May 22, 2014 Thursday

Leo Carrillo State Beach	Inside the south rock
11:00 am to 12:30 pm	3' to 4', sets overhead
Low upcoming tide	Slight NW breeze
High patchy clouds to overcast	Fun session

Day 2 of the Fay Moore Memorial Trip South

What a great day. Left Joan and Larry's at 8 am, went straight to Corrales' for a chorizo, egg, potato, beans and rice breakfast burrito, onto Starbucks for a tall regular coffee, and out to Surfers' Point to enjoy my breakfast watching the local surfers in action. Small wind waves lapped onto the rocks at C Street, not at all inviting.

My destination today was the Portofino Inn in Redondo Beach, where we had a two-night reservation. Plan was to get one surf session in, here or at Leo Carrillo, a favorite spot of Kevin and I. Since Surfers' Point was sloppy I decided to head to Leo Carrillo, taking the chance of passing up rideable waves in hope of better ones further south.

First I took a thirty-minute walk along the Surfers' Point's neatly groomed path for walkers, joggers, surfers and bicyclists. A few years ago Ventura launched a cobblestone beach restoration project. Last year I heard a talk at the Surfrider Conference about the city's efforts to combat erosion and restore beach sand. And guess what? It's working. Ventura had restored ten feet of beach from the Ventura River mouth to the pier, and this year the city is spending $300,000 to dump additional tons of cobblestone and sand along the beachfront.

At Leo Carrillo the waves were infrequent, small, rideable and only three surfers were out. Some nice mellow waves came in by the big rock – remember this is where the movie Gidget was filmed and the rock played a prominent part of the scenery. I was puzzled as to why the surfers were not at the rock. They were further south and inside. A set came through that peaked were the surfers were. Two of them connected on head-high waves and screamed across fast right peeling waves. That did it – I was going out.

The low tide produced some ten yards of exposed rocks between the sandy beach and the water. I gingerly picked my way over the rocks and cautiously paddled through the shallow water and thick kelp out to the big rock. My strategy was to go for the mellow waves between the big sets, but it never happened. While stroking hard for my first wave I felt my wedding ring sliding off my finger. "Damn I forgot to take off my ring!" I always remove it before going out. Thus I paddled in, catching white water, cautiously stepped over the rocks, walked back to my car, took off my ring and returned back to the big rock – burning twenty minutes in the process.

I tried for several waves and missed them all; the kelp was too thick. My hands became entangled every time I dipped them into the water. It also wrapped around my skeg, impeding movement. No wonder the other guys were south and inside. They were outside of the kelp beds. So I moved in and joined them. Later chatting with one of them, he stated that at low tide the kelp was on the surface and one has to wait for the tide to come up to catch the waves at the big rock.

I didn't catch many waves, but when I did they were fast and smooth. I used my knee technique – jump up to me knees, shoot through the initial section and then stand-up. All the waves closed out on the small rocks near the shore. But I could fly down the faces a long ways before they folded over in small walls of water.

Three or less surfers were in the water during my entire session, adding to today's ideal conditions – smooth as glass surface, fast peeling right waves and no crowd. It was a good session, just what I needed to burn off the anxiety and nervous energy over my mother's memorial. I obtained that surfer calm for facing the slow drive down PCH (Highway 1) through Malibu, Santa Monica, the bumper-to-bumper traffic on Lincoln Blvd through Venice to Marina del Rey, and the slow crawl through Manhattan Beach and Hermosa Beach to the Portofino Inn in Redondo Beach.