January 6, 2014 Monday

Bolinas	Channel
9:30 am to 10:30 am	1' to 2', sets to 3'
Low tide	Slight offshore breeze
Overcast with patchy sunlight	Exercise session

I almost didn't go out today. Forecast was a 3 ft NW swell at 12 seconds with light NE winds. After two good sessions at Stinson I was hopeful for another good day. At Brighton Ave only two cars were parked by the tennis court - not a good sign. Discouraged, I didn't bother taking my camera to check out the waves. No one was in the water at the Patch or the Channel. I walked down to the Groin for a closer look. In five minutes, I saw four decent left curls break. That was one of them in the above photo, which I took with my iPhone.

Back at the cars, Russ the stand-up guy and his friend Pete were suiting up.

"Russ, you're going out? There's not much there."

"Yes, we drove all this way thus we're going to do it." Russ and Pete live in Vallejo.

"Good I will join you."

There was nothing special about these waves. All of them were small, slow and mushy. But it was good exercise, and a day in the water is always a good day.

  

January 4, 2014 Saturday

Stinson Beach	South of the Lifeguard Tower
12 noon to 1:30 pm	3' to 4', sets to 6'
High tide (6.2 ft at 1 pm)	No wind to slight onshore breeze
Warm and sunny	Fun session

After our good session on Thursday, Kevin and I were hoping for the same today, so we returned to Stinson again at high tide and again we were not disappointed. The waves had doubled in size — a constant 3 to 4 feet with sets to 6 feet. The big ones were classic Stinson end-to-end walls, lines that stretch across the entire beach and folded over from top to bottom in one big explosion.

The big ones intimated me, but Kevin convinced me that the channel just south of the lifeguard tower was still working and that by waiting for the sets to pass we would have no problems paddling out, and he was right. By the time I suited up Kevin had been in the water for fifteen minutes (I'm slow). I stood in chest high water with my arm wrapped around the nose of my board and ducked under five waves of white water before the set let up. Then I jumped on the board and sprinted outside. I had to do this maneuver a few times today, but quickly got used to it.

"Dad, go for the in-between waves, the big ones close out," Kevin greeted me when I finally got out there.

While standing in waist high water, I watched Kevin come down a classic wave. He glided into a head-high wall, calmly set his rail in the middle of the swell, stood firm in the middle of his board and shot down a blue-green glassy wall all the way to the shore.

Seeing that and with the strategy of going for the in-between waves, I connected on a few memorable and powerful curls. My last wave was my best ride. I took off late on a clean left breaking wall, dropped down the face, climbed back up to the top of the wave, stepped to the middle of the board, hummed across an ever-forming left curl that finally collapsed on the sand and I stepped off in knee-deep water.

Again we agreed that today was another great start to the New Year. 

January 2, 2014 Thursday

Stinson Beach	South of the Lifeguard Tower
10:00 am to 11:30 am	2' to 3', sets to 4'
High tide (7.1 ft at 10:40 am)	No wind
Warm and sunny	Fun session

First Session of 2014

Son Kevin and I were on our first surf session of the year, heading for Stinson or Bolinas. We came out of the forest on the Panoramic Highway and got our first glimpse of the sea. There was no white water at Bolinas. I mean zero, zip, nada; not at the Channel where there is always some white water or at the Patch. Surf forecasts were for a small NW swell with a "King" high tide (7.1 ft). Within two seconds, Bolinas was out and Stinson was our only choice.

At Stinson the waves looked like fun: small clean glassy curls, mixed in with a few larger close out walls. Jim the Stinson carpenter turned sculptor was sitting on the beach checking out the waves. I hadn't seen him in months. Jim grew up in Stinson and is an excellent surfer, but due to a shoulder separation he couldn't go surfing and was facing a few more months for recuperation. He pointer out that waves were good, especially at the peak just south of the lifeguard tower. We agreed.

While suiting up I thought that the conditions were perfect for me. I haven't surfed in three weeks and my arms were weak, the waves were "fun" size, small, glassy and good shape (no fear factor), and the weather was warm and sunny. I knew it was going to be a good session.

The waves didn't disappoint — frequent clean peelers breaking left and right. Catch a wave, paddle back out and immediately stroke into another one. With no wind, the surface was glassy smooth and no body else was out there. "Where is everyone? Where are the locals?" We couldn't believe it. The nearest surfer was 300 yards north of us. We had a great time. What a perfect start to the New Year.

