October 6, 2008 Monday

Montara	Old Chart House Restaurant
9:30 am to 10:30 am	4' to 5', sets overhead
Mid upcoming tide	Slight onshore breeze
Sunny, blue skies, fog on the horizon	Brief thrilling session

Again I was sitting outside in surf more thrilling than I like. Kevin and I went to Montara after rejecting Pacifica.

The plan was to meet at Linda Mar at 7:45 am so that Kevin could get in a brief surf session before work. Tomorrow he leaves for Madison, Wisconsin to attend a computer conference at his alma mater, thus today was his only chance to surf this week. My phone rang as I pulled into the parking lot at Linda Mar. It was Kevin, “Dad I over slept. It’ll take awhile to get there but I’m coming. How’s the surf?”

“Not good. It’s head high but not clean,” I answered.

“You want to check out Montara in the meanwhile?” he asked.

“No I’ll wait for you here,” I replied. I wasn’t anxious to go to Montara. The waves this morning at Ocean Beach were big, thus I figured Montara would be huge also. The safe bet was to stay here.

My expectations were high. Stormsurf predicted six-foot local wind swell at ten seconds and a 2.5 foot south swell at fourteen seconds. This combination could produce some great waves at most breaks. But at Linda Mar, which is a narrow north-facing cove, the south swells can’t get in. The surf was west wind swells, irregular peaks, bumpy, and not clean. Size was flat to three feet. Every five minutes the wind swells would pile together to form a set of head high waves. The north end was bigger and more irregular than the south end, which was smaller but clean. Set waves at both ends were walled. I took pictures but no one connected with a good one. The above photo is the best wave I shot that morning. While I watched the surf got worst.

Kevin arrived. “Dad let’s check out Montara. We can come back here if it’s not good. Or we could go out here if you want to. The north end looks the best.”

“Most likely Montara is better than this. Let’s go,” I replied. Of course we would not be coming back.

From the parking lot of the old Chart House Restaurant at the south end of Montara, we saw the same bumpy conditions. The waves looked small but there were a couple of well-defined peaks. No one was out, thus to save time and beat the crowd we decided to go out here, a quick forty-five minute session. Like the last time I was here, the waves were much bigger than they looked from the bluff: thick waves, big drops and powerful sections that drive right up to the steep beach.

We timed our entry well, waiting for a lull between sets, running down the steep incline, we jumped in and paddled out with no problems. The backwash was pronounced, we bobbed up and down and felt the swirling current all around us. Kevin caught one, dropped into a head high left, hummed down a fast section and straightened out as it closed out near shore. I paddled into a left wall, hung at the top a second, dropped down the face, cruised across a fast section that died in the shore break, a great ride. Then the big sets came marching through. At this point the waves became a little too thrilling for my tastes.

I caught another one, a big wall of water. I jumped up, hung at the top of the wave a little too long. “Oh, no,” I thought as I free fell down a crashing six-foot wave. The nose of the board dipped in the water, bounced up and bucked me off into the turbulence, which held me down for what seemed a long time. Under water, my board bushed my head. I was lucky it didn’t hit me. “Yes, it’s little too thrilling.” After that I became very selective and paddled around one closed out wave after another.

I watched Kevin take off late on a sizeable wave. He screamed down the swell and disappeared in a curtain of white water. After a few seconds his board popped up and then Kevin surfaced. A makeable left came in, I went for it, paddled hard, pushed into it, hung at the top for an instance and dropped into a steep head-high section, screamed across the face a long ways and straightened out ahead of a crashing wall of white water.

Paddling out was an adventure. A big set came through and I was caught inside. I ducked, rolled and scratched through several waves until there was a break in the set. Once outside, I was fifty yards north of Kevin. Breathing hard, I sat there and rested. “I’m too old for this,” I thought. “I’m going to get back into running to build up my stamina.”

“One more good one and I’m going in,” Kevin shouted to me.

“Me too,” I responded. Kevin caught a good right wave. From the back I watched his head speed ahead of the feathering lip of the breaking curl until the entire wave collapsed all at once. He surfaced and started paddling back out. I guess that wasn’t “a good one.” I stoked into a big right peak, dropped to the bottom, swung right and watched a twenty-foot long curtain of water come over all at once. I straightened out, turned left, rode the soup and drove the board right up to the steep beach. “That’s it, I’m out of here.”

I turned to watch Kevin take off on another sizeable right wave, he hung at the top too long, dropped straight down, the wave was at least two feet over his head, the board bounced up and knocked Kevin off into four feet of white water. He surfaced and immediately caught the soup of a small wave to come in.

Back at the cars, we were glad we had gone out. The wind was picking up. We had caught the best of the morning. Kevin quickly dressed, gave me a hug and headed off to work. He was leaving for Wisconsin tomorrow and wouldn’t be back until Sunday. As I drove off, the ocean was filled with white caps and a fog bank shrouded the north point of the cove. Off to Denny’s in Pacifica I went for breakfast and to write up this adventure.