August 10, 2012 Friday

Bolinas	Groin
8:45 am to 10:30 am	1' to 2', sets to 3'
Mid dropping tide	Slight NW cross breeze
Fog to patchy sun	Fun session

At 8 am I saw fifteen surfers at the Groin with Mary paddling over from the Patch and Susan who always wears sunglasses entering the water. Regulars out there were: Jacek the tattoo artist, Jaime the starving artist cartoonist, Dexter the Bolinas local, David who rides the Becker board, Matt from Petaluma, and Bridget, another Bolinas local.

Matt pulled up as I was changing the lens on my camera. He mentioned that he had not been surfing in awhile and wondered if he could do it. "Matt, it's just like riding a bike." Bicycles were the reason Matt had not been in the water. He had recently purchased a carbon-fiber road bike and was riding that everyday. Also work had been steady - Matt does the computer design work for a large Marin landscape architecture firm. When the economy crashed in 2008 Matt was in the water a lot. Recently we hadn't seen him because he has been busy working. Out in the water, I watched Matt connect with several waves. True he wasn't at his best, but he certainly knew what he was doing.

"I'm back into it!" he said after our session.

"Just how long has it been?"

"Weekend before fathers day, I went surfing with my son. That was the last time." Another words - two months. Matt was stoked and said I would see him again next week out here.

Why were there so many surfers in the water? Answer - it was Friday and there was a heat wave. The NOAA weather radio issued a hot weather warning for the next three days. A high pressure system was blocking out the cooler moist air, resulting in triple digit temperatures -- spare the air days, possible power outages due to excessive use of air conditioners, stay in doors, don't be active and wear loose fitting clothes. But to my surprise, on-the-deck fog hung over Stinson Beach and Bolinas and a cool breeze put a texture on the surface of the water. The waves were small and flat - buoy report was 7.9 ft N swell at 9 seconds with a 1.1 south swell at 17 seconds and a W wind at 4 mph.

To beat the crowd I paddled out to the north end of the pack and sat inside. The set waves had a good left line-up along the shore ending at the house on the south side of the ramp. I managed to quickly catch two small waves that peeled to the left all the way to the sand. Later I drifted out to the middle of the pack to converse with Jaime, Jacek, and Dexter. All three of us competed for the infrequent set waves. I managed to catch a couple, but spent most of the time waiting for the next set. Jacek, as usual, glided into the set waves early, cut left, hung at the top, walked the nose, dropped down the face as the waves broke, crouched down, grabbed the outside rail and hung on to work back into the swell. He did that again and again.

I noticed that David had drifted back to the inside peak and I decided to join him. Wednesday David had mentioned that there was a surfer who sat way inside, caught all the good small waves, walked the nose and hung five on all of them. He was there again - calmly sitting ten yards over and ten yards closer to shore. Light hair, thin, 40 years or so, no booties and no leash on a nose riding longboard. He would smoothly and with great speed paddle into these flat small waves, glide into the waves, cleanly turn left, take one step, pause to insure he was in the wave and then walk up to the nose, plant five toes on the tip of the board, calmly walk back and drive the board into the white water when the wave broke on the sand. The guy knew what he was doing. I noticed that he would start paddling out and over because he saw the sets coming way before I did. Thus when the waves arrived, he was in position, stroked into the first one of every set and drove them all the way to the sand.

Out in the water, a friendly surfer started chatting about how good Bolinas was and how he loved to come here. Also, he couldn't believe the cool weather. It was 105 degrees at his place yesterday.

"Where do you live?"

"In the valley, near Vacaville, on the way to Sacramento."

"The fog must have been a pleasant sight."

"You got that right."

"Coming from Vacaville, why did you pick Bolinas and not Ocean Beach, Salmon Creek or Pacifica?"

"I like Bolinas. I knew it would be good. Besides Ocean Beach doesn't get good until the fall - September and October."

The sand was out. When I entered the water, the waves were pushing up the ramp. Even though the tide was going out, when I exited the water the waves were still pushing up the ramp. I had watched Jacek and his friend dodge the waves shooting up the retaining wall of the house on the south side of the ramp, and thus I decided to paddle over to the ramp to avoid the waves crashing into the retaining wall. As I paddled in, I was pushed in by one breaking wave and put my feet down expecting to feel sand. To my surprise I was on rocks. All the sand in front of the ramp was gone and the underlying rocks were exposed.

As I changed, the fog lifted and the sun burst out. As always, it was another beautiful Marin morning.