Inspiration

I didn't fully utilize the "La Bomba"TM swell this weekend. I only surfed Saturday, although the wind wasn't blowing Sunday morning and I could have gone for the two days of surf. On Saturday we were afraid of the forecasted south wind and reacted more to what we thought would happen than what actually happened. We hid from the wind at sunrise Saturday. We went to the fun little novelty wave that's protected from the wind but isn't much of a wave. The outside left was working because the wind never came up. It was, at 6 people, 3x more crowded than I've ever seen it. To be fair, it's not my first, or even second choice spot, so I don't have much experience with how crowded it gets. Chatting with a guy who surfed the outside while we were on the inside he agreed that it was the most crowded he'd ever seen it in his 20+ years of surfing there. Still, I got some fun waves. I did what I consider my best cutback of the year. I'm experienced enough to know that what it felt like is not what it looked like, which brings me to some inspiration.

The Displacmentia Blog has a post today that reminds me that hulls are fun! And that hulls are not for show. I have a little 6' hull, and longboard hulls, and I bought and sold a hull that didn't work like a hull should. So I think my cutback is best felt and not seen. I wish some of the more "hull-y" waves around here weren't so crowded, or that I could find an uncrowded one.

Then the Mandala Surfboards blog has a board with a description that fits me pretty well, "super fun combination for the aging shredder or aspiring lip blaster" The only problem is, I was never much of a shredder, but I'm an aging aspiring lip blaster! The shape is not far from the Vernor TreeHugger I've been ridding, although probably more sharp around the edges and certainly for a smaller old guy.

The uncrowded waves I've been riding are a bit more challenging than what I can handle on a longboard or hull, but within my abilities on a modern, hard-railed, multi-fined board. And that's the whole point of this blog, the right board for the right conditions. :) 

Kook move

Major kook move.

The south swell was getting a bit smaller and the wind was questionable, but the tide was right. So JB and I agreed to meet around dawn. I arrived first and started getting ready only to find I forgot my wetsuit. I had my boots, towel, extra layer, everything except the suit. I must have not been paying attention when I grabbed the pile of stuff. When JB arrived I asked if he had an extra suit, and he said he had two in his hands at home but decided to not bring both. Ugh!

I didn't miss much. The swell was not as good as last time and there was just enough junk on the water that JB was hesitating going at all. I was able to encourage him by pointing out the good waves right out front, he didn't even need to hike down the beach. I'm glad he got out, but he only got two waves because it turned out to be more shifty than it looked.

I took a moment to run up the coast and look around a little. I didn't find any magic, but added a little to my understanding of the area.

So that was the extent of my surfing. On the drive home I made a side trip to try to sell a board. The guy hesitated, and so I have to keep trying before I can order the semi-gun.

I did more work polishing the oxidation off the Mad River Explorer. I had been loosing steam because with all the work it wasn't looking that much better. I tried one last thing, soap. It made a huge difference as it cleaned off all the polishing compound and the loose oxidation that wasn't coming off with just a rag and water. What I ended up with was pretty good looking and I have faith that the wax will take once I finish removing the rest of the oxidation. I'm not sure if I'm getting 100% of the oxidation off, but I'm not willing to continue working with the diminishing returns I'm getting. 

Next I need to order the webbing to repair the seats. I'm trying to decide if I should take the risk on colored webbing, or stick with the safe choice of black. For colors, I can either go with a tan so it blends with the wood of the seats and the color of the inside of the canoe, or I can go with blue or another color to either match, complement, or "pop" with the outside of the canoe. Every time I think about it, I lead a different way.

Lake Chabot

I brought the family out on the MorningStar for a paddle on Lake Chabot. The most important thing to know about canoeing on this lake is that there is a portage from the car to the launch. It's about 1,000 feet, so it's not any sort of trek. But if I was there with just my 5-year old son, I would have had to make two trips to haul even the basic gear down to the water.

They've got a pretty good set-up there with grassy meadows for picnicking, a store with snacks, trails that go all the way around the lake, and a range of boats to rent. The whole trip wasn't too expensive with parking, boat launch, and boat inspection not more than $15. Plenty worth the price considering there are docks along the shore that lead to port-a-potties, benches, and the trails. It's a good sized lake with two large bays and a small island too. (Nobody is allowed to go on the island, bummer.)

We had a leisurely paddle around and landed on shore to have a snack and use the bathrooms. After a rest ashore we decided it was time to make the trip back and get home for a real lunch.

I paddled us back to the marina totaling about 2 miles. Along the way we saw mallard ducks and Canadian geese in the water. We saw cormorants and coots to, but far fewer of those. Near the marina at one of the docks we saw someone land a good sized fish. I couldn't tell what kind it was, but it was more than 12-inches long!

The next day I could have gone surfing but conditions weren't shaping up to be very good. I opted instead to sleep in, spend some time with family, and do a little more work on the Mad River. I'm still slowly working through polishing the gel coat up. After that I'll work on refinishing the wood.

Paddling upwind

 This isn’t a metaphor. Yesterday I took out the Mad River Explorer 16 for the first time. I was solo, and went down the the MLK shoreline. I knew there was a steady north breeze, and the tide was mid and falling, but I went anyway. At the launch the breeze was light, but being cautious, I opted to spend my energy paddling upwind. Upwind was also with the tide, which meant there was some texture in the deep water where wind waves met the opposing flow of water. As I paddles upwind I got away from shelter and gradually faced a stiffer breeze. I learned a lot about how to handle the headwind, and how low the limit is of what I can paddle against. 

