sorry peeps.. i'm out of the loop this morning.. Stayed up late last night watching "Spirited Away". I figured that the onshores would be raging and conditions sub-optimal.. but.. looking at the cam and looking at the wind vectors it doesn't seem to be too blowy!?.. Looks like you could find some schnazzy corners, ramps and sections out at our beloved beach break if you had it in mind to get wet. anybody have the first hand account??

I have to get some work done and then i'll post some cool pics a few people sent me..

siiiick..

take a moment to think of everybody out on the playa this weekend.. tossing aside shackles of the societal matrix.. grunting and salivating into the desert winds... soaring and burrowing into the light twisted environs of black rock vistas. Wandering from encampment to encampment.. licking and playing.. discussing and interacting.. communicating via unspoken exchanges of energies.. post-apocalyptic rubber and steel.. hallucinagenic eruptions of consequence and meaning.. Replenishing the spirit of creativity and unbridled exuberance. letting it fly and letting it go. burning the man... wish i was there..

OB ugly.. cruised south with Lerm.. Spots down there looking ugly.. brown.. churned... trashy.. grey... sloppy.. gross.. Ended up at the Smoke-out spot.. you know that spot.. Smock-A-Flay.. The wind was blowing somethin' fierce at OB... out of the WSW... pretty much dead onshore. Wouldn't ya know it was blowin onshore down in P-town too.. Lindy looked ok.. surfable.. about 10 surfers strewn about.. crumbly, low-tide waves flicking in and squirting here and there.. utlility session possibilities.. The swell seemed to have diminished in size from yesterday.. biggest waves at Smoke-a-J probably about head-high.. all of which closed out.. anything over shoulder high formed up into a thunderous wall of closeout symmetry.. all the tangential energy vectors of the wave somehow conspired together at the last second and agreed to all break at once.. like.. all the little parts of the wave probably communicated with each other as they approached the beach.. they saw Lerm and i sitting there.. drooling over the tapering overhead wave coming our way.. then they all shouted together.. "OK.. we don't want those pesky surfers to ride us.. let's all get together now and lurch up and break all at the same time.. one.. two.. three.. CRASH!!"... or.. something.. soo.. Lerm and i were stuck riding the medium sized guys when they came through.. The waves at S-A-J seem to have a way of starting to break.. then backing off.. so you have to pump just to stay with the wave.. then they'll give you a millisecond of steepening open face which will get your hopes up.. then they'll suck up and close-out violently.. Then on your way back out from a small little slightly satisfying ride you'll be forced to duck dive through 8 or 9 of the dirtiest, trash-strewn, dumping, fuck-you closeouts right on your head.. then you'll get back outside and the ocean will shut down for while.. There was a friggin dirty diaper floating around in the lineup with us!!! The water in Pollutica is so disgusting right now.. but.. nevertheless.. we still had a blast and it was great to be the only two surfers out there.. I caught a few little pumping rights and a handful of little lefts where i got to work on my backside bottom turn into off-the-top combos.. sort-of..

anyhooo.. awww yeah.. sort-of..

anybody score good times this morning?

it seems that Matt-yellow-board is bummed on the niceness scene.. what can we do to cheer this cat up? The dude is a great surfer and it would be a shame to bum him out..

"Damm, this used to be a chill group of core surfers sharing experiences of the SF surf scene, not sure what it is now. Good on you E for starting it, but I have to say...it's pretty out of control now. When I see a group of surfers ditching boards and coming in hoards to one peak at OB (helmets, gloves, and funboards in tow)..i now gruble.."fuck the niceness" to myself, and paddle down the beach. sorry to be a downer....can't wait for the first solid swell to come "clean up the beach" - former nice guy - matt"

couple of nice indo pics...

well.. there are waves.. there are also relatively biatchy WSW winds hacking and blowing and disturbing.. The sea-surface at Sloat wasn't crazed or totally disheveled... but most waves ended up crumbling or flopping over instead of peeling nicely.. at least that's how it looked from the lot. I think that if you actually sacked up and paddled out you'd probably score a handful of fun, peeling head-high rides.. but you'd also be dealing with disorganized closeouts, duckdiving.. onshore wind in your face and nobody else around.. I headed south in the hopes that the southerly origins of the winds would enable some better conditions in P-tizzle. Checked Green-Globule-Man's domain at Smoke-A-Jay.. Horrible.. hacked surface with 90% closeouts. shoulder high.. nobody out.. Lindy looking pretty similar.. the WSW wind kinda grooming the very south end of the cove.. but no waves were breaking down there.. a handful of loggers were actually scoring a few rides in the middle.. nothing great but they were going down the line for an instant before the inevitable closeout.. i thought about it for a sec but headed back to Rockaway for a second look.. Back to Smoke-OK and i notice a somewhat interesting right peel along.. hmmm.. watched for a few more minutes and eventually saw another agreeable section.. took my wetty out of the car and turned it inside out.. got ready to put it on.. watching and waiting for that third example of rideability to present itself.. waiting.. waiting.. closeouts... sloppy closeouts.. sloppy/flabby/upchucky/fugly closeout after closeout.. onshore winds in my face.. garbled surface.. no more good ones coming through... i'm audi.. no surf.. maybe tomorrow!!

