June 30, 2010 Wednesday

Bolinas	Channel
9:00 am to 10:30 am	2' to 3', occasional 4'
Low upcoming tide	Offshore breeze to fierce NW wind
Bright sunny day	So - so session

Frank the standup guy came paddling by as I sat between sets at the peak half way between the Groin and the Channel. When I first came down to the beach to take pictures Frank was all by himself beyond the outside rock at the Patch. When I returned after suiting up to go out, he was all by himself at the furthest peak at the Channel, right where the outflow from the lagoon collided with the incoming swells.

“Frank how is it over there?” I had been watching the Channel and seeing what looked like nice small rideable waves.

“Not so good. Have you ever had your skeg hit the sand?”

“Frank, then it’s too shallow right?” I arrived at Bolinas just at the turn of a minus low tide.

Frank took up standup surfing a few months ago and this morning was the first time he had experienced surfing in shallow water. He was sailing along on a small wave when his skeg hit the sand and sent him flying. We both agreed that it was not a good idea to be on a large standup board in one foot of water.

I had no expectations of waves this morning. Per the Internet conditions were: 5 ft NW swell at 10 seconds, 1 ft south swell at 14 seconds, 21 knot NW winds and 53 degree water. From shore I noticed a new finger of sand extending out some twenty yards on the north edge of the out-flowing water of the channel. This feature created small “classic” fast peeling one-foot high left waves. With the tide coming in and a little deeper water these ripples could become rideable two to three-foot curls.

From mid-peak I watched another set of good-looking waves come through the Channel. I had to check this out. I rode a small right wave in and walked in waist high water to the Channel. I could see the finger of sand up on the shore and I followed it out to the break. My strategy was to find the edge of the peak that would give me an instant to jump up and position in the wave. I never found it. On my first wave I stood in chest high water, saw a swell coming, turned and jumped onto my board. I stroked into it, remained laying down, turned nearly parallel to the wave and shot down a two-foot curl on my belly until the wave broke over me. I walked out to the start of the white water to try it again. I jumped on my board and paddled out a little further, not far, and jumped off to test the depth of the water; it was over-head. The finger of sand ended and a cliff under the water began. I moved in ten feet and tested the depth again; it was chest-high this time. I was getting the picture: ocean swells came in, combined with small wind swells, and would slam into a wall of shallow sand, jump up and come over hard.

These waves reminded me of the Sandspit in Santa Barbara. The opening of the Santa Barbara Harbor has a sand bank on the north side of the main channel where small waves peel perfectly to the right. Ocean swells travel through a deep channel, hit the shallow sand bank, jump up and peel right along the contour of the bank. This place was best in big swells. When Rincon was ten feet, the Sandspit was a perfect three feet. I surfed there once when I was a student at UCSB, forty-five years ago. I remembered the waves were difficult to catch and position, but once locked in I rode for a long ways on perfect two-foot curls.

Noting all of this I paddled further out determined to only go for the bigger waves. One came; I took off, jumped up, turned, cut down the face as it collapsed in front of me. It was a head-high boomer that bounced me good. Later I connected on a decent wall. I stroked into a four-footer, got into it early and was up when I dropped down the face. I managed to climb high in the curl and hum across a steep face. After the initial break these waves diminished in size. I was cruising along a now two-foot face when the bottom dropped out and the sand appeared. Today the water was crystal clear. While locked in this fast curl, the wave jumped up, water sucked up into the curl and big grain sand appeared in three inches of water. I panicked and fell off the front side of my board, something you should never do. One should always fall into the wave. I flopped into three-inches of water and landed on my back. I was lucky that my board didn’t hit me.

I caught a couple more and then the surf died. I paddle back over to the Groin and caught one good one that took me near the Groin wall, a perfect wave to go in on.

“Big south swell coming this Sunday.” Russ greeted me as he was putting his standup board in his truck. “Seven feet at seventeen seconds. But Sunday is the Fourth of July. You coming out this Sunday?”

“No! They close the road on the Fourth. It’s the town’s big party. That’s when they have the Bolinas – Stinson Beach tug-of-war.”

“But if you come early, like at six-thirty.” Russ was trying to convince himself that it would be ok to surf on Sunday.

