Surf for the weekend – Tropical swell, S swell, and windswell…yea for waves!

The tropical SE swell from Elida finally started to fill in a bit more on Friday…I actually caught a few waves in Newport throughout the day…surfed about 10:30 and there were some shoulder high sets…by 2:30pm there were a few shoulder-head high sets through the river jetties…maybe a few bigger ones. Shape wasn’t that great, it was lined up and closing out on most of them, with crumbly texture as well. The water was nice and warm though so it was definitely better than sitting at a desk. Not sure if the swell made it into any other beaches at this point…so if you saw some waves in the other counties drop me an email or a comment. Here is a shot of the Dana Point Buoy…check out the 10-second energy.



Anyway on to the weekend.

We are going to have plenty of surf this weekend…both Saturday and Sunday will be surf days.

We are going to see a mix of building S swell (170-190), SE tropical swell from Elida (which may die out by Saturday evening), and the persistent background NW windswell.

Saturday will start slow overall except for areas that have some tropical swell showing already.

As the new S swell fills in through the day and into the afternoon most breaks without S exposure will be in the waist-high range. Spots with exposure to the S swell will be in the chest-shoulder high range. Good S facing beaches will be in the shoulder-head high+ range, while the standout breaks, mostly in Orange County and parts of Northern San Diego, see head-high to overhead+ surf with sets going a could of feet overhead at times as the swell starts to peak later Saturday evening and into Sunday. (I would expect a lot of this swell to hold into Monday as well).

Winds are forecast to be light through the mornings and only moderate for the afternoons. If it follows a similar pattern to the last couple of days we have even seen some clean-up in shape late in the day as we head toward dusk.

This swell will be worth driving around for…and you may have to hunt around to find some decent shape. Right now it looks like we are going to see a lot of walled up beach breaks in the top areas as well as a lot of S-to-N current to fight with. I think the best shape will be at the points and reefs that pick up the S swell…it will hold the waves better and will be less of a constant paddle. If you have to surf the beach break look for jetty, pier, rock, or really big-ass sandbar to help break it up.

Have fun this weekend...I will probably be posting some sort of update so check back if you get some computer time.