crowds

Up early and out after some fooling around, but still early enough to beat the worst of the crowd. Waves were shifty, small and the tide was doing a number on them but the morning was beautiful and I sat away from from a pocket of people enjoying myself. The regular pod of dolphins was doing it's thing out the back and they began moving in towards the rip I was sitting next to, one shot under me and then I was utterly surrounded (and letting a few good ones slip by out of pure amazement.) They were swimming slowly by either side of me, the board was getting buffeted by their wake, I could have quite easily reached out and touched a few and one quite calmly eyeballed me as he came up out of the water. 10 seconds or so of serious crowding as they passed and that was it. Never had them within an arm's reach before and felt terrible as they headed off as 'Wow, those dorsal fins really do look like a Greenough with bit more tip' was one of the first things through my mind. Even managed to slide a few waves and put it on a rail once in a while. A really good day all told.

Being nice to marine mammals is a good thing- if you have kids or dig origami, check Peggy Oki's project here:
http://www.peggy-oki.com/cu_origami.html

Thanks

Waves, creeks, rocks, wind and fog

And so the central Cal trip went. Solid surf, serious afternoon winds and pretty incredible weather. Surfed all the spots I could and did well, pretty much head high or better the whole way. A few spots were just too punishing to bother with, a few were an incredible amount of fun and I had the widowmaker so I was at least prepared. I surfed by myself most all of the time but those that I did encounter in the water and parking lots were all good people. South of Sur was the mellowist so made for a good warmup, the creeks in the Sur were gorgeous, one would be unridable and the next somehow working (if only for a short while), missed the Carmel beachie which I'm determined to get good one day, Santa Cruz was firing but too crowded for my blood, a jetty north of there had some crisp rights and still further north a blown out but working beachie haded me a couple of good left drops. The creeks in Whitey's turf looked pretty rocking but the paddle out alone was not working for me and it all culminated with Ocean Beach being a manageable size so the paddle out was only gruelling not impossible. Visited with the fine folks at Mollusk Surf Shop who deserve your good attentions and as I left the shop on the way out of town I ran into Manny Caro who was an utterly nice guy. I took no photos the entire trip (I'm a backward antipodean- no digi camera, no cell phone, no TV and a tendency to forget to take a camera with me. I plan on developing the two films I no longer remember what's on and getting some sort of digital camera this year though.) and reveled in the cold, undocumented joy of it all.

Dream Quiver #3

Kidman 6'0" Diamond Tail Single
Full-on 'Morning Of The Earth' MP style machine. Big Greenough flex fin, starfin, cutaway- lots of options here.

So I went to the beach early a day or so ago, very low expectations but desperately needing to get wet. It wasn't good, but wasn't awful- waist to chest (at times) and I watched some thruster guy put together a decent ride. I went south of the 5-10 person crowd to a spot that usually works and gambled on it being better as the tide filled. Thought I'd blown it as I spent some time sitting between two rips and not seeing anything much worth paddling for, but patience was a virtue and it slowly happened. Mostly small lefts with a few bigger shorter rights popping up on the edges. I rode few, felt the starfin work nicely and had a fine old time on my backhand for an hour or so before it died on me. All by myself but not really as there were fishos casting at both rips, a 3 person pack maybe 50 yards away, kids hollering on the beach, a pod of dolphins working what must have been a rich spot on the outside and a seal in the lineup with me for a while. Went to work happy