“Russ, every beach in Northern California will be crowded on Sunday. Everybody heads to the beach on the Fourth to set off those over-priced Red Devil fireworks.”

“Monday then. The swell will still be strong on Monday. But come early.” Russ jumped into his truck and started the engine.

“Good I’ll see you on Monday.”

June 16, 2010 Wednesday

Bolinas	Channel
8:00 am to 9:30 am	2' to 3', sets to 4'
Low outgoing tide	No wind
Bright and sunny	Fun session

The left peak returned to the Channel this morning. For the past three months there was no peak at the Groin or the Channel. The storms had moved in tons of sand and had planed off the bottom causing every wave from six inches to ten feet to break in a solid wall of water. The good left peak, which we had counted on for years, was formed by a dome of sand deposited at the mouth of the lagoon by the tidal action of the currents. During Monday’s minus low tide, Jack and I observed a finger of sand forming in front of the Groin pole and extending out for twenty yards. With this morning’s higher tide our old favorite left peak was back and I managed to connect on several of good ones.

“Loren you should get yourself a stand-up board for days like this when it’s flat,” Russ sarcastically greeted me at 7:30 am when I arrived. “Then you would have something to do. That’s what I plan to do.”

Surf prospects on the Internet were not good; 11 ft NW swell at 10 seconds with a 1.4 ft south swell at 14 seconds and 20 knot NW winds, gusts to 24 and water temperature at 50 degrees. “Big wind swell, a ripple of south, cold water and strong winds. It doesn’t look good. But I will check it out any way.”

Russ and I were discouraged standing on the seawall checking out the waves. The tide was super low, all the rocks of the Patch reef were exposed and small gutless two foot waves were breaking beyond the outside rock. One surfer was out between the Groin and the Channel, the surface was flat and it looked like he was just paddling around. Then a small wave came through.

“Russ, look that one is rideable.” We watched it peel continuously to the left. A second one approached, the surfer stroked into it, turned left down a nicely formed wall and trimmed across the face for a long ways. Our interest picked up. A third wave came through and the surfer managed to catch the fourth one of the set. Two more waves came in after that. A set of six good waves had just appeared out of nowhere.

“That’s it, I’m going,” Russ announced.

“I’ll join you.”

Russ recently took up stand-up surfing and was still getting used to paddling, balancing and catching waves. He entered the water at the base of the ramp, paddled down to the Channel, turned north and paddled all the way to the Patch. After a half hour I saw this speck of a surfer in the distance riding a wave at the Patch with a paddle in his hand. That must be Russ I thought. After our session he mentioned that he caught ten small waves and was finally getting the hang of it, thus for him it was a good session.

I entered the water at the Groin and realized that the surfer we had been watching was Creighton. I paddled out to join him. He told me that he arrived at 6:30 am, was discouraged but decided to go out anyway. To his surprise the waves picked up and he connected on four or five long fast lefts. Of course that was an hour ago and by now the waves have died down, just my luck.

First wave I caught had some force behind it. I dropped down the face, trimmed left before the wave closed out in front of me. Same thing happened on my second wave. My third wave was a right. I climbed high in the curl, cruised through a short section, the wave built up again and I shot through another fast section. I hadn’t caught a wave like that in weeks. Now I was into it. I caught one good left and then another. The good waves were a combination of little wind swells that combine together on top of a south ground swell. I would catch the wind swell and push my weight forward to drop into the ground swell. The shape of the bottom forced all the waves to break to the left. On my best wave, I was well positioned for a four-foot set wave. I took off late, turned quickly into a steep face, climbed to the top of the curl, stepped to the middle of the board and stood there. The wave continuously unfolded in front of me while I cruised along until it closed out in one foot of water near the shore. That’s the Bolinas of old that I remember so well.

Four of us were in the water, Creighton and I and two others, who stayed ten to twenty yard away from us. Thus for an hour Creighton and I had this break to ourselves.

One of the others went in. “Did that guy go in already?” Creighton commented. “He wasn’t out very long.”

“He must have to go to work.”

“Yeah, so do I. One more good one and I’ll go in.” When Creighton said that I could feel it in my bones, the old “just one more wave” game. A four-foot set wave came through, I paddled over it and out of the corner of my eye I saw Creighton drop down the face. I looked for him expecting to wave good-bye. But he was paddling out again.

