Turkey Day Surf – Clean and holding…with a new NW swell out the back

Thanksgiving will be a marginal surf day…the swell is still a little steeply angled to put many waves at the “average spots”…expect nice conditions but mostly slow inconsistent surf.

In the water we are going to have a mix of holding NW energy (290-300), some background SW swell (200-220) and some local NW windswell.



Average spots are going to see knee-waist high surf through the morning on Thursday. Most of it will be soft and slow, breaking close to shore if your spot can’t handle the tide swings. The better NW facing spots will be more in the waist-high range with some inconsistent chest high sets…again a little soft on the higher tides.

The NW facing standouts in South Ventura, the South Bay, and parts of Central/Southern San Diego, will see consistent waist-chest high+ surf with some shoulder high+ sets mixing in at times. Again plan on slower shape with long waits between the bigger waves through the morning.

Later in the afternoon the new long-period WNW-NW swell (280-300) will start to arrive, showing mostly in the Northerly counties (Santa Barbara, Ventura) before the sun sets. I don’t expect a ton of new size, even in those areas, but there may be some bigger waves pushing through into the indicator spots by late in the day. The rest of Socal may see a bit of an increase in wave-consistency…but not much size until the swell fills in later in the evening.

Winds look good…mostly light and variable to light offshore in the morning. Look for building WNW-NW winds around 10-15 knots for the afternoon.



So the smaller surf will continue on Thursday morning…keeping things slow and soft…but rideable if you have the right equipment (longboards for most people…and maybe some of those retro-fish if you are a lighter surfer). It is the holiday…so expect a crowd pretty much anywhere there are semi-rideable waves. Keep an eye on the NW spots…there is always a chance that we will have a few sneaker sets at those good breaks by the end of the day. Personally I might take out the old ugly stick, surf with the fam, and then go into some sort of turkey coma by the afternoon.

Here are the tides…have a great holiday guys!

11/26/2009 Thursday
04:49AM LST 4.5 H
11:32AM LST 1.8 L
04:50PM LST 3.4 H
10:41PM LST 1.4 L

Turkey Day Surf - A little sloppy with a high chance of afternoon coma

The surf isn't looking so good for Thursday. It will be rideable but there will still be some rain, some wind, and some nasty water quality to contend with.

In the water we are going to have a mix of WNW windswell/storm swell, some S swell (180-190), and some steeper NW swell hanging in the background.

Most spots will see some waist-chest high sets while the standout W facing breaks as well as the top combo spots, mostly through San Diego, see some shoulder high+ faces on the lower tides.

Kaser you can skip this part - Winds are looking light...but with consistent onshore flow out of the W around 5-knots through the morning. Afternoon winds pick up out of the WNW around 10-12+ knots. Periods of rain showers will continue to push through throughout the day as well. Check out the NWS winds for tomorrow morning.



Overall it looks like Thursday is going to be a bit sloppy...not totally blown out...but not clean either. Most spots are going to see semi-mushy/gutless crossed up peaks with short swell periods. Occasionally there may be a little punchier set if your spot has S facing exposure. The SD top spots look bigger and bit more consistent than other areas but the winds look stronger down there as well. You will also have water quality to worry about it...It dumped some rain at my place last night and I expect that was the case in most areas...water quality is going to be pretty poopy for the next couple of days until the bacteria counts start to drop. All in all it might be good to take it easy tomorrow...or at bare minimum try and avoid areas with heavy runoff.

Here are the tides

01:38AM LST 2.3 L
07:49AM LST 6.0 H
03:21PM LST -0.5 L
09:47PM LST 3.5 H

Happy early Thanksgiving! (man I am fired up for Turkey)...just an FYI - I will be skipping the forecast tomorrow so I can hang with the family and go into a turkey coma during the afternoon while watching football (which = awesome). I will be back at it on Friday.

Have a great one you guys!