the beach. I caught the 3rd wave in and then paddled back out with him. I congratulated him on his guts and he said no, had actually tried to duck the wave and got dragged all that way. Holy crow.

I then caught some totally unmakeable closeout and while I was underwater getting mugged by this wave I felt my right ankle feel lighter. No, not two days in a row of my stupid leash ripping off my ankle. I was out past the end of the pier, which is 1200 feet in length and had a long swim ahead of me. By the time I got in I was too tired to make it back out through lines of whitewater so I hung out with the rest of Bakersfield in the parking lot.

Comments:

The buoys were big, real big so I headed to the most sheltered spot I knew about. It was muddy from all of the rains and about head high. Tide was pretty low, and the left was working real good. I hung on the north side of the pack and picked off a bunch of fun lefts. Racy drops, a chance to go to the lip and then a slowdown for a cutback. Half the time I'd lose the wave here but sometimes I could work it into the next band of racing sections which would end up in a close out semi-cover up in a rock band. My best wave ever at this spot was one of these lefts, that started out a tad overhead and ended up about waist high.

Best conversation with random surfer in the water ever. A guy paddles up on a longboard and sits near me. I smell a lot of suntan lotion right away. He then turns to me and says, "Is it just me, or does this water sting your eyes?" He had a point, the water was nasty and brown from a week of rains, but my eyes didn't sting and I smelled his suntan lotion. So I asked "You have suntan lotion on?", to which he realized the error of his ways and was comforted to know the no, the water was not going to kill him.

My leash ripped off of my ankle on one nice wipeout. Stupid velcro is getting completely useless, I have to tuck my leash under my wetsuit. The tide was low and there were oddels of rocks but lucky for me my board stopped short of the rocks and I managed to rescue it.

Comments:

Pete and I met at the Mesa, hoping this swell would be so big it would light up sleepy breaks and we could score some uncrowded fun. Well either the tide was too high or this swell didn't really make it to Santa Barbara proper but it wasn't firing. The beachbreak had some fun looking waist to chest high waves that would mostly close out, but the spot we wanted to go out at was just too slow to shortboard.

So we hit the beachbreak. Right off the bat I caught two fast lefts, rail grabbing and tucked in like I was going to get covered but didn't. After that Pete got some good rights while I cursed my board for not getting me into more waves. I finally got a few good rights, did a couple of real giant turns, hit a few lips. The air smelled like Bacon, which must of meant the wind was slight offshore. It made us hungry for some breaky, but we solderied on making the best of a so so session, allthewhile wondering if it was going off everywhere else.

Comments:

After an amazing shortboarding session in overhead waves this morning, Greggory and I head out for a longboarding session at Campus Point. Although the swell had waned on the charts, I was surprised to see lackluster conditions at the point. The wind was up, which may have beaten some juice out of the swell, but it was amazing that is was waist high or so. We longboarded poles with a few other people, caught some small but long rides and had a good time. Surfing is pretty amazing that way, here I am, longboarding a small point break in windy conditions the same day that earlier gave a great shortboarding session at a clean reef.

Campus Point parking lot was all jacked up. The uni took away the meters for the day for something, who knows what. Greggory had a "G" pass which let us park up there, but all others were hosed. We better talk to Yang about that one.

Comments:

After yesterday's session at Rincon I was tempted to go back and try some more, but instead I opted for smaller waves that I could catch more of. The swell had dropped since yesterday afternoon, but as I walked out in the pre-dawn haze I was pretty much at peace with whatever was out there. Walking to surf on a lush trail before the sun rises, in the stillness of the morning is the best ever to bring calm and focus. I had my 6'6" on me still, this would be ok for this session, although more foam would have helped scratch to a few frustrating almost beens.

There was an awesome 3 legged dog with two different colored eyes on the beach. 3 legged dogs are awesome, and different colored eyes is icing on the cake, man. Again I wanted to walk up top and backdoor the peak but the rock situation was looking rugged and I was bootyless so I was a chump and paddled in at the channel and got some lactic acid worked out of the shoulders on the long paddle up.

Fun sets were coming in, looking burly on the outside and just plain boxy, sucking up in foam and dirt on the inside. Unlike yesterday, I managed to catch more then 1 wave, a handfull of fast fun drops. Superstars were pulling in way deep and making it past the first section. I on the other hand didn't make the first section on my first two waves and had wussed on a cover up opp. On the third wave it was closing out also but this time I manned up and stuck in for the cover up as the sheet came over my head and swallowed me up. It was brutal in this area, a swirl of foam and sand and weird currents made it tough to get back on your board and get out of the impact zone. I speant much time sideways in the zone getting slapped around after a wave.

The folks were friendly, a couple of guys were owning the peak and I got shuffled out of a good lineup spot once by some deft pre-set manuvering. The tide was rising and the consistency was slowing down but the extra water was going to help the inside peak. Out of the water and at work by 8:00.