1) keep the bow down. Even sitting reverse left too much now in the air on the empty canoe. I had to shift my weight forward which meant kneeling at the yoke. It makes it harder to make strokes, but ends up being the way to go because of the increased efficiency. 

2) keep it straight. The canoe has less wind resistance when pointed straight into the wind. This takes more concentration than I expected. Almost every stroke has correction as part of it, which is frustrating when also fighting the wind. I wanted to power stroke into the wind, but if I got too much angle to the wind, the canoe would swing around to be broadside to the wind and it was a real struggle to get it facing upwind again.

2a) occasional swirling gusts can swing the canoe off line with the wind. 

2b) once sideways to the wind, I would get quickly swept to the middle of the channel where the water was rougher

2c)  now sideways in rougher water, long sweep strokes are needed to straighten out. Sometimes it was easier to spin around 180 and drift downwind towards shore before finishing the 360 to get headed up wind. Most of the times I needed to hug the shore to get spun around a little bit sheltered from the wind. However, snagging the paddle blade in the shallow mud on the downwind side of the canoe caused the canoe to lever against the stuck blade and tried to pull it out of my hands. Extra care was needed. 

3) the Mad River boat doesn’t have any tumble home, which I appreciated in the wind and waves. I’m curious how wet I would have gotten in the Morningstar with it’s tumble home shape. 

4) I need a better way to paddle solo than on my knees. I can’t keep my knees bent for that long. I want to keep the yoke and avoid doing three seats. The middle seat on the Morningstar prevents it having a carry yoke, which makes it a struggle to carry any distance. 

Great Weekend

A south swell in the water and spring tides high in the morning so JB and I got to the beach closer to dawn than first light. Our first waves were at a spot I've purposely not discussed publicly. Although it's visible from the road, the somewhat transient nature of the Scott's Creek bar makes it sorta secret when it forms and starts working. By now, tons of people have driven past and word must be out for anyone interested. So that's where we paddled out around dawn. 

It looked great from the road. It was actually pretty shifty and soft, making it hard to get a satisfying ride. JB did better than I did, getting two "good" rides as well as several mushy ones. I only got two mushy ones and when I saw 6 more people paddling out, I took that second mushy waves to the beach. From the beach I found another peak that was hollow and nobody on it. I paddled out to it and grabbed a few close-out barrels, one in each direction. JB had joined me and didn't have as much luck. We decided to head to the reef instead.

The walk to the reef was sketchy because all the sand between the rocks is washed out right now. The tide was mid-low and we still were in water up to our chest and getting pushed around by wave surges. There were a handful of people at the first spot, mostly going left. We kept walking. The cove/channel was also devoid of sand making it more bouldery with reef peaks sticking out of the water when waves lowered the water level. Sketchy. It actually seemed safer to walk to the tip of the reef as far as possible and then paddle out sideways washing over the shallow spots and getting pushed to the outside part of the channel. I ended up at the top of the reef and got a good one. The larger ones would break a little further out and had great shape. The medium and smaller ones would bowl up and break where reef peaks would boil the face of the wave. Sketchy!

We each got a few and JB decided to move down the reef where the waves were hitting different. I stayed at the top picking carefully and not paying the price for the few mistakes in judgement. (Well, I did chip the tip of a fin on the reef duckdiving my way back out after a wipe out.) I noticed that some that swung to wide to go left looked like going right was an option. I tentatively took a right and found a pretty good wave to fill in between the more exciting lefts. I eventually got worn out and took a right to the beach. It was also sketchy, but the reef was more predictable in shape with fewer peaks and more readable ridges. When I got to the beach the tide was pretty low and I explored the tidepools to see what was there. I found lots of the same things. No purple urchins, no owl limpets, but many turban snails. I found two nearly complete, empty pink abalone shells. I decided to leave them there.

My exploring continued as JB kept getting good waves and paddling back out. I ended up back at the other reef just as the last few people were on the beach leaving. I decided to paddle out and caught a wave before JB was on the beach waiting for me this time. I caught one more with arms of jelly and just rode it to the beach. We got back to the cars and it had been nearly 5 hours of beach time!

I left that spot and met my family down at tres mile sand. It was a beautiful day, waves were good there too, and the tide was very low. I explored some of the deeper tide pools and found some of the more rare species. I was watching novelty left and it looked fun, but I was spent.

The next morning I wasn't planning on surfing but my body felt recharged enough to go get a few. I checked the reefs and the wind was just enough to kill it. I checked the landing and it looked pretty mushy. I went back to novelty lefts with a board and the 4th Gear Flyer. I didn't make the final decision until I was suited up when I decided the surf mat was the right choice. The reasoning was that the medium sized waves were getting reef peak boils on the face, and many of the waves were hit with backwash warbling the face pretty harshly. I rode nearly 10 waves of all sorts and had a pretty good novelty session. As I was getting rides I thought that this wave was pretty good on a surf mat but might be frustrating on most other surfcraft. The surf mat allowed me to enjoy these waves. I know the surf mat would have also been tons of fun up on the reef, or on any of a number of the reefs along here. 

Then Monday I took the day off work and my son and I went for a hike in the redwoods. A great weekend all around.