“That was too good. I have to get another one.” And he caught another four-foot set wave, and another and another. Five waves later Creighton finally gave me a wave and called it quits.

Now I had the break all to myself. I looked around, what a beautiful morning, warm bright sunshine, no wind and every five minutes a nice four-foot wave would come through. If the water wasn’t so damn cold I could stay out here all day.

June 2, 2010 Wednesday

Bolinas	Patch
10:30 am to 12 noon	2' to 3', sets to 4'
Low tide (-0.5 ft)	NW cross breeze
Overcast with a low cloud cover	Fun session

Meet Chris from Orange County in Southern California, that’s him in the above photo. He is living every young man’s dream: Easy Rider and Surf Safari. Check out his rig: a big freeway cruising motorcycle with all the amenities pulling a trailer that carries two longboards. He rode up from SoCal for the Santa Cruz Longboard Union (SCLU) Memorial Day Classic, an annual longboard surf contest, in which Chris made the semi-finals. After the contest he continued further north to visit his brother and to cruise over to Bolinas because loves to surf here. He likes the mellow waves at the Patch and the good vibes of the its surfers.

I prodded him for more details. On his trailer were two Dewey Weber longboards and he was wearing a Dewey Weber tee shirt. He told me he rides for the Weber team. I mentioned that I had met Dewey once when I was a kid. Chris pulled out his wallet and handed me Shea Weber’s business card. Shea is Dewey’s son and now runs the business. Chris did not know Woody, our local superstar who is also on the Weber team.

He showed me his boards. The bigger one was his favorite and had a glassed on 13” single fin. The smaller one was a tri-fin. He had to use this board for the contest at Streamers Lane because the big fin on the other board was not a “kelp-fin,” meaning it protruded too deep in the water to maneuver the kelp beds in Santa Cruz. He unlocked the straps around the boards to show me his big board. What a classic: 9’ 0’ in length, 24 inches wide (which is w-i-d-e), six-inch square tail, 1 ½ inch balsa wood stringer and an elegant gold pin-striped pattern on the top. The top was domed and tapered down to thin rails, similar to my 9’ 2” Haut. It was a beautiful board.

Chris’ rig drew a crowd. Ray the Petaluma fireman joined us as did a local Bolinas resident who happened by. This gentleman was familiar with bikes and asked several motorcycle questions. Chris’ vehicle was built for comfort: thick cushy driver’s seat, a small leather passenger seat, a large wrap-around windshield, stereo speakers, and a small built in two-way radio to communicate with the passenger when cruising on the road. And it also had heated handgrips. I had never heard of such a thing. The Bolinas resident sternly told me that heated handgrips are an important feature. In cold weather, the rider’s hands can freeze and become numb; something we Marin surfers can relate to. Chris bought the bike used and it now has over 200,000 miles, which for a well-made cruising machine is nothing.

“So what is in the trailer?” Ray gestured to the compact trailer connected to the bike.

“A bed and a tent. Do you want to see it?”

And with that and within two seconds, Chris grabbed a handle in the front of the trailer, pulled on it, and the top swung up and out and rested on the ground doubling the length of the trailer. This process automatically unfolded a tent, a tent tall enough for the 6’ 2” Chris to stand up in. In the front half of the tent was a bed on a platform with storage space underneath. Can you imagine that? In an instant the tent is ready; no tent pole to fuss with, no stakes to drive into the ground and no ropes to mess with.

We all “oooohed” in amazement. What a well designed set up. And within two seconds, Chris had it all taken down and packed away.

Chris joined us out in the water at the Patch on his big fin board. There was nothing special about the waves: well shaped, difficult to catch, long slow riding waves. Ten people were in the water, three of them on standup boards. The standup guys dominated the break because they could catch the waves thirty yards outside of the rest of us when the swells were flat. I had difficulty pushing into the waves, but not Chris. He caught everything he tried for. Several times he hung five on flat Patch curls. I didn’t think that it was physically possible to walk the nose on Patch waves, but Chris could do it. For an hour and a half we all enjoyed sharing waves at the Patch peak.

As usual, it was another beautiful and interesting morning in Marin.