September 21, 2011 Wednesday

Bolinas	Groin
10:00 am to 11:30 am	1' to 2', sets to 3'
Mid outgoing tide	Slight onshore breeze
On-the-deck fog	Exercise session

I had my hopes up that the first NW swell of the season had arrived this morning and I would be out in the beautiful sunshine like we had yesterday going for four to five-foot fast peeling lefts at the Channel. It didn't happen. Swell had dropped significantly to 3.3 ft at 11 seconds, which resulted in similar but smaller, weaker and less frequent waves. As I drove out of the forest on the Panoramic Highway, I peered out at a thick blanket of on-the-deck fog that covered the Stinson-Bolinas Bay. The fog was so thick that I could not see the Patch from the base of the ramp and the automatic focusing feature on my camera could not focus due to everything being grayish-white from the fog. I did manage to take a couple of shots at the Groin when surfers rode in close to shore. That's Hank in the above photo completing a decent ride a few feet from the Groin pole.

I met Mary coming out of the water from the Patch when I went back to the car to suit up. She reported the waves were ok but infrequent and she was tired from yesterday's session. Frank and Russ, the stand-up guys, were back at the cars.

"Frank, did you have your fog horn on this morning?"

"You know when you launch from the ramp on days like today, after paddling a short while, you have no idea where you are." Frank and Russ could not see the shore and thus had no bearings as to location. They decided to start paddling for shore. After a minute or two they could faintly see Mary riding a wave on the inside section of the Patch.

I paddled out to the Groin to join David who rides the Becker board, Hank, Mark the archaeologist, Jacek the tattoo artist, Rob from Dogtown, Matt and a few others. All of us grumbled that the predicted first north swell of the season had not arrived. We jockeyed around for a couple of hours in these small weak waves without any rides worthy of mentioning here.

"Mark, when do you take off for the Aleutian Islands?" Mark was about to leave on a ten-day trip to Alaska on a job assignment.

"Tomorrow."

"Are you taking your wetsuit?"

"No. I have too much work to do." The other day he mentioned that this was the best time of the year for weather and that there was a surf break near by. The reality is that the weather is always severe in the Aleutians. Continuous forty to fifty-knot winds over a thirty-six hour period that produced thirty-five foot seas generated our much-anticipated swell.

"Be sure to send us an Aleutian Islands weather report."

"Will do."

"David, what kind of sandwich did you make for today?" It was approaching lunchtime. Yesterday David told me he packs a lunch every morning before each surf session and then eats it during his hour-long journey back to Berkeley.

"Same sandwich I always make. Swiss cheese and lettuce."

"That's all? No meat?"

"It's the carrot chaser that makes the meal." No wonder he was in such great shape. He surfs for three to four hours, four to five times a week and only eats Swiss cheese and lettuce sandwiches and carrots for lunch. Now there is a health regiment.

When I got home I went online to Stormsurf to see what happened to that swell. Stormsurf predicted the swell would hit at 10 pm tonight and that early tomorrow morning the swell would be 7.5 ft at 15 seconds from 299 degrees with only 1 to 5 mph NW wind. Being an optimist and wanting to believe their forecast, I'm planning to be out there early tomorrow.