Surf for Monday – Windswell, WNW energy, and maybe a small morning window

If you look at the whole day, Monday isn’t looking like much of a surf day...but there may be a little wiggle-room in the morning.

In the water we are going to have a mix of steady and still pretty strong NW windswell, some medium period WNW-NW swell (285-300) that moves in slowly throughout the day, and some background SW energy.



Most average WNW facing breaks are going to see surf in the waist-chest high range...but with a few bigger sets at the spots that do better on the short-period swells. Top NW facing breaks will be in the chest-head high range with a few bigger sets mixing in through the better parts of the tide. Most of the bigger sizes will be at the NW windswell standouts in San Diego, but the better NW areas in Ventura and the South Bay will have some bigger sizes as well.

Winds are where things look a little funky. The general wind for tomorrow will be onshore, with plenty of NW winds continuing to follow in behind the departing cold front that battered us all weekend. We may see a little surf window in the morning…particularly if our air-temps get really cold tonight. If it gets cold enough we may see a bit of a land-breeze form up, which would keep shape at least sort of rideable in the semi-protected areas for the morning. Check out the COAMPS…they are showing a bit of that instability/land-breeze in the forecast model.



So overall I am not expecting it to be very clean, or that fun on Monday…while there might be some lumpy, but not totally blown out peaks in the morning, it won’t last long. Eventually the winds will turn onshore out of the WNW-NW around 10-20 knots and tear up shape all over by the middle of the day. Really, between the questionable clean and the continuingly poor water quality, you probably shouldn’t waste a lot of time on the surf for Monday…but if poo-water doesn’t bother you, and you live close-by, you might give your windswell spot a quick drive-by or at least a fast morning cam check.

Here are the tides…have a good week!

12/14/2009 Monday
12:41AM LST 2.2 L
06:55AM LST 6.0 H
02:26PM LST -0.9 L
08:51PM LST 3.6 H

Rain and Wind for the Weekend – Looking Nasty

This won’t be much of a surf weekend…the weather will be pretty lame and onshore winds are going to kill it on Sunday.

Hey I wanted to say thanks to you guys for filling out the survey…I am getting a lot of good responses…I will probably close it down on Sunday (so I can get the after action stuff done early next week)…If you haven’t responded yet, here is the link

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/BGTYQRC

Ok back to the surf….In the water on Saturday we are going to have slowly fading WNW energy, mostly leftovers from earlier in the week but with a mix of other medium period energy from fronts following that bigger one…in general it will be smaller though. We will also have a mix of building S-SW windswell moving in with the front.



On Saturday look for wave heights to hold around waist-chest high+ at the average WNW facing breaks. Top spots will be in the chest-head high range with a few inconsistent bigger sets lurking around out there.

Conditions look pretty lame…S-SW winds around 10-15 knots are expected to hold throughout the day and then strengthen up to about 15-20 knots by the afternoon. Rain, clouds, and other nastiness will push through all day.

One thing worth noting is that the S winds don’t totally blow out every spot…so there may be a little surf-wiggle-room during the dawn patrol. If you don’t mind the rain, you might want to give the S protected spots a look, particularly if they like the windswell combo stuff we have in the water for Saturday morning.



On Sunday the windswell builds back up, but so do the onshore winds, so it doesn’t look very surfable.



Wave heights will start off similar to Saturday but I expect chundery mess of WNW slop moving in later in the day as the W-NW winds top out around 20 knots.

Basically at this point…with the onshore W winds in the forecast…I think Sunday will be a write-off.



So not super exciting this weekend…I would just keep a weather eye on the protected spots on Saturday, but other than that we can expect more rain and onshore wind. Stay dry and have a good one.

Here are the tides…

12/12/2009 Saturday
05:41AM LST 5.9 H
01:04PM LST -0.3 L
07:15PM LST 3.5 H

12/13/2009 Sunday
12:00AM LST 2.0 L
06:19AM LST 6.0 H
01:47PM LST -0.7 L
08:07PM LST 3.6 H

Friday’s Funkiness – Building windswell

Friday won’t be a surf day…it may be rideable in a few spots, but high morning tides and building onshore winds will kill shape pretty fast. Oh and it is Friday the 13th…so that sort of narrows down our odds on dodging the wind bullet.