or.. if you scour the coast you will probably find some niceness somewhere..

good luck!!

people have been discussing south swell headed our way.. nobody is predicting a massive whopping south swell. more like just a background utility swell..
Surpulse predicts 1ft 17seconds from 205 degrees and peaking on sunday night or monday. soo.. that's not that serious.. Blakestah predicts, "2-3 ft south from 190 due in next Monday through Wednesday, should have 17 second energy"... soo.. we'll see what happens.. Santa Cruz area breaks should be packed to the gills with labor day wave-riders.. everyone waiting to catch one of the sparse south swell set waves.. ugg.. santa cruz is such a double-edged sword.. best waves around.. worst crowd and vibe scene EVER!! well.. except for our little spots when they happen..

in other news.. I'm officially moving down to the beach!!!! Scored an uber-cute, small little cottage with a garden and a fireplace and sunlights in the ceiling.. It's basically one big room with a little kitchen and bathroom attached.. two big pine trees in the yard.. and i can WALK TO SURF now!!!! so psyched!!

kewl..

"David Bowie

UB40!"

e

san o yesterday

The string of windless/glassy mornings has finally come to an end:( Slummin! It seems that we've had favorable winds for the dawnie for almost a week now.. but today ended that pleasurable stint. I checked the beach around 6:20. There were a few surfer-heads bobbing out at Kelly's Cove.. but nare a soul throughout the rest of the beach. Sliz looked somewhat approachable.. maybe even a bit bigger than yesterday. Shoulder/Head-high crumbly, wind-whipped windswell lines chugged in and looked to offer up a rideable corner or two or seven... but.. only if you're feelin the desperation.. With this south wind and moderately schweet windswell you might head south and peep some north-facing beach or cove.. who knows??? as the tide comes up P-town might distribute some goodies? I'm going to opt for a little yoga followed by guitar jam tonight and save my shit for tomorrow morning.. If any of y'all scored south of the city maybe throw in a vague hint on this here board as i'd be up for road-trippin' for tomorrow's DP..

Scout mentioned the presence of some green jelly-like globules down at San O a few years back.. it's funny that he should mention them because the other day i was surfing "Smoke-A-Jay" (Rockaway) in P-town when i noticed a similar flourescent green jelly-like globule floating in the water right next to me. I've been in the habit of picking up jellyfish and tossing them at the heads of my unsuspecting surf companions and i started to do the same with this flourescent green globby. I picked it up in my hand I began to throw it but the damn thing wouldn't come off my hand. I whipped it and cajoled but it wouldn't come off.. slowly but forcefully the thing started to spread up my arm! It spread past my shoulder and down into my chest and up my neck. It was engulfing my body and i let out a riotous scream right before it enclosed my mouth and head.. within minutes my whole body was covered in this viscous, sticky, gelatinous green slime. Somehow i was still able to breath but my breaths were slow and labored.. i could feel the slime being sucked down into my lungs with every difficult breath. The slime was also reaching into my ears and into my brain. I started to experience a slight change in my thought process.. My sensory perception at first grew very dim and grey, almost as if things were being broken down and reorganized.. I would have been painfully frightened if it wasn't for some weird, deep sense of confidence that i felt for some reason.. A few moments later my sensory perception rushed back with invigorated clarity and focus. I could make out blades of grass on the mountain across from highway one.. I could hear the calls of birds way down the beach. I could pick out the lights of boats miles out to sea. I could hear millions of overlapping human conversations on land but could focus on any and distinguish precisely what was being said.. all of a sudden i had super-powers!! i was the green blob!! but something inside me wasn't right.. I could feel this burning anger and hatred boiled and seething within.. Not necessarily directed at anything in particular.. just kind-of bubbling and gurgling within.. I realized suddenly that i was still sitting out on my board in the lineup.... other surfers were screaming and staring at me but i paid them little notice.. The waves were large and right at that moment the biggest set of the afternoon lurched up from the horizon.. i took a few paddles and couldn't believe how powerful my strokes were.. i was immediately up and riding.. i pumped once and then threw this gigantic gauge into the face of the wave.. the whole rock cliff at the south-end of rockaway got splashed with water from my slime-powers-assisted cutty.. the end section of the wave approached and i pumped a few more times and then launched into this humungous air.. to my shock and amazement.. i was suddenly floating really high in the air. i had been going right at Rockaway and i was now flying over the headland separating Rockaway from Lindy.. As i cleared the land and started my descent down to the cove at lindy.. my anger started raging.. i had no control.. it just started firing within me.. i came flying out of the air.. right in the middle of the lineup at Lindy.. this big guy covered in green slime.. screaming at the top of his lungs and wearing this gruesome, devilish grimace..

