My Chin Won't Dry (Rachel's Point & HMB Jetty)

Last night I had the surf posse over for a fun evening of pizza and surf porn (Modern Collective, Scratching the Surface, and the classic Endless Summer). This morning the plan was to meet up at Rachel's Point for a surf check. I arrived first and to me, it looked marginal. The break was sheltered from the steady breeze and the waves were overhead (shoulder-high in Luke's wildly inaccurate estimation from the clifftop), but mushy with short shoulders that seemed to peter out quickly. When the gang arrived, my judgment was overruled, and I'm glad of it.

Luke, J-Bird, Jacob, Chris and I were joined by Dugen and Kyle, who sadly broke his only board in half on a heavy day at Dunes last week, and we were the only ones out. Everyone was on a longboard except me and Chris, but the slightly smaller inside peak was working just fine for us, and it had a more consistent take-off zone. With my chin cut glued together only yesterday, I did my best to follow the doctor's instructions to avoid prolonged submersion. Even with an easy channel paddle out, the heavy surface chop made it difficult to keep my chin dry.

Chris, Jacob, J-Bird, Luke and Kyle

As always, Rachel's required that I set fear aside and get close to the peak if I wanted to ride any waves. Fortunately, that's getting easier to do, and the wave wasn't pitching as much as during previous sessions. I got a bunch of fast, pretty long rides with fun drops, all lefts. The chop made it interesting, The first time I encountered a mogul as I made the drop, it threw me off. But the next time I rode over one hump in the face, then another, and another, like surfing down stairs. Chris saw it from the front and said it looked pretty wild. Stoked!

It's interesting how differently surfers can experience the same session. Luke had a couple of bad holddowns, and J-Bird got skunked (read her report here), but I had a blast! It was the best of my surf sessions this weekend. Jacob also got some nice rides, from the outside. I followed J-Bird in to check on Luke, who'd gone to sit on the beach after a nasty wipeout, and could've gone back out for more.

We drove in our wetsuits to the Jetty for a second session, since J-Bird needed to get some waves. It was windier and of course much smaller there, with a little crowd on the cleanest peak near the rock jetty. I caught a few anti-climatic closeouts and called it a day, still basking in the stoke from Rachel's Point. Good waves, good fun, good friends, good weekend!

Surfline: We have a mix of old WNW (270-295) swell mixing with a dose of S (180-190+) energy for generally smaller surf today. Shoulder-head high waves are common, while standouts go slightly overhead on the best sets. Breezy northerly flow adds some weird side/offshore bump/texture to most areas (N wind protected spots stay much cleaner). Buoy 46012: (Wave) SWELL: 7.5 ft at 11.4 s W 12 / 5.9 ft at 11.4 s WNW 11 / WIND WAVE: 5.2 ft at 6.7 s NW / WVHT: 9.2 ft / APD: 7.0 s / MWD: 278° (Met) WSPD: 17 kts / GST: 21 kts / WVHT: 9.2 ft / DPD: 14.0 s / WDIR: 320° / ATMP: 53.6° F / WTMP: 53.1° F. Tide: 3.5' rising to 4.5' high then falling to 4'.