Our surf will be a mix of building WNW-NW windswell and some background SW energy (200-220). The windswell will be on the rise through the day…but will mostly be coming in from a steep swell angle, so it will skip past most breaks basically showing in a few of the top NW facing areas. The lesser exposed spots will see a slight bump in size but won’t see much change overall.



Look for the average spots to hold around knee high with some inconsistent waist high sets as the tide drops. Top NW facing spots in Ventura, the south Bay, and San Diego, will be more in the waist-chest high range on the lower tides…and may see some chest-shoulder high sets by the afternoon as the swell mix increases.

Winds look semi-manageable for the morning…with light/variable onshore flow in the 5-6 knot range on tap for most of SoCal. Santa Barbara and Ventura areas will see building NW winds 10-15 knots coming through by midmorning and then gusts hitting 20-knots by midday. The rest of Socal will have 10-15 knot NW winds by the afternoon and some stronger gusts coming onshore by sundown and into the early night.



Like I said…it won’t be very appealing out there on Friday…just mostly weak, tide swamped windswell for the morning…with slightly larger and sloppier windswell on tape for the afternoon. Your best bet is going to be keeping an eye on conditions and hoping that we see the tide drop before the winds get going...there may be a little wiggle-room in the timing of the wind switch, particularly at spots in OC/SD…but I wouldn’t plan you day around it. Even if the winds cooperate plan on brining your small, really small, wave gear for most spots.

Here are the tides…

11/13/2009 Friday
06:12AM LST 5.9
H 01:04PM LST 0.1
L 06:59PM LST 4.1 H

Links for the regional forecasts…

Santa Barbara - http://socalforecastsb.blogspot.com/
Ventura - http://socalforecastven.blogspot.com/
Los Angeles - http://socalforecastla.blogspot.com/
Orange County - http://socalforecastoc.blogspot.com/
San Diego - http://socalforecastsd.blogspot.com/

Waves for Wednesday – mid-week mess

Wednesday is not looking like a surf day.

We will actually have a mix of new swell hitting on Wednesday but coastal winds are going to be pretty unstable (aka…bad) thanks to a passing cold front. In the water we are going to have a mix of early weak leftovers, new S-SW swell (190-210), and building WNW-NW energy (285-300) in the form of medium period swell along with increasing local windswell.



Wave heights are going hold in the waist-chest high range for many of the avereage exposed spots. Standout S-SW facing breaks, good NW windswell spots, and the top combo spots, will be in the chest-shoulder high range…and I wouldn’t be surprised to see some bigger sets mixing in on the lower tides.

Unfortunately shape doesn’t look great…onshore winds are expected to continue blowing overnight and will likely set up a funky eddy in the morning. At this point it looks like onshore W winds around 5-10 knots blowing through most of Santa Barbara, Ventura, and Los Angeles counties. Orange County and San Diego will be more SW’erly…and a touch lighter…more 5-8 knots through the early mornign. Onshore flow is expected to increase out of the W around 12-18 knots by the afternoon. I am posting the early morning COAMPS model below…but I think that it is being a bit optimistic on the slight side/offshore flow that it is showing along the coast…chances are that even if winds switch around for an hour+ in the mornign it won’t be enough to groom out the bump set up by tonights winds.



I don’t think that it will be worth investing much time in the surf tomorrow…mostly because of the wind. I definitely wouldn’t plan on driving very far to check it. I would however give it a quick look (if you live close) or a quick cam-check (if you don’t live close)…just to see how the winds unroll tonight…we might see some small pockets of surfyness at the more protected spots.

Here are the tides…

01:51AM LDT 0.5 L
08:05AM LDT 4.5 H
01:53PM LDT 1.7 L
07:39PM LDT 5.0 H