Happy monday morning! A small windswell and zero wind at the coast this morning. 4.6ft 8seconds on the SF buoy. With the super low tide at 6 am there were some dumpier, more barrelly sections at the butt-crack of dawn... but as the tide came up conditions took a turn for the worse and suffered from some mushy insignificance. Throughout the session a few meaty slabs sauntered in, keeping things interesting. I watched a few plate-glass barrels crack and thunder along.. but.. no luck in getting into any for me at least.. i think that Robme's homie Gary tucked into one. I managed a few racy rides with last-second, ledging take-offs and walled-up sections... but... they weren't "DYNO-MITE!" or anything.. probably will be fun most of the day.. it'll be a Toasty day too.. maybe into the 90s in SF..

yesterday i surfed two sessions and had a great time.. Buried-whale cove in the morning. and then again in the afternoon with Kaiser Sose.. good times!!

i might be living out on 45th soon so i was scoping out my new hood..

peace y'all..

anybody have any trippy or tripped-out surf stories?

french bikini contest

carving 360

big rock in san diego

peurto

Glassy, warm water, beautiful sky, no wind, not many surfers, friendly seals... and.. and... no waves! well.. there were a few vertically challenged waves coming through but all in all it's a good day to take your ol' granny out for a spin at OB. Robme and i surfed in the middle and did our best to stroke into the waist/shoulder-high dumpy micro-peelers flowing in. We each caught a handful.. It's so fricken nice to have glassy conditions at OB that i almost didn't even mind the absence of significant waves. The languid, oil-like glassiness translated directly into my state-of-mind. It worked to sooth and calm my anxious spirit. The feeling of paddling into and then taking off and gliding down the face of a smooth, flawless wedge of natural energy can't be beat.. even if the waves are only 24 inches high. I saw Paul B out there picking off a bunch of waves.. and also saw OB underground legend Alex Martins paddling out as i came in. Then as i came out of the water i noticed this gigantic sand castle that i somehow hadn't noticed before. It was probably 8 feet high and contained this dark, mysterious doorway.. i wandered up to it and poked my head inside the door. A wonderful aroma of freshly baked bread wafted up to me, and i heard what i thought was distant singing from far off.. What the funk?? I kind-of ventured into the doorway a little more and before i knew it i slipped and then started sliding down this long, wet slide of slimy seaweed. i grabbed and tugged and did everything in my power to stop the slide but to no avail.. in a few minutes i was dumped into this dark subterranean chamber. There was a dim light down this hall and the floor was sticky and gooey.. There was a resounding, rhythmic drumbeat echoing throughout.. I made my way toward the faint light and found that it was in fact a torch on the wall of this long hallway.. there were other torches lining the hall and an opening in the distance. It was obvious that the pounding percussive rhythm eminated from the opening at the end of the hall.. as i approached the pounding grew louder and i noticed shadows and flickering light dancing and moving inside the opening.. I reached the end of the hall and tentatively peered into the opening.. I looked from above down into a huge underground cave... giant!.. there was a raging bonfire in the middle of the floor and all these people dancing and groping and sweating and drumming around the bonfire. beautiful people.. I was way up above, far enough that the people below couldn't really see me.. i watched as the drumming got quicker and the dancing grew faster and more lascivious. the women were wrything and sweating, dancing ferociously and howling up into the air.. the cave echoed and pulsed with the thunderous screams and cacophonous drumbeat. Clothes were torn away and muscular, slick curvaceous bodies lept and gesticulated around the fire.. Suddenly all attention was directed toward the middle of the fire.. i watched in stunned amazement as some sort of spiritual essence began to take form above the bonfire. It seemed that somehow the flames themselves coalesced into this vaguely human-like form.. this flame-spirit began moving and gyrating to the rhythm of the drums and the dancers.. faster and faster.. harder and harder. My heart was racing and my whole body drenched with sweat as i watched this scene unfold.. i was still in my wetty and had my trusty green lantern surfboard with me!! Suddenly, shockingly, the visage of the flame-spirit looked directly up at me!!!! instantly all the naked dancers and drummers looked up at me too!!! Fuck!!! My instinct screamed to turn and run down the hall back to to slide and up to the safety of Ocean Beach but i was strangly transfixed and couldn't turn myself away.. The flame-spirit slowly shifted and began to change shape and extend itself up toward me.. As it extened from the bonfire it stretched and arced out toward me.. it began to take on the shape of a wave!! seriously!! in a few moments this giant, conical, stationary wave of flame extended out from about 5 feet in front of me 100 yards to the base of the cave and the circle of dancers. I knew what i had to do.. Without any forthought i grabbed my board and lept off my perch at the top of the cave.. I landed on the face of the wave of flame and began pumping and carving down the line.. at a 45 degree angle toward the ground.. the wave of flame began barrelling and breaking behind me and before i knew it i was standing strait up inside this gargantuan flame-barrel!! just standing there.. accellerating rapidly toward the huge bonfire below.. the music pumping like crazy.. the dancers were going wild below.. i was screaming at the top of my lungs as the flame licked and crackled all around.. everything rushing and melding, flying and erupting.. i was headed strait for the bonfire.. as it approached the barrel got super deep until all i could see was flame.. all i could here was the ever-present thunder of the drumbeat.. until.. until....

