Last week was the perfect confluence of good weather, good swell, and time off work. The swell was 3' @ 17sec from 195-200, an odd angle with more west than usual. Thursday I woke at 3am to arrive at dawn at the Wadl Reefs, south end, and although it wasn't lined up right, there were still plenty of 4-6' bowls to be had for the small group that arrived around dawn. I tried to stick to the unused peak and got a few fun waves on the QQ. As the tide dropped things didn't get better and I was wondering what other spots looked like, so I went in before I got exhausted.
On the drive into town the two "Miles" were crowded with cars making it look like a Saturday. I kept driving without even looking and after a coffee+donut stop I checked the west side. I went to the end of Fair and from the backside I didn't like what I saw at Mitchel's, and the Fair section of the reef was just a closeout. Similar up at John, but there were bowls mixed in with the walls and since nobody was out and the day was sunny and warm I went for it on the mat. By the time I made it out there were a few others out, but there were plenty of waves to keep us busy and satisfied. I was mostly getting short rides that closed out after one section, and it was bigger than I had tried it on a mat at this spot at 4' with a few larger sets. I think part of it was the swell angle, but the mat wasn't the right choice for that time. It did let me use my legs more than my tired-from-the-morning-surf arms, so I'm glad for that.
I grabbed lunch with JA and returned to see how John looked with a bit higher tide. Still had only a few people and looked surfable but I needed to sleep instead. By 2pm I was awoke with a call from JA wanting to go for a surf. John had gotten worse with the higher tide so we crossed town to check Rockview. There were too many people for the quality of wave coming through, and the other nearby spots had similar things that kept us out of the water. JA went back to work and I went to my parents house. I watched a tv movie and the Warriors game and then slept on the floor.
I awoke the next morning at 5am with the intention to surf by no plans on where. I thought I might try Wadl again but when I got to 4 mile and saw only one car I stopped. The waves were okay, 4-6' but breaking oddly on the high tide. It was hitting the point and wedging up, then either flattening out of standing up a wobbly wall that closed out. The normal inside reef wasn't doing much more than breaking with no wall, just a short shoulder. My tired arms, the odd breaking waves, and my general mellowed satisfaction from the previous day of surfing lead me to take several trips over the falls. I could have gotten some good rides but I was just as happy taking the hits.
The tide dropped and as the wave got better the crowd got agro, so I left. I took the coast route home and enjoyed the sunny morning.
I am skipping a family vacation to Europe this fall and so I get a surf vacation to keep things fair. I was thinking back to my previous surf vacations and the best of them compared to the Thursday I just had. Surfing decent (but not great) waves, sunny and warm, with nothing to do except surf, eat, and sleep. The worst of the trips were as bad as any other day of bad surfing, except I spent a decent amount of money for the experience. So I figured I just had myself a surf vacation without all the airfare! (But travel to a foreign country always effects me in non-surfing ways. If nothing else it's a reminder of how easy life is in the USA, especially once you learn to tune out all the advertising.)
