SURF: Waist to Shoulder high waves. Fairly clean, but a little swamped with the tide.

Gear: 7’4.

With the Stewart in the shop being patched up, the 7’4 was a good choice for a little paddle practice. The waves cooperated enough that I could paddle out without too much trouble, but still get into position on a steeper wave to really try the board out.

I caught two waves.

I faceplanted them both.

It’s all practice. I practiced being in the right spot to catch a wave, I practiced paddling, I practiced safely tumbling around in the wash after pearling a board.

I’ve been practicing a lot of things lately.

I’ve been under the weather a bit. My thyroid has been out of whack. It’s a reoccurring problem, this time cause when my doctor was unable to give me a new prescription before my old one ran out. It pretty much makes me tired beyond tired. No amount of sleep can make me feel better and since I know sleeping in will do me no good, I get up early and surf instead. I ache, my muscles are tired and I can barely keep up, but I keep going. I keep practicing.

The more engaged I can keep my mind and body, through surfing, skiing, biking, skateboarding, anything, the easier a time I think I will have hanging in there till my system recovers. I take on the challenging surf days, THEN sleep in, exhausted for good reason and resting deservedly. Like in surfing, I’m learning to practice balance.

Photo by Cynthia

SURF: 1-3ft. Light winds. Warm and sunny.
Gear: 9’4 Stewart, 8’3 Petty

The winter has done some strange things here in Norther California.

A giant chunk of Sloat is missing and a new beach seems to have appeared smack in the middle of Cowells. The spot where I picked off wave after wave back in November is now occupied by families grilling up burgers and lounging in the sun.

The waves were still mellow, but the crowd is a bit more compact. I was unable to navigate 20+ people got get down the line and get the long rides of last November. But the sun was warm and it was a good day out overall.

I spent a little time picking off waves at Indicators before heading back to the pack at Cowells. Had a minor tangle up with Cynthia on a wave resulting in a broken rail on my board. She uses Protek fins so the damage was minor. I ran up the cliff, grabbed the 8’3 and went back out for a few more waves.

One highlight for the day: spotted a sea otter at Indicators. I hadn’t seen one in the wild before. They are really dang cute.

Another weekend up in Tahoe. Ahh mountains.

I decided this weekend to work on my charge. When my life feels out of control, I hold back when I surf. I get scared of steep waves, I don’t like speed. I have more experience skiing than surfing and took the opportunity to get my charge back. I took my runs with lots more speed, worked on tightening up my form, even got more air and more tree time than before. It’s nice to get a little oomf back.

Now if the surf will just cooperate, I can throw some charge into the waves!

Surf: 2-4ft, clean, inconsistent. Dark.

After Tuesdays bigger wave morning, I was pretty excited to hear the swell was dying down. At high tide the waves were mushy. It was an easy paddle with lots of sprinting for mushy waves. I wound up doing a fair amount of kooky riding, trying to make bottom turns standing on my nose.

I surfed till I couldn’t see, went home, packed a bag for Tahoe. California living is pretty special.

Surf: 4-10ft, 20s period. Raining, Windy.
Gear: RipCurl G-Bomb and 7’4 roundtail.

We’ve had storm after storm the last few months. I’ve watched the buoys spike, heard the rain pounding away at my windows, and grumbled about how it was soo big and too rough to go out. I had a new wetsuit and a new board but no beautiful day to try them both out on.

Sometimes you have to suck it up and take on unruly surf.

Josh talked me in to a dawn patrol at Lindy. Long period waves were pitching into closeouts but I did manage to paddle out AND paddle back in without getting stomped. Didn’t catch a wave, but got to claim some success in at least getting out in conditions I’m not comfortable with.

The waves were really beautiful, giant blue-grey walls on a big grey black sky. Slices of whitewater peaking through right before it slammed shut in a curtain of whitewater and a roar of spray. Not too shabby too look it. The rain wasn’t mixing well with the salt water so there was a sliver layer on top disappearing into the sea. Pretty cool.