The swell decreased a bit this morning.. biggest waves maybe head high.. most waves in the waist/shoulder range.. If yesterday surfed better than it looked from shore... today looked better from shore than it surfed. Pulled up to Scrote at 6:20 and witnessed fairly glassy conditions with shoulder-high waves peeling but backing off... but peeling.. Only guy out was Lerm. I started getting pretty excited. Conditions weren't the archetype of oceanic splendor but it looked like there would be some smooth, translucent vectors to careen across. In reality it proved difficult to get in position for the infrequent slices of niceness. Most waves would back off or close.. though there were solid corners and sections if you had your flow-cap on and could work it. i also surfed horribly this morning so my report might be negatively shaded because of that. I wiped hard on this fantastic right.. just boggled the takeoff and free-fell for a while.. then got bonked on my head by my board really hard and saw a flash of light. I thought i might be damaged goods for a second but i was ok. Later in the session i stroked into another peeling right with much potential for maneuvers.. I paddled in and milked the take-off for a boost of speed right off the bat.. (you know when you click your takeoff just right and feel the balance and acceleration.. shit seems to click).. then i pumped off the bottom and fired off a semi-decent turn off-the-top.. but somehow i compressed weirdly after the turn and i ended up being forced down into a violent squat on my board. I'm doing a poor job of explaining it but it felt like i got pushed down really hard onto my board.. my knees bent inward and almost cracked against the top of my board. I'm lucky my knees didn't blow out. Thank you stretching and yoga!!

there was also a TON of sealife in the water.. fish jumping, birds diving, seals and sea-lions, the whole nine-yards.. spooked me..

go get some..

e

today was the kind of day where it pays to actually put your wetty on and paddle out, even though conditions look iffy from the car.
Again smallest at VFers, bigger at Sliz and biggest in the middle. Not much wind but the sea-surface struggled with a bit of morning sickness. I ended up surfing the middle with Da blakestah, Lermification and Kus. Shoulder/head-high waves (4ft 9sec on the SF buoy) would consistently lurch toward shore.. looking relatively calm and mellow.. and then jack up and hammer down on the shallow inside sandbars. There were some compromising rips and currents that made the inside section all weird, gurgly and imperfect. If you surf OB alot you know what i'm talking about. However!! the drops were steep and critical and really fun, imho.. Kus charged into a sizeable closeout barrel. I watched blakestah take off on some steep/meaty slabs on his UFO. Lerm also slanked into quite a few nuggety nuggies. The sea lions were taking off on waves and doing their neck-jerking/stare-down dance. It was tough to find sections that would allow for lip maneuvers and such, but it was easy to find heeps of pitching lips and gnarlesburg situations. the water was warm and the duck-dives were relatively infrequent. I'm smilin!

surfed a non-lindy break in P-town last night.. There looked to be close to 150 surfers in the water at Schmlindy. The south wind blew a mellow side-offshore and the small windswell offered up some impeccible/perfection longboardy waves. the water was ridiculously filthy.

schweeeet..

i'm currently reading the kelly slater (auto)biography "Pipe Dreams".. it's enjoyable.. though a little like eating candy.. he seems like a really cool guy. i wish he talked about the techniques of surfing more than the politics and scenes though.. i want to hear about his psychological tactics for learning and developing maneuvers... or detailed descriptions of deep pipe barrels.. or pamela anderson sessions!!!

