Eastside Manners (38th Ave)

I had a small hope of surfing closer to home today, but Manabu's timely report sent me south again. The Surfline cams were clear earlier but the fog had rolled in by the time I reached the beach. I checked Capitola first, just because I like the break, but it was teeny tiny with a clot of surfers chasing almost nothing. The Hook seemed fun but crowded (of course), and what I could see of nearby 38th looked smaller but enchantingly almost empty.

The lack of crowd was an illusion of the fog. When I paddled out, I found there were a lot more surfers in the water than I'd been able to see from the bluff top. Still, I found my space on an inside edge, and got some fine rides. Surfline wasn't kidding, though, when it said the Eastside surf was inconsistent. Patience was required to score those sweet rides.

 

I was pleasantly surprised that the vibe was much different from yesterday's on the Westside. I heard a few surfers apologizing for dropping in or getting in the way, and receiving not a verbal thrashing but a smile and "don't worry about it." When I inadvertently dropped in on and actually collided with a longboarder (on a final check over my shoulder, I could swear I'd seen him backing off), my "So sorry, dude! Is your board okay?" was met with complete silence as he paddled off. (It's a testament to the durability of Arrow's epoxy that Magic was also unscathed.) Party waves were cheerfully accepted, people were hooting strangers into waves, and folks seemed friendly and happy to be on the water on what became a sunny Sunday. Then a garbage truck woman arrived; after snaking me and then complaining that I'd dropped in on her, she deliberately went left on another right in order to narrowly miss clipping the front of my board. By then I was about done anyway, after another nearly 2.5 hour session, so I moved away from her and caught another nice ride in close to the beach. My paddling muscles ache after so much water time this weekend, but the stoke goes on!

Surfline: Mix of a decent size/holding NW windswell and minor/easing SW groundswell. Clean and looking pretty fun for a big board. Expect inconsistent, workable lines to waist high that will slow down as the tide fills back in. Buoy 46012: 8.5 ft @ 10 sec.