Jump

Huge jump in the swell from today through to tomorrow. You kind of wonder if it's going to arrive as a single, giant set from nothing because it really is totally flat out there.

[Thanks to the Hurley Surf iPhone app for the forecast and picture via Coastalwatch.com]

Contrasts

One weekend up in the mountains. Following weekend surfing turquoise waters in a 2mm wetsuit. It was a fortnight of contrasts.

Gnarled tree on the slopes

Mark tail grabbing in the park

Crystal rights 

Only two out

Lined up

Insanely clear water

Deceptive

The wind had been howling a steady Southerly overnight and into the morning, doing its best to rip sideways into the belly of a fairly solid 4-5ft swell. We had planned to go for the early but this combination of conditions doesn't bode well for anywhere aside from a few sheltered corners. Spots that would be packed to the edge as everyone else had the same idea.

As the wind swung around to SSW in the afternoon, opening up options, we headed down to have a look. Under a leaden sky the sets were crumbling in, throwing outwards on a shallower bank in the middle, but otherwise still suffering from wobble and sickness from the day's earlier wind. I opted out. Marcus opted in.

It looked like hard work but as the sun touched down on the horizon, clearing the clouds to touch the tops of the waves, and the wind dropped for a moment, there was a brief twenty minutes when it looked worthy of a paddle. Snapped off a few shots but with the light waning and Marcus periodically coming up the beach to tell me how much seawater was getting pushed into his lungs, there wasn't time to make the most of this interlude.

Photos are from this small window and make it look far, far better than it actually was. For the lucky few who were out at the time they had just five or six out and it largely to themselves. Mind you, it is a deception as it would have been preceded by a few hours of lumpy frustration. Though sometimes that's what makes a session all the better.

It was like this for a magic 20 minute window

Lefts were the pick	Paddle out	Outside
Scratching	Lots of white water	Heavy inside bank
Setting a line	Looking up	Nice lefts
The odd cover up	Rooster tail catching the sun	In the thick of it

Bolder

I don't have a new lens, I didn't commando crawl along the sand to creep up on the bird; and yet the detail in the shot is enough to see the fine brush strokes of small, water tight feathers crowning the head and neck. The bird was close, but a few feet away. Either this is a new intimidation tactic or he's getting much, much bolder. I'll be sleeping with one eye open from now on.

Northern Hemisphere

Saw this video (link originally courtesy of my good mate Howard at Fisher-Viking; his blog is an excellent read by the way).

"Uncommon Ideals", vid. below, is definitely worth a watch. For those that have had the pleasure of surfing in the Northern Hemisphere in anything other than the Summer months it does a spookily accurate job of capturing the experience without getting too scientific about water temperatures and wind chill.

For those with an aversion to art, or who have been raised on a strict diet of early years Taylor Steele videos, a pre-warning; it includes poetry. Though also surfing. You can always turn the sound down if it offends thee and thy disposition.


Uncommon Ideals. from Doggerland. on Vimeo.

Overhead for the Groms

[UPDATE - pictures from this morning added]

Report called it 1ft but it was definitely pushing +2ft (shoulder high) on the sets. Overhead for the groms who seem to be out in force today. Someone must've left a gate open overnight.

Had some incredibly fun lefts and rights with the odd cover up as the walls refracted into small bowls. The banks are perfect at the moment. Looking forward to when the mid-sized swell hits on Tuesday.

The final nuance to the session (and what really made it) where the two whales that strayed into the bay and popped up about 100m out from the beach. Even from that distance they looked huge and the line up sub-consciously paddled outwards en masse in a unified welcome party. It kept the mood just the right side of amiable. At least for a while. As the consistency dropped the good vibes halo effect of the whales faded and the crowd got a little hassly. Including a heinous drop in by my good self on Marcus. I swear he was going right. This bring the score to approximately even. Not that I'm keeping track or anything.

In other nature news I became some kind of landing satellite / docking station for a series of swimming crabs. Small (about the size of your thumbnail), round, and dark grey like a matte ball bearing. They seemed to enjoy hanging around for a while and crawling up my back. At least until I started to get a "The Mummy Returns" flashback and thought they might be trying to find a way to burrow into my skin. Decided to gently moved them on rather than deal with my irrational fear.

Pics. from the trip to the Maldives last week are in progress. As is a video for full motion viewing. Updates on this sometime soon.

Getting artistic with the iPhone	Refraction was doing its thing	Turquoise walls are back
Hack!	The nemesis has bought in some commando style reinforcements	Sliding
THere were a few of these today (mostly on the lefts....quietly claiming one of those)	Freight wasn't deterring the whales	Being under 40kgs means you can do stuff like this on next to nothing
This wee fella' was making mincemeat of the small waves	Down the corner - less consistent but some nice ones rolling through	These are the ones most people were looking out for

Give me Sunshine [for the very squeamish amongst you, look away now]

Had a suspect mole removed from my arm last week leaving an inch long cut and 3 stitches behind with a slice of muscle gone (this I can ill afford) and two weeks stuck on dry land. The advice to avoid the ball of continuous atomic reaction, or at least apply a heavy zinc coating to shield you from it, is worth considering.