The Searches

Two incidents of searches occurred today -

A tall thin stranger approached me as I was walking down the beach with my board before entering the water. He looked stressed and nervous. He asked if I had surfed here long — about 25 years I responded. He then requested that I keep an eye out for a bracelet that he had lost. He was visiting Stinson and went body surfing yesterday. He recalled that his bracelet felt loose, and sure enough after being pounded by a set wave, it was gone. He mentioned that the bracelet was special, made personally for him by a Buddhist monk in Viet Nam. He searched and searched yesterday and continued looking this morning. He posted notices all around the park offering a $175 reward.

"You just learned a hard lesson my friend," I said to him and pointed to my ring finger. "I always take my wedding ring off before surfing. The cold water causes the skin and fingers to contract. Thus you can't wear jewelry into the water."

I don't think he appreciated my comments. When we exited the water he was still searching and stopping others to inquire if they had seen it. Note - as of January 16th, one of his notices was still posted on the concrete slab in front of the showers.

All during our session, a huge red Coast Guard helicopter flew overhead — back and forth, up and down, out to sea and back again. They were obviously searching for someone in the water. They didn't fly over land or close to the cliffs. It must have been for someone who went overboard. After an hour a Coast Guard boat showed up and anchored a hundred yards offshore. Whatever they were looking for, they did not find it. We could still hear and see the helicopter as we changed out of our wetsuits.

"Kevin, this is a good application for drones — air-sea recues." With small inexpensive pilotless aircraft, the Coast Guard could launch fifty of them, cover a much wider area and keep the search going for a longer period of time. Each one could beam its video to a central site where a small crew would view them, all this at less cost. This will happen soon.

Kevin and I agreed, today was a great start to the New Year.

July 10, 2013 Wednesday

Pacifica	Linda Mar
8:50 am to 10:00 am	2’, sets to 3’, occasional 4’
Mid upcoming tide	Steady onshore breeze
Overcast – June gloom like	Fun session

Today was a day of firsts for me:

• First time surfing away from Bolinas since my operation last August.

• First time using my friend Brad’s surfboard.

• First time going through the new tunnel at Devil’s Slide

My surfing rehab began mid-January. The operation was the last week of August 2012, followed by 58 days of recuperating, a couple of surf sessions at the Patch, followed by an internal infection that put me back in the hospital for four days and out of the water for another three months. In January I returned to the Patch with weak arms and legs and messed up timing, but slowly, little by little I regained my strength and confidence. I have surfed 37 times since January, now my arms feel strong, my timing (read that as ability to pop up) has improved and I felt I was ready to branch out. With the small swells and south winds of the past two weeks, I had talked with Hank about going to Pacifica. When my son Kevin called yesterday about surfing with him and his girl friend Tori at Linda Mar, I said yes.

Nothing spectacular to report concerning the waves, it was an overcast ugly day with choppy blown out waves, but it felt good to jump into a new environment.

Today I rode my friend Brad's board for the first time. Brad, a life-long friend who lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico, asked me to store his board and to use it whenever I wanted to. He and I learned to surf together as kids, were surf buddies through high school and were roommates for four years at UC Santa Barbara. Recently Brad's daughter and her family lived in Manhattan Beach, thus Brad purchased an old Becker board to use whenever he visited them. A few months ago, Erin's husband transferred to San Francisco and they purchased a house in Greenbrae. Erin informed Brad that he had to move his board because she didn't have room to store it at her new house.

So it's Lorenzo to the rescue. I now have use of a 9' 4", 23 inches wide classic Becker longboard that is longer, wider and thicker than my 9' 2" Haut. It's a real paddling machine. This morning Tori used my Haut and I was on Brad's board for the first time. It floats me higher and paddles faster than the Haut. I loved it. I was able to catch waves while they were still flat and cruise into them like Jacek does. I now have a new Patch board.

After our hour session, Kevin had to head south to go to work at Oracle in Redwood City. He suggested that I join them at the Half Moon Bay Coffee House at the corner of Main Street and Highway 92 for breakfast. I was all for it because I would get to venture through the new tunnel that cut through the San Pedro Mountain to bypass the treacherous Devil's Slide.