peace be with you..

e

hossegor

cruised the beach around 6:15.
Super-small at VFers (waist/chest).. very little wind. 2 guys out there gallivanting about. not really catching anything.. southward... Middle of the beach looking decidedly larger. I noticed quite a few interesting sandbars. Slightly overhead windswell walls dumping and detonating but also upchucking the occasional money section. nobody out throughout the middle. Something about the grey/daunting/sickly sky, the wild/tumultuous/unwieldy waves, the utter and total absence of other humans and the mysterious/gruesome recent pervasiveness of the man in grey kept my excitement about a solo session in the middle of the beach this morning in check.. ONward to sloat.. the SW wind more evident at Sliz.. 2 guys out in the shoulder/head-high waves.. Not too inviting but i donned the wetty and hit it.. As usual shit proved more fun once out in the water catching waves than it looked from the parking lot. Slightly crumbly/bumbly/disorganized, the waves would come in a bit mushy but then hit a shallow part of a sandbar and buckle and break and sometimes even peel! I caught 2 really good waves and about 6 or 7 "eh" ones in about an hour. First good one was a steep left ... pigdog takeoff.. let go of rail.. bottom turn then a semi-nice lip smack.. back to the bottom.. bottom turn.. then as the wave began to peter i used my remaining speed to carve into the face and then around into a weak little roundhouse bounce off the white-water. The other good wave was a right where i kind-of navigated some weird bumps and bubbles on the drop.. sort of doing a little pop-a-wheelie and leaning back to make it over a little bump (felt like jumping off a curb on your bicycle) then i just ferociously pumped like a screaming banshee down the line to stay ahead of the crashing/crumbling lip.. The wave bowled up nice as i headed down the line and it was invigorating to watch, feel and ride the meaty thickness of a "tasty" wave.

soo.. that's that..

the legendary Jersey-bomber Kus is coming into town this afternoon. if you see some scrappy guy pulling into unmakeable barrels tomorrow morning it's probably him..

schweet..

e

also.. i guess the brown turd is stalled somewhere in the shaping process.. i think that Geoff Rausche is super busy.. because i ordered it about 6 weeks ago and i haven't heard anything from him at all.. i called once about 3.5 weeks ago and he said that he hadn't started it yet.. soo.. that's the scoop.. i'm jonesing to ride it.. but.. don't know when it will be done??

thanks again everyone for hooking a brotha so hard!!!

wales

indo (pics by scott bass)

pigdog

hossegor

what up lads and lassies!
back from mendo..
now i'm up in this mo' fo'
gettin' skunked like a ho'.... dad'

we gotz da crazy-wack onshores!
oh yeah
we gotz da weak piddly wind-swell
oh yeah
we gotz da dirty-funky water
oh yeah
we gotz da tweaker-freak locals
oh yeah

Lerm reports suckage at Lindy
oh no
Looks like suckage at OB too
oh no
maybe some north-facing exposed beach-break
oh yeah
because we gotz the south wind and small wind-swell
oh yeah

ok ok.. enough.. i hope that all y'all enjoyed some quality-time in the green room this last week.. I've been effectively "off-the-grid" all week up north in mendo. I ended up scoring 3 somewhat random but enjoyable sessions. I surfed this ginormous, exposed beachbreak most of the time. The vertically-challenged swell wasn't enough to produce waves at any of the better spots in the area. Surfing this huge, exposed, sharkified beach break by myself every session way up in the north-country caused me a bit of consternation.. This beach was a bit like OB on steroids. Even the dainty 5ft 9sec windswell was frickin slammin and jammin and crackin' down on my noggin. I managed to slank into a slew of high-performance/hang-on-by-the-seat-of-my-pants racers.. popped a few lip-flicks off the close-out sections.. My parents (sitting on the beach) couldn't believe how far out i was.. my mom commented, "Ethan, i thought you would surely float out and be lost at sea!"..

but.. all in all.. little in the way of "epic ridiculous sickest ever sickness" was garnered by me on this trip..

on the first day i was there i watched the end of the south swell in the water peel and feather (strong offshores) into this semi-secret reef break.. only a few waves per set every 7 minutes or so but it was chugging along and peeling and beckoning and teasing and looking oh-so-scrumptious to this wave-starved slurfer.. but.. alas.. i was hiking with moms/sis/seymore and the ladies wanted to git a bit of lunch first.. by the time i got back to the spot (2 hours later) the tide had effectively killed the beautiful sets :(

soo.. hopefully we'll see a slackening of wind... at least enough to enable some niceness at OB with this windswell..

e

your's truly on a piddly little white-water ride

local spot enjoying the last south swell

flat.. pt conception buoy at 4ft 6seconds.. light west wind but it doesn't really matter as there ain't no waves to ride.. I'm actually psychologically OK with the flatness as i've come down with a cold.. sucks.. but.. would suck much harder if conditions were on fire.. soo.. nothing much else to report.. y'all know about the windswell that's supposed to arrive this weekend and the super-weak South groundswell.. hopefully we'll be feelin' that shit come tomorrow.. I'll be driving up the coast on sunday and hope to score a session at Salmon creek or some such.. we'll see what pans out. I'm hoping to finally surf a rocky mendo spot next week as i've checked it a bunch but never surfed it..

