July 27, 2009 Monday

Bolinas	Groin
10:00 am to 11:30 am	2' to 3', sets to 4'
Low upcoming tide	South onshore wind
Overcast, high fog	Fun session

“What am I doing here?” I kept saying to myself. I was sitting alone, outside just north of the Groin wall. Claude and his friend were at the Channel. The others around me had gone in. Bobbing up and down like a cork, I was facing San Pedro Point, though I couldn’t see it due to the fog on the horizon, and the south wind was blasting me in the face. Chop surrounded me, the swell was uneven and bumpy and white caps were forming out to sea.

“I’m here because this is the last day of the south swell,” again talking to myself. The big south swell, which was labeled Storm #4S by Stormsurf (meaning the fourth major south swell of the season), began last Thursday, peaked on Friday, continued through Saturday and Sunday and now the last remnants of it were here Monday. Starting tomorrow the south swell would be gone, replaced by two to three foot wind swells from the north. My only chance for waves this week was today.

Then my luck changed. I thought about trying the inside waves like I caught last Friday. The finger of sand that stretched out from the end of the Groin wall was still forcing the formation of decent left curls. The water was very shallow in front of the wall and gradually became deeper as you moved north. The change in depth caused the bigger waves to peel continuously north for several yards. There was also a strong current to the north. To fight the current I got off my board and stood in waist high water, thus preventing it from moving me around. At one point I dropped into overhead water. I paddled a few yards south, got off my board and was in chest high water, a little further south I was in waist deep water. If I could locate the edge of the sandbar I would be in position for the big waves that continuously broke along the changing depth of the sandbar. This strategy worked. I would locate the edge of the sandbar, stand next to my board in chest deep water and wait for the sets. Once I saw a big one approaching I would paddle out to it, quickly turn around, take off late, swing left, jump to the middle of the board, climb high in the curl, zoom down a continuously unfolding left curl and end by driving the nose into the white water of the shore break. I repeated this maneuver seven times in an hour. All of them were fast, long rides.

Then the surf camp beginners entered the water. Twenty young people on soft-top boards spread across the edge of my sandbar. All the other experienced surfers were out at the Channel. I was the only old guy mixed in with the soft-tops. I kept applying my strategy. The beginners did know how to recognize approaching set waves, thus I would paddle out to meet them and be all alone on the take off. I would turn into a four-foot wall and see three beginners frozen like deer in the headlights as I would begin to pick up speed high in the curls. Luckily I didn’t hit any of them, but I did come close. I knew it was not a good idea to be weaving in and out around the surf campers, but the inside waves were so good I could not resist going for them. On one good one I weaved my way all the way to the shore and decided to call it a day.

Back at the cars I chatted with Claude and his friend. They were out at the Channel and had connected on some decent right waves. Claude mentioned that it was bumpy, he never saw a smooth wave, but every twenty minutes a big set would come through. He caught four head high, fast, long rights that made this morning’s session a good one.

For all three of us, what started out has a slow morning turned into a fun session.