Blighty

Back in the UK for a week and true to form it is absolutely pissing it down. Grey, overcast, wet, cold. But the scenery is stunning. I'd forgotten how the patchwork quilt of greens divide the land into neat little parcels that somehow soften the hills and seem to accentuate a level of calm and wildness even though these divisions demonstrate about as much taming of the landscape as you can possibly get.

Plenty of surf tomorrow but strong onshore winds with it so it's fairly low quality wind swell. Needless to say, we'll still go in.

Spooked

Grey and overcast with leaden heavy skies that dipped down to the horizon. Brisk offshores that pulled a chunk off the top of the wave and created that characteristic long hiss after the wave had ominously rumbled past. Buckets of rain that turned the water a dark grey-green. A straight-in swell with lots of power driving strong rips and a light, rippling chop to an otherwise flawless ocean. And a dead calmness of manageable sets between sneakers that spun in at least twice the size of the in-betweeners.

This combination of conditions almost exactly matched an experience I had several years back (pushing 20 years back now) where I had the distinctly unpleasant experience of being held as an underwater hostage for two waves at a lesser known spot in North Wales. The only variation to the above was the water temperature which hung at a frigid 6 degrees C. It would be too dramatic to say I almost drowned but I was certainly seeing spots and clawing for an ocean's surface that never seemed to come.

This memory did it's own clawing in my psyche and conspired to leave me standing on the beach whilst Marcus went out to do battle with the hefty surf. Strange thing was that it was definitely much smaller than the swell of a couple of weeks ago but on that day the sun was shining, the water sparkled with a turquoise blue and everything seemed much friendlier. Such is the way of these strange fears we hold hidden away.

Three weeks ago. Sun's shining. In like a shot.

Last Saturday. Ominous. Watched from the beach.

Nemesis

Anyone who read the post Mexican Stand Off a few weeks back will have noted the somewhat creepy stare down from one of the beach locals. Seeing it once was just an interesting observation. Today he was back and stationed at the North end of the beach to try a new tactic, the low swoop into air brake and skate over the top of the head routine. Adding a perfectly pitched and timed screech on the upswing to maximise effect. I think diplomats would call this an escalation.

Artsy

Get a camera, buy some lenses, take a few photos. Eventually you're going to wonder what you might do in a less high definition, super saturated colour world. No apologies for these early attempts at a delve into the murky world of black and white. They're definitely not Ansel Adams - keep those expectations low.

Airbrushed

Great day for photos with a really flat light and plenty of waves. Not everyone got it right though; have a look at the wipe out photo and follow the leash. Yup, he's in there somewhere. And yes, he did get tumbled over the lip and enjoy that moment of weightlessness before being smashed about like a potato in a sack.

Today was even better than yesterday with the swell kicking up a notch to 3ft and with offshore winds adding a bit more shape and lip. Headed back to the same bank just South of the flags, dodging close out explosions on the inside to scoot to the line-up just in time for a few rights and lefts. The odd 4ft+ rouge set kept it interesting though generally they were one wave sneak ins that cleaned up the line up without causing too much damage.

Rain has settled in now though bringing onshore Sou-easters with it so a chance to take a few warm baths and soak out the knots after staying in far longer than was sensible both yesterday and today. New wetsuit is working perfectly (in case anyone was interested).

Am thinking about investing in some new lenses as pictures seem to be losing a bit of crispness on the longer end of the zoom. It is a 20 year old lens though so it's probably about time to think about an upgrade. Any suggestions let me know.

The rights were the pick today.	Knee boarder (they still exist), racing	Concentration
Follow the leash...	Claiming	It's all about timing
	Looked even bigger when the groms got into it

Laden

The huge swell on Wednesday managed to rip up most of the seaweed sitting off the rocks at the North end. It most likely borrowed quite a bit of it from coastal areas both North and South of here too. It left the right-handers rolling into the bay with a distinct cookies and cream look. Just a little bit heavier and probably more on the salty side of sweet.

Most people seemed to be giving these ones a miss or kicking out before the inside. Not surprising. When the Summer ends and the first Autumn storms roll through the seaweed sheds even heavier than this. Paddling through it turns your leash into some kind of purse seine net that grabs as much junk as it can. Either way, it leaves you in the distinctly uncomfortable unpleasantness of being stuck in a shore break with what feels like a hundred tentacles grabbing at your arms and legs (medium sized not giant tentacles but nevertheless) and what feels like the inert body of a 100kg wrestler attached to your leash. It takes a steely constitution to consider getting yourself stuck int his position more than once.

Looks inviting..	...until it turns into this. Cookies and cream look.
Another one rolls in through the seaweed	A tiny one laden with seaweed.