"pump up the jam, pump it up!"

"me and julio down by the schoolyard"

Doin' the butt... sexy sexy... ain't nothin' wrong.. if you wanna do the butt.. ALL NIGHT LONG!!"

"top jimmy, He's the king"

"I'm building you a pyramid
With limestone blocks so large
I drag them from the mountain top
You'll need a two car garage...

Cause it's the ocean flowing in our veins
That it's the salt that's in our tears
Cause we could have come so very far
In at least as many years

Take the highway through the Great Divide"

"Last year holloween fell on the weekend.. me and ghetto boys are trick-or-treatin'.. robbin' little kids for bags.. until an old-man got behind our ass."

"Ohhh.. we're half way there.. OOHH OHH.. livin' on a prayer!! take my hand.. and we'll make it i swear!! ohh ohh . livin' on a prayer!!"

"Super man came down to me
he said you rock so naturally
i said now that you've learned to dig
let me tell you why
i'm so for real
i'm cosmo dee from outer space
i came to rock the human race
i do it right cause i can't do it wrong
that's why the whole world is singin' this song..

jam on it.. jam on it.. ja ja ja ja ja ja jam on it

wicky wicky wicky wicky"

e

"slappy" garcia interview

wonder if there are waves here?

bells beach feelin' the love

more bells

somewhere north of here.. last weekend - (thanks cloude for the pics)

"i got five on it"

all signs point toward flat. I opted for the sleep-in/snuggles/french-toast/kick-it morning. It looks like dribblers are farting up onto the beach.. but.. most likely nothing to give you that little surf-charged flutter in your stomach. Blakestah predicts a NW windswell to arrive this weekend (4ft 13sec).. mixed with another South swell on sunday (210 degrees, 1.3ft 17sec).. we should maybe see some wave-activity for the weekend and into next week. If the winds stay light that windswell might be great for local beaches.

Come-on little windswell..
give us some waves..
we'll gently ride your breakers
please make em' concave.

"the D O double drizzay.. the fly human being seeing no i'm not european bein' all i can.. when i got the mutha-fuckin' mic in my hand.. and.."

umm... soo also there is a light onshore at OB (6knots out of the west) but the surface looks OK.. the SF buoy is still reading 2.3ft 14 seconds but it looks like all the swell activity is coming from 180degrees.. I guess the SF buoy sits far enough out from the coast that it receives the 180degree swell??.. while.. that same swell, capable of providing us grandiose amounts of both spiritual and tactile pleasure, just innocently palpitates right past our hallowed shores.. or something..

i also want to just comment on what an amazing experience it was to follow and ride this last south swell from its beginning to its end.. Last thursday and friday we started noticing inconsistent groundswell bands blipping into the offshore-groomed confines of Montara.. nothing special really but exciting to see the beginning of the swell.. then on friday afternoon i ventured further south (based on a tip-off) and saw the definitive cordoroy bands stacked up toward the horizon.. the swell was pumping and i tried my damndest to nestle into it's womb.. Saturday and Sunday shit continued to pump.. though by sunday the biggest sets had diminished.. I also noticed that the consistency of waves increased.. which i guess reflected the diminishing swell-period (17sec to 14sec).. After having surfed the same swell for 4 or 5 sessions my subconscious positioning and movement became better attuned to the pace of the sets.. it was weird but i definitely noticed it.. i knew when to pass on a wave because the probability of a better one existing behind it was high.. and i knew when to go on a semi-random wave because there was most likely a 5-minute lull behind it. Then it was great to wind down the swell with a couple seshies at OB.. The same pattern evident in the sets.. at a comfortable surfspot for me.. niiiice..

soo.. i'm off to Mendocino on sunday and won't be back until next sunday.. i'll probably be able to get a few reports up but it won't be every day.. Hope everybody finds sculpted, head-high, razor-sharp neverending sections of nirvana..

anybody have any pre-season resolutions for the upcoming season?
- get their deepest barrel ever?
- swim among dolphins?
- floater?
- ride backside down the line?
- 100 sessions in a year?
- carving 360?
- aireals?
- hangin' ten?
- have more fun?
- yoga?
- rip shit up?

