April 18, 2012 Wednesday

Bolinas	Channel
9:45 am to 10:30 am	3' to 4', sets to 5'
High tide (4.7 ft at 10:30 am)	Stiff NW cross breeze
Sunny with high clouds	Fun session

In the brief forty-five minutes that I was out at the Channel, I connected on four fast, tight, clean left curls. The Internet predictions were fair for waves this morning - 6 ft N swell at 300 degrees at 13 seconds with a NW breeze at 10 knots. For a short period the wind was offshore creating clean conditions while the tide was coming up. Marty, my water testing partner, couldn't make it today so I have to drive our water samples to the Branson School in Ross and get them there by 12 noon. Thus I had time for just a brief session in the water, but it was worth it.

The dawn protrollers were already out of the water and all had smiles on their faces. Mary had a good session at the Patch as did DB the Safeway checker who quickly said hello and rushed off to her job.

"Jaime, I hate to say it, but it was listen to your show or watch the Giants play the Phillies. I chose the Giants." Jaime does the Faultline radio show, two hours of sophisticated rock, on KWMR, West Marin Radio, every Tuesday from 8:30 to 10:30 pm.

"If I wasn't doing that show I would have done the same thing."

Besides being a music aficionado, he is also a big baseball fan. Jaime too had a good session at the Patch. Jack the Dave Sweet team rider also felt good about his Patch session. He was on a roll - today was his fourth day in a row surfing. Stand-up guys Frank and Russ had fun at the Patch but cautioned that with the raising tide the waves were dying. They recommended the Channel.

"Jeff, yesterday I had a phone conversation with Brad Tucker." Jeff the Dillon Beach boat mechanic was toweling off his beautiful hollow wood board that he made after his session at the Channel. "I called him to get his address because I wanted to send him a copy of our story." I had submitted my January 6th blog about Jeff's wood surfboard to the West Marin Citizen and they printed it last week. When I posted my blog story I had sent a link to Brad Tucker, founder of Wood Surfboard Supply in Santa Anna - Jeff used their template to build his board.

"Loren, Brad told me that he had linked the story to their newsletter and out of the blue I got a call from a guy on the East Coast who heard of me through Brad's newsletter. He needed help working with epoxy resins on a wood boat. I was blown away how the word spreads. I was able to help him over the phone."

"Jeff, that's the surf network at work."

The morning crew was gone when I paddled out to the Channel. Jacek the tattoo artist sat at the apex of the Channel peak. Don my Kahuna Kupuna surf contest partner was on the right side of the peak. I joined David who rides the Becker board on the left side.

Since I only had forty-five minutes, I was sprinting to get in as many waves as possible. I set the goal of catching one wave of every set and quickly connected on a decent left. The waves peaked, stood straight up, came over hard and then collapsed into a soft shoulder that would reform on the inside into second decent curl. After my first wave, I positioned myself further north and inside of the others to concentrate on the inside walls. This strategy worked. I was separated from the others and thus had this peak to myself. On my best wave, I paddled out to meet a set wave that was peaking further north. The wave looked like a wall but I decided to give it a try. It was cresting when I glided into it. I cut left, stayed high in the curl, the wave jumped up, I stepped to the middle of the board, crouched down and hung on while a perfect circular curl formed in front of me. I shot through this section, cut back to let the wave build up, cut left again and stood there as I cruised across another perfect curl until it closed out on the inside. I ended up in waist deep water, twenty yards south and ten yard in from the Groin pole. I sprinted back out and connected on three more good ones before calling it a session.

I had that glow of satisfaction from the exercise and the joy of a fun session as I drove through the beautiful hills of Marin - through Olema, pass Samuel P. Taylor Park, Lagunitas, and over the ridge to Fairfax onto Ross. It was a good day.