Third Time's the Charm (Waddell)

This morning our little surf posse formed up in Half Moon Bay and we drove in caravan down Highway 1: Luke in his big truck, just-arrived-yesterday East Coast transplants J-Bird and Jacob, me and Scott, and Nikki in her new Subaru. We checked Tres Rocas and Gazos Creek (not necessarily in that order), but neither was tempting and they had some nasty shorepound. Continuing south, Luke pulled over just before the Waddell parking lot, where some tasty waves were breaking beside the road. We suited up, clambered down the boulders armoring the highway, and hit the water on a hot sunny day at the start of Autumn.

The only crowd was us.

Nikki, Luke and J-Bird

For a change Waddell was good to me. Quite good, in fact. It was a bit lully which let me get to the outside without much difficulty. The waves were shoulder- to head-high with decent form, and I rode a bunch of nice lefts. Stokeful! A good time was had by all.

Tyler was already in the water on his orange shortboard when we paddled out. Luke swapped boards with him for a bit but didn't get much joy, and went back to his Strive. I was trying out my brand new Pentax Optio W90 waterproof camera (replacing the flooded W80), but sadly, video of one of Luke's good rides fell victim to operator error, stop/start mixup due to difficulty reading the LCD screen in sunlight. (Sorry, buddy. Next time.)

Surfline: Building new NW groundswell set up head high to overhead surf at well exposed spots, while other areas saw a smaller share of that swell along with a minor mix of NW windswell and trace SW groundswell. Buoy 46012: (Wave) SWELL: 4.6 ft at 12.1 s NW / WIND WAVE: 2.3 ft at 5.3 s NW / WVHT: 5.2 ft / APD: 6.8 s / MWD: 318°