Madiera (william henry photos)

moss landing

sorry about the late post.. i had a work meeting..

no slurf for me this morning. blakestah reports that,"the beach is absolutely NOT working this morning. Light onshores and mushy tiny waves."

sooo.. that doesn't sound too promising..

Bagel, Kaiser and i met for a tuesday arvo sesh and sesh yesterday afternoon. Reports trickled in that there were still waves to be had at the beach.. coupled with sunshine and the warmest water in years and we be on dat shite.. Met up at Bagels and sampled some of his friend's indica.. stonily talked story for a while and then remembered that we had gotten together to surf, dag-nabit! soo.. surf we did.. Talking Heads "Remain in the Light" cranking as we pulled up to a mid-beach mysto south-swell sandbar.. Sunrays beaming down onto shoulder-high groundswell peelers.. rights and lefts... stoke building and frothing.. long stretch on the beach as pelicans glide in formation.. Slow, deep breaths as surf-enriched muscles groan from recent overexertion.. Paddle out to the peak.. almost no need for wetty.. waiting for the sets.. shooting the shit.. 6 or 7 wave set ripples through.. we each snag one.. Smooth Operator blips the lip.. Kaiser charges undaunted.. Long-ass waits but waves funnel in.. keep us satisfied.. then.. all of the sudden... the motha-fuckin fog rolls in.. like a grey blanket of the metaphysical unkown.. thoughts of the tooth suddenly take form in my mind.. thoughts of the legendary "fog eel" fills me with consternation.. the "fog eel" is a rare species along the northern california coast that only comes to the surface during extremely foggy conditions. as it's afraid of the light and sun.. The "fog eel" has these stange, shadow-like black eyes. If you stare at them long enough you become entranced.. the fog eel then slithers up to you and bites your achilles heel.. sucking blood and life-force.. soo.. next time you're surfing in the dense fog in nor-cal.. watch out for the fog eel..
anyway.. we had a grand-ol-time catching mini groundswell pulses for a few hours yesterday.. there probably are a few tricklers coming through this morning.. might be a good occasion to take your honey, or your grandma or your dog out for an OB surf sesh..

i have to say that after this south-swell bonanza this week.. and the Montara niceness last week.. my body is craving some rest.. or at least to switch it up a bit.. soo.. the flat spell predicted for the next few days may not be such a bad thing.. is that blasphemy!?

e

ldogg sent some baja pics in

Justin sent this in.. sign me up!!

Back to the source this morning.. good ol' OB. Sick of driving so hit up the local digs with Kaiser, Bagel and a handful of others. South swell sets still pulsing in with surprising consistency. Sea-surface alternating between slightly-warbled and almost-glassy. Lots of closeout walls but also some nuggety corners. Water temperature warmer than i've ever felt it! Chest-high rights and lefts parading in and breaking steeply. Not your typical OB experience as duckdiving was kept to a minimum. The waves had some funkiness to them as they broke... sometimes throwing cavernous barrels.. sometimes lurching and bouncing.. sometimes mellowly ramping and othertimes just plain sweetness.. I think that bagel's new nickname should be "smooth operator".. because that cat flows the lopy, languid, silky-smoove steez on the wave faces.. no doubt a style finely tuned from years of honing and refining along the chiseled undulations of 1rst-point Malibu. I was cool to watch him slank down the face of a little left.. he calmly bounced off the lip two times.. i then ended up taking the next wave (another left) and felt my style slightly affected by watching his wave.. I probably still looked like the blocky, kooky flailer that i am but it was still cool to imagine that i was flowy like the smooth operator. In other session news this super annoying guy with a mustach and a blue longboard spent the entire session following our man Kaiser all over the lineup.. Kaiser would paddle 200 yards away from the small group of surfers to explore a little left that was happening and this guy would just follow him over there and then takeoff right behind him.. then Kaiser would paddle back, just to get away from the guy and he would follow Kaiser back.. it was really annoying.. thankfully he wasn't following me so much so i simultaneously empathized with Kaiser and chuckled at his predicament..

anyway.. the waves were fun.. OB is working.. cruise the beach.. find your peak and cruise into some enjoyable south-swell pulses..