The new wetsuit is amazing. Warm, flexible, no flushing. I’ve always liked my old suit. It’s sturdy, warm and comfortable, but the G Bomb is very toasty. Even in the pouring rain and howling winds I stayed warm and even a little dry. Definitely digging the upgrade.

Surf: Shoulder High to Well Overhead waves. Jumbled up, short period surf. Angry.

I’ll admit it, I’m a little out of shape. 20 days between surf session is killer for surfing fitness. I’ve tried to do at least 20 pushups a day (made it to 40! yay!) but there’s no substitute for water time. That said, the Jetty was seriously unruly today. Waves were double and tripple stacked with little time in between sets to paddle out. With most sets being well over head high it was not the day to be on a longboard at the Jetty.

About the third or fourth time I was pushed back I thought to myself “Am I really about to get denied at the JETTY?”
I fought for a while, but I love my board and that pounding break was not looking exciting. I didn’t want to snap my board or fight that hard so I rode some white water like a kook, called it a day. Sigh.

After some pizza, a little surf shop browsing, I headed home. My friend Frankie had a new loaner board waiting for me. Yay! Nothing rounds off a seriously punishing session like having a new board to wax. It’s a 7’4, with a pretty mellow rocker. I’m hoping it will help me get used to riding a shorter board since it does not require the steeper waves my 6’8 requires. It is still plenty thick so I will most likely not be duck diving any time soon, but hopefully will help me get the feel of less float and more turning ability.

Surf: Still stormy and angry. But it’s 50 and sunny in Tahoe! Go Snow!

While everyone else was watching Mavericks, I was off skiing. The weather was pretty beautiful. I spent the weekend trying to work on my technique and get my comfort level for speed back up. I figure if I can get more comfortable going fast on skis, maybe facing a head high drop on a short board won’t be so intimidating. Having learned to ski when I was a little kid, it’s coming back pretty easy. I wish I had those skills to apply to surfing. Too bad I didn’t get the chance to learn when I was a little grom.

Surf: Knee to Waist High. Clean, but inconsistent.

Lovely morning. The moon was setting over the ocean, lighting up the water like a big ole painting. I watched the little waves for a while waiting for Chuck arrive. We paddled out to small waves, great for a longboard but a little trickier for Chuck on the shortboard.

I got a few mellow rides. The best wave of the morning went to Chuck. He’d called me into the wave, but it was the first good sized wave all morning so I called him into it instead. He got a nice little ride out of it.

I love calm mornings.

SURF: 4-8ft.

I met a few stokereporters out for dawn patrol at Ocean Beach. I was optimistically assured by Josh it would be a nice 3-5 and good practice on the shortboard. Arg.

It was definitely bigger than I was expecting. I still haven’t been able to duck dive my 6’8 so all and all the morning was much harder than I anticipated. I let Veronica borrow my 7 that is nearly impossible to duck dive. She wound up ditching it and swimming with it in tow. I wanted to do things my way so she made it out and I didn’t.

Ahh well. It was a beautiful morning regardless. I did manage to bruise my leg up pretty good in the shorebreak. I’m not exactly sure what law of physics ocean beach had to break to administer that beatdown, but I got beatdown pretty good.

SURF: UNNNG.
SNOW: 4-6ft.

It’s been raining and raining and raining. The surf is jumbled, big, messy, not to mention the sewer overflows. Eww.

But when it rains, it snows.

Laura, Sahana and I booked it to Tahoe to pick off some snow. After a month of barely surfing, it felt so great to get on skis and go. I haven’t skied in years (I can’t remember the last time I went) but it all came back pretty quickly and I had a blast. Tahoe is really beautiful.

Big fluffy snowflakes are a good thing to keep in mind when it’s shin deep puddles and slopsurf. It’s gotta be snowing somewhere!