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Here are a few shots of the W-NW swell that hit on Sunday Feb 28th. It was pretty super-size comboing up with a 6’ high tide…which made for some interesting beach scenes.
These first 2 are screen grabs from the HB city camera…
Here are a few that I shot down at Newport Pier…right before a wave jumped the breakwall and sent my 4 year old scampering into the middle of the street.
And here are a few of Seal Beach from blog reader Joshua…
And finally there was a bunch of other chaos up in Seal where waves were washing over the berms and flooding the parking lot. Check out this slideshow over on Foamez.com’s What the Blank??? blog.
Hey Gang…a good friend of mine helps run www.Saveourbeach.org, (a non-profit dedicated to improving the water quality along the Southern California coastline,)…and she has a beach clean-up set for Seal Beach on Friday (June 19th). Since we like clean beaches I thought I would pass it on…but even better, this clean-up is sponsored by Vans Shoes and it sounds like the first 100 people to the beach get free-shirts, some other giveaways, and coffee & bagels (hmmm bagels).
If you guys are free on Friday, and in the Seal Beach area, try and stop by.
Here are the details
This Friday, June 19th from 9am-noon Vans will be celebrating National Oceans Month & kicking off the US Open of Surfing by rolling up our sleeves & giving Seal Beach, CA a good cleaning. We'll have fun Vans giveaways for volunteers and coffee & bagels, too.
No need to bring anything. Vans will supply trash bags, gloves, hats and t-shirts. Just show up at 1st & Ocean Ave in Seal Beach. Sign in at the blue tent, by the Windsurfing Rigging Area on the left as you enter the parking lot. No parking passes necessary from 9 to noon. If you need more info hit up twitter.com/vans_66.
DIRECTIONS: Katella Ave or 405 freeway to Seal Beach Blvd Turn left onto SB Blvd to Pacific Coast Hwy Turn right onto PCH to 1st Street Turn left onto 1st Street til it ends into a parking lot Pull into parking lot and park
Seal Beach is the northernmost beach in Orange County…the last OC beach before you move north into Long Beach and LA County.
Seal Beach is bracketed by 2 large jetties. To the north you have the breakwater separating the outflow of the San Gabriel Rivermouth from Alamitos Bay. To the south you have a large jetty that separates Seal Beach from the Naval Special Weapons station.
The length, shape and orientation of these jetties actually play a large role in the size and shape of the surf throughout the beach. There are also 2 small jetties that help influence the beach…one is the south breakwater of the San Gabriel river, (which is considerable shorter than the north breakwater), and a short barrier wall that extends part of the length of the Seal Beach Pier.
There are 4 distinct surf areas throughout Seal Beach:
San Gabriel River Mouth (aka Ray Bay) The San Gabriel river mouth is one of those spots that when it turns on it can be great, but most of the time it doesn’t really work all that well. Add in the fact that you have high levels of pollution and bacteria (and probably the occasional dead body) moving out of the river and you can see why it doesn’t get much press. If that wasn’t enough there are also a shitload of stingrays that hang out in the sand underneath the sections of the wave that break in the river-outflow…they like the warmer than usual water and the other nastiness that floats down the river.
That being said there are times when the river can become magical. S swells, particularly shorter-period S swells like the ones produced by hurricanes, can connect waves from the sandbar way up along the north jetty and line up a long right section through to the inside. On the right swell it is one of the longest waves in North OC.
Before you get to excited realize that this wave is pretty fickle, tide & wind sensitive, and if the sand is wrong it won’t connect all that well. A good rule of thumb for getting waves at this spot is to check it when the S swell is too big to ride at other spots.
Spot details: Best swell direction: SE-S (160-190 degrees) Best Wind: N-NE-E, light-moderate Santa Ana winds are the best. Sea Floor: Sand…and a ton of stingrays. Best Season: Late summer through Fall Crowds: On the right swell they come out of the woodwork.
Seal Beach Pier: North Side North of the pier is sort of an average spot. Most of the year the surf near the pier is on the small side which keeps a lot of longboards in the lineup, and makes it a decent beginner spot. As you start to get a bit more swell in the water you start to see a couple of shifty peaks develop just to the north of the pier…these sort of die out as you move further north (and closer to the river).
Generally the best swell mix for this side of the pier is a west swell with a little something extra to cross it up (either some windswell or a bit of S swell). It takes a lot of swell to get this place really pumping which makes it a decent fallback spot if the swell is getting to big in some of the other areas.
Spot details: Best swell direction: W (260-280 degrees) Best Wind: N-NE-E, light-moderate Santa Ana winds are the best. Sea Floor: Sand Best Season: Late Fall through early Spring Crowds: Average most of the time…gets heavy when other spots are too big.
Seal Beach Pier: South Side Most times the south side is a bodyboard spot…but occasionally it turns into dumpy hollow shorebreak wave that, when it is really working, will occasionally toss up a rideable section to trick someone into paddling out on a surfboard.
The spot works best on large W swells. When it starts working you have some pretty decent looking peaks that set up close to the pier and break almost on the sand on the inside. A lot of this is due to the shape of the seafloor and thanks to swell reflection off of the breakwall under the pier (and the bigger jetty to the south). These little wedgers can throw some solid barrels on the right tides.
Since it takes a lot of swell it doesn’t really break all that often but when it does expect a large crowd in the water. The location next to the jetty helps to block out a lot of the wind and it can stay rideable even in stormy conditions. Again this is a much better wave for a skilled bodyboarder…but it can be surfable under the right scenario.
Spot details: Best swell direction: W (260-280 degrees) Best Wind: N-NE-E, light-moderate Santa Ana winds are the best. Sea Floor: Sand Best Season: Late Fall through early Spring Crowds: Average when working…and then gets really heavy as the swell gets bigger.
Seal Beach Cloudbreak One of the few “big wave” spots in Orange County...though calling it a big wave spot is sort of a misnomer. It can get very big on the right swell but you never really see the hyper-critical section that you would normally associate with a “big wave” spot like Jaws, Mavericks, or Todos. Cloudbreak is sort of like a big wave that has had its teeth removed.
Now don’t get me wrong there is a lot of water moving around out there and it is very easy to get into surf that is well past most people’s comfort zone. It doesn’t really start breaking until the wave is already double-overhead+ and it doesn’t get good until it is much bigger than that. Before attempting to surf it you want to make sure you have a high surf skill level, great paddling/swimming endurance, the right equipment, and a buddy or two to watch your back in the lineup.
The wave itself is a large peak generated in part by long-period swell refracting in from deep water and a bit of reflection off the south jetty. As you can see in the picture the wave sets up a loooong ways from shore…so you can expect a long paddle from the beach and to be sitting in some deep water once you get outside. The spot needs a large, long-period WNW-W swell, and a very low tide to really start to work. Winds need to be almost nonexistent or light-moderate offshore…it gets blown out really fast because it is so exposed. Occasionally you can see some guys towing-in with jet skies when it is really big, but the lifeguards shut it down pretty quick if there are paddle-in surfers in the lineup.
Spot details: Best swell direction: LARGE, long-period, WNW-W swell (270-280 degrees) Best Wind: N-NE-E, light-moderate Santa Ana winds are the best. Sea Floor: Sand…but you are really screwed if you find the bottom. Best Season: Late Fall through Winter Crowds: Can be crowded when it works…naturally it gets smaller as the waves get bigger.
Finally here is some video footage that is found on youtube...(sorry if the music sucks)