I checked out Bagel's art opening on sunday.. The art was funny and cool, the vibes were cruisy.. ladies were cuties... and this sexy woman in a small, tight black dress and big stilleto heels was all over the kid's jock.. like i said... Smooth Operator..

stockton ave last weekend. (photos courtesy of tuffproductions.com)
ruffo

adam repogle

repogle

wow.. i'm not worthy.. friday afternoon, then a 4-hour saturday session, then 2.5 hours yesterday.. a certain steep beach north of antarctica was flowing the love, feeding the juice, living the dream. I nearly fell on my knees in tears as i watched a thick, macking, squeaky-clean south-swell set march in and then just crack and barrel along.. you know that resounding *CRACK* that happens when throaty barrels do their thing.. that was the sound... wave after orgasmic wave. overhead.. slight offshore.. absolute total glass.. only a handful of surfers.. could this be real?? it was... Sorrowfully it got dark just as i was getting into a rhythm.. soo.. Lerm and i ventured back on saturday afternoon.. we walked/paddled south for a while and hunkered down at this point-break-like left that felt like something out of the mentawais! SERIOUSLY!! Jerm scored his first in-and-out barrel as i watched and then got annihilated on the inside. Although the set waves were immaculate and tear-jerkingly beautiful.. they proved deceivingly difficult to stroke into.. well.. at least for us.. this other guy seriously managed to catch a nice wave every set.. sometimes two waves.. he probably caught 40 rides during out session.. Lerm and i probably caught around 15 or so. The dude was going ballistic.. barrel into monster slash.. Massive air-drop takeoff into barrel into floater into off-the-lip into off-the-lip into off-the-lip... then strokes into a little inside guy for a micro coverup.. all the while we're avoiding massive set-wave closeouts and trying to position ourselves for the peelers.. but.. we each got our fill.. Then back to said ravishing spot for the sunday early.. this time i was on my game and had a better feel and understanding of the rhythm and pace of the sets.. i knew what to expect and was able to score a wave pretty much every set.. I spent a brief, celestial moment in the GREEN room.. and also put alot of work and repetitive drilling into my "backhand attack".. hee hee.. there was a little back-wash bounce on sunday and the takeoffs were often hairball bouncy airdrops into barrels and such.. most people were backing away when they should have been charging.. there was also a santa cruz rat-pack crew just absolutely obliterating all waves that came their way.. barrels and airs and giant floaters over huge barrelly closeouts.. impressive.. blakestah mentioned this spot getting crowded.. but it never really did.. at least during the 10 or so hours i spent there.. it's probably still going right now. plus there were about 5 or 10 separate peaks north and south of the main beach that were all firing..

Lerm and i surfed the remnants this morning at a more local beach.. still fun... almost achieved shackage on this one set-wave.. but instead got the royal wallop.. by the looks of things the south swell will all be gone by tomorrow..

thank you south swell gods!!!! also a thank-you to whichever cosmic entity is responsible for the tropical blend of south swell, no wind, balmy weather, sunny skies, warm ocean, glassy surface, good friends, smiles, conversation, post-session euphoria, chillin!!! thank you all!!! a great weekend!

anyhoo.. here's some evidence..

somewhere down there.. friday night..

blurry niceness

san mateo county secret spot on the same day - the south just never reached around half moon bay.. but maybe marin??

i'm sure some of y'all scored.. let's here some stories!!!!

Returned again to our favorite little secret spot somewhere north of Peru. I didn't even check OB as i'm giving the landlord some time to roam and do his thing without my potentially tasty self causing him distraction. The south swell began showing at the HMB buoy last night at 4ft 17seconds.. right now it's at the SF buoy at 3.3ft 17seconds.. We felt it in the water during our sesh but it wasn't anything to go gaga over. Every 7 minutes or so a loosely gathered set of 3 or 4 head-high waves would march through and offer-up some thicky lefts. Sorrowfully the wind blew a bit more side/onshore than days past and effectively smothered sections that would have held open yesterday and wed. at the same little part of the beach. It was still enjoyable to take off into a few meatier, girthier, chunkified bands of long-distance wave energy. The small windswell in the water kept things semi-interesting during the lulls between sets.. south swell is "in the hiz".. but.. it's kind-of hiding and scrawny and meek.

Lerm reports that OB was ridiculously glassy at around 6:25.. but he couldn't really see the lineup through the thick fog. He also reports that waves looked miniscule..

soo.. just the strait digs this morning.. i can't immediately think of anything scandalous or strange or repugnant or mischeivous to report.. soo.. good luck finding waves.. Blakestah mentioned yesterday that the south swell is swinging to even a more southerly angle as it continues.. soo.. that doesn't bode well for our bay-area swell window.. which i think hovers around 203 degrees from the south and about 320 from the north?? anyone know exact numbers?

schweeet..

bbr sent a few pics of his chili trip.. one word... DAAAmmnnn!!

chili sauce

north santa cruz county

I surfed this wave and got both obliterated and deeply shacked.. anyone guess it?