The Tom Lantos tunnel opened to the public last March 6 and consists of a pair of north and south bound bores that run 4,200 feet through the mountain, providing two lanes in both directions, has 32 ventilation fans, is well lit, took six years to build and cost $439 million. The project was fully funded by Federal Emergency Relief funds, secured by Rep. Tom Lantos, who pushed Congress for years to approve the project. Stating that a tunnel was not feasible, CalTrans in the early 1990's proposed a new inland route around the mountain. The locals objected and via a 1997 ballot initiative voted 74% for a tunnel. Nine years later funding was finally secured and construction began and last March it finished.

For six years, I drove by the project on my way to surf breaks in Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz and each time was amazed by the scope of the project. Boring into the mountain began at the south end above Montara, and crews built a 162-foot long arch bridge on over a canyon that runs along the north side of the mountain. It was well worth it. What an impressive ride over the bridge and through the long bore to the other end. The tunnel journey is faster and safer. No more nail baiting glimpses over the 1000-foot cliff that drops into the sea and the crashing waves onto the rocks below. And the project is not done. The final phase is to convert the old Devil Slide road into bike and hiking trails.

If you ever get the chance to travel south to Half Moon Bay or Santa Cruz, take Highway 1 and enjoy the ride.

July 3, 2013 Wednesday

Bolinas	Channel
8:45 am to 10:15 am	2' to 3', occasional 4'
High upcoming tide	No wind to stiff west breeze
Low fog to patchy sunshine	Fun session

Russ the stand-up guy was toweling off when I arrived at 7:40. He claimed that for 45 minutes continuous three to four-foot waves came through Green Africa (the outside peak north of the Patch reef) and that he was on them until they died. The biology teachers, Kathy and Clark, came up the ramp while I was chatting with Russ and stated they had connected on several fun ones at the Channel. Bibbit and Jason, also school teachers on summer leave, came by on their way to the Channel. From the seawall I watched David who rides the Becker board glide into a couple of nice lefts at a peak half way between the Channel and the Groin wall. This morning the San Francisco buoy reported a 3-foot south swell at 15 seconds combined with a 3-foot north wind swell. I decided to join David at that fun peak between the Channel and the Groin.

After floundering around for an hour, I finally figured it out. The trick was to wait patiently outside, past everybody else, for the sets. They came in groups of four to six waves, with the third and fourth ones being the largest. I would sit way outside, let the first two waves go by and then connect on the third or fourth wave. I managed to catch them while they were still fairly flat, like Jacek the tattoo artist does. A wind swell on top of a ground swell would jump up, I would stroke like mad to catch it and the momentum of the wind swell would carry me over the edge of the ground swell. This left me with plenty of time to stand up and position my board high in the wave as I dropped over the ledge, resulting in a good, long ride.

Twice I changed pattern and took off late. I jumped up to my knees as white water was feathering in front of me, ducked under the curl of the first section, coasted out onto the shoulder, stood up and trimmed through the inside curl near the Groin pole. After an hour and a half, my spent arms were telling me it was time to head in. On my last ride, a sizeable wall broke on my back, pushing me into a mountain of white water, I jump to my knees, turned the board left with my hands and shot pass the breaking part of the wave into the curl that was reforming on the inside. I stood up to glide through the last part of the curl before the wave died in the deep water near the end of the Groin wall.

What a fun session I thought to myself as I walked up the beach. I glanced back to see David on another good one. David, who never gets out before 11 am, still had another forty-five minutes to go. I don't know how he does it.

June 28, 2013 Friday

Bolinas	Patch
8:15 am to 9:30 am	3' to 4', occasional 5'
Low dropping tide	Slight onshore breeze to NW cross wind
On-the-deck fog to patchy clouds, warm heat-wave weather	Fun session

Martha had just come from checking the waves as I pulled up this morning.

"So how is it?"

"I don't know, I couldn't see a thing. Don't bother taking your camera. The fog is too thick."

Fog was the story this morning. The Bay Area was locked into another high-pressure heat wave. Mill Valley was sunny and clear, but an On-The-Deck fog gripped the coast.

"Are you going out?"

"Yes, judging by the cars, several of the regulars are out there." That included: Mary, Hank, DB the Safeway checker, Jack the Dave Sweet team rider, Paul the Mill Valley swim coach, Mark the archaeologist, Jaime the starving artist cartoonist and stand-up guy Frank.

Martha was right, I couldn't see pass the shore break and could barely see the outline of the cliff. The fog had lifted a bit when I entered the water, but I still couldn't see any surfers from the shore. I figured I would paddled for the outside rock at the Patch and run into the crowd. I followed the white water pattern around the Patch reef rocks. I paddled a few minutes and didn't see anybody. I paddled some more and still didn't see anyone. I kept expecting to see the outside rock, but I never saw it. Finally south of me, I caught a glimpse of Frank on his stand-up. Next I saw the outline of Paul coming left on a slow three-foot wave coming towards me. To my surprise I was north of the crowd. I then began heading out and to the south, and a minute later I saw the rock, the crowd, paddled over to them and greeted them all.

"Temperamental south swell," that was what Hank called it afterwards while we were having breakfast at the Parkside in Stinson Beach, temperamental due to the long waits between sets. The swell was all over the place. This morning the San Francisco buoy reported 3 to 4-foot south swell at 15 seconds. A new south swell had arrived yesterday, was going to peak today and would slowly fade over the weekend.

When first out there, I missed a couple of set waves and decided to move in a little. Hank and Martha remained outside, some thirty yards beyond the outside rock. Then they began paddling out and so did I. Three big waves broke fifteen yards beyond them with me scratching like mad behind them. All three of us had to plough through a ton of white water. This was typical of this morning. Long periods of small waves breaking near the rock to infrequent sets that broke twenty to thirty yards further out. With the thick fog, we couldn't see the sets coming and were often caught inside.

My first wave was my best ride. I took off on a wall that stretched across the impact zone. I turned left while white water slid down the face in front of me, cruised under it, climbed back into the swell, positioned high in the curl, locked my inside rail under the peeling lip, crouched down and cruised through a fast section. I cut back to stay in the wave and pushed it as far I could.

Jaime was back in water today and cruising after his run-in with some rocks at the Patch that injured his ribs. I watched him catch a set wave and milk it all the way into the inside, near the rocks that had injured him. He handled it with skill and grace - "no harm, no foul."

Hank gave me that one more wave sign and proceeded outside. He connected on a four-foot set wave and kept coming and coming. I caught a good side view of him locked in the curl, mid-board, mid-wave as he sailed by me. He calmly kept going and working that wave all the way to shore. I'll swear he traveled nearly a quarter mile.

We ended this beautiful morning with a good breakfast at the Parkside.

  

June 17, 2013 Monday

Bolinas	Groin
8:20 am to 9:40 am	0 ft, sets 1' to 2'
High dropping tide	Offshore breeze to stiff NW cross wind
Clear sunny morning	Exercise session

A Beautiful Flat Morning

As you can see in the above photo, it was a beautiful morning with no waves.

Ten people were out at the Channel at 7:20 am. As I walked from the ramp to the Groin, no one caught a wave. In fact nothing remotely rideable came through. Finally a couple of two-footers arrived, a guy I didn't recognize caught the first one and a goofy-foot female caught the second one. Everyone else remained sitting there waiting for who knows what. A few minutes later another set of two-footers appeared and the same two caught them. When they exited the water I finally recognized them — Clark and Kathy, the biology teachers.

"Loren, it's cold out there," Clark greeted me. "It must be 48 degrees. This past weekend's wind has stirred up the water."

Surf predictions for this morning were dismal — Stormsurf.com's graphic for the whole North Bay (Point Reyes to Santa Cruz) depicted a 1.5 foot north combined with a 1.4 south resulting in one to two-foot swells for the whole area. With glassy conditions this morning and declining swells for the rest of the week, I decided to go out.

The others out at the Channel were Hank (his first day back from a week trip to Kansas), David who rides the Becker board, Russ on his stand-up, and Bill from Berkeley on his wave-ski. Mary and Creighton were out at the Patch.

The waves were nothing to write about. I managed to catch several tiny ones that forced me to work on jumping up. Thanks to Clark's warning I wore gloves, and despite that protection after an hour my hands were going numb. Hank was the first of us to go in and I followed him in a few minutes later. At 9:53 precisely, while I was changing, David came by — a new early exit record for him. He usually stays out until eleven.

The highlight of the morning was two ospreys diving for fish. These incredible fliers would circle about twenty feet above the water, swoop down to the surface and with a small splash would hook a fish with their claws, and immediately take off with a fish dangling below them. Then the race was on, seagulls would pursue them attempting to steal their catch. Fortunately both ospreys outmaneuvered the gulls.

Yes it was another beautiful morning in Marin.