***Official 2021 Community Surf Journal***

Aruka

Tom Curren status
Feb 23, 2010
11,981
22,510
113
PNW
Horrendous weather here for the past few days and the foreseeable future. Prob could have driven an hour+ for some stormy groveling but instead opting to pack up the camper blow this popsicle stand.
 

oeste858

Phil Edwards status
Sep 11, 2017
6,931
17,272
113
San Diego, CA
fun NewYearsDay afternoon surf in chest-HH skatepark conditions at reef #1. An outer reef was bigger and better and I saw my neighbor get a bomb left on his signature green board. But I only had 45min until the kids woke up from naps, so I stayed at the main break and tried to get as many rights as I could in a spread out takeoff zone with about 10-15 guys. Hadn't ridden the eps Tomo x-wing in a few weeks, put in the grey & bamboo muchacho thrusters that I love and it was a good fit for the playful waves: slashes, schwacks, floaters, and pulling into closeout sections. Water was chilly but sunny and clear skies. Everyone seems to be feeling friendly and optimistic after turning the page on the dumpster fire of last year. 2021 can only be better! Looks like there might be some ghost / blackbird conditions the next couple weeks!
 

chilly1

Nep status
Jan 4, 2010
734
1,094
93
NYD dawn patrol thought swell would be pulsing (like it was this morning!) but only like HH-ish (at the smallest spot in bay area zone) first wave caught with unexpected backwash jack, composed of bottom to run down the line but a nice curl called for semi stall and nice little, albeit brief, vision and clean exit. A good way to kick off the aqua year!
 

Mr J

Michael Peterson status
Aug 18, 2003
2,250
1,454
113
Regional Vic, Australia
The waves are much bigger and the paddle-outs more brutal and I get fewer waves per session as the ocean is a lot more unforgiving with a much larger playing field but yeah, I guess not too much changes. Still mostly solo sessions too. :roflmao:
I'm living in the equivalent of your place. I went surfing on New Year's Day in the open ocean beach break. No one else in, clean surface conditions, but swell confused from overnight windswell. I caught one bloody wave and that closed out on me, but at least I made the bottom turn. The conditions largely explains why I had the place to myself, another reason would be that others did more celebrating than me.

It's a quiet place in winter, but a holiday town this time of the year. I thought about giving one of the busy sheltered spots a go in the evening, but went skateboarding instead. The previous open ocean session paid off though - two bumpy waves, but decent power and far more satisfying than the dribble that would have been offer in the sheltered spots.

Taking a couple of days rest, sore muscles, overall had a good run of waves recently. I'll go in tomorrow.
 

Brsnstein

OTF status
Jul 28, 2018
250
479
63
SoCal
South Bay NYD was surprisingly fun. After a few consecutive sessions of generally surfing like sh!t (dicking around with fins with occasional moments of relief), things finally came together. Got a few 100 yd+ lefts that allowed for some quick hits between racing sections, but the highlight was running right that let me lay into turn before the end section.

Same spot today. A touch bigger, but more walled. Mostly just racing before kicking out or punching through, but finished on a good two turn left.

One month old blindbox thumb is dialed in and feels awesome
 

b.r.

Phil Edwards status
Dec 19, 2003
5,921
3,033
113
Leucadia
www.youtube.com
Just had the best session of the year. Had a bunch of full speed racer right handers and on one I got to lay it over on the rail at the end with a violent hack. A guy paddled down from the next spot up and said you are getting some smoking waves and we took turns on the sets. A good friend paddled out and I gave him the next set he raced it all the way to the next spot down. He paddled back out and sat out the back all of a sudden yelled look a whale . And sure enough a smallish grey whale I’m guessing was right in the outside line up. Yewww. Sitting in jacuzzi now soaking old bones.
 

doc_flavonoid

Billy Hamilton status
Dec 27, 2019
1,740
3,198
113
I'm living in the equivalent of your place. I went surfing on New Year's Day in the open ocean beach break. No one else in, clean surface conditions, but swell confused from overnight windswell. I caught one bloody wave and that closed out on me, but at least I made the bottom turn. The conditions largely explains why I had the place to myself, another reason would be that others did more celebrating than me.

It's a quiet place in winter, but a holiday town this time of the year. I thought about giving one of the busy sheltered spots a go in the evening, but went skateboarding instead. The previous open ocean session paid off though - two bumpy waves, but decent power and far more satisfying than the dribble that would have been offer in the sheltered spots.

Taking a couple of days rest, sore muscles, overall had a good run of waves recently. I'll go in tomorrow.
ok ill play.

nyd. while k was practicing duck dives, hit up a little nook i figured would have a few. figured it would be borderline small but surprised with the amount of quality swell in the water.

not as surprised at the crowd factor. stayed manageable at 5 and under but the wfh rando scene is fvcking weird.

two instalocs from 5 fvchn hrs away thinking they were running the show. one guy giving the hard stare while his bud is hand signaling directions. been a few decades since i lived in sc, but fuk me runnin guys do this sh!t down there now.

nother dude shows up with his caravan of two pos trailers, piles out with like 8 rugrats and a couple chicks. board under his arm askingme if im going out. ? trying to wrap my head around this dudes mormon game but then he goes and bends my ear in the water about how jacked his shoulder is. i forget trying to figure out how hes banging the two chickys and popping out babies cause he talks all the time and cant catch sh!t and eventually gets washed. thank fvcking god.

by this time im wondering if anybody i know is ever going to show up for a couple. not that i like other surfers all that much but a familiar face would be more relatable than the sc bros about now.

finally a stoked out loc from up north clammers out a bit before dusk and starts tossing buckets. not the sharpest knife in the drawer but no denying his enthusiasm.

beautiful afternoon and lots of waves
 
Last edited:

Senor Sopa

Billy Hamilton status
Mar 11, 2015
1,366
2,176
113
Ponto
nyd. while k was practicing duck dives, hit up a little nook i figured would have a few. figured it would be borderline small but surprised with the amount of quality swell in the water.

finally a stoked out loc from up north clammers out a bit before dusk and starts tossing buckets. not the sharpest knife in the drawer but no denying his enthusiasm.

beautiful afternoon and lots of waves
Wowzers, doc_flavs with the quotables. Were you so enthusiastic when we were 16?

This is good chit "finally a stoked out loc from up north clammers out a bit before dusk and starts tossing buckets"
Leaverite can you help us translate. lol. I miss surfing with guys like this.

Today was full on stokaboka for me. Double session, super rare. A day where "All you waves belong to me". It's not always like this, been surfing this chunk of ocean for 30+ years. Always there on the best days, know all the dudes, all the history, blah blah. This was on top of that, just on "ON" day.
So much stuff, This is gonna be long. Hope I can entertain. Maybe some quoteables.

Wakeup, check the random free cam at 6:15 that has incredible low-light. It's never good when you see people coming in that early in the day. Dude was doing keep turning around am I blowing look back. Hmm, not going out. Cranked out dishes from last nights pizza extravaganza (need separate thread for that). Slept bad last night, went back to bed 730 to 8:15. Yeah guy, whole new day, check the cam, looking fun now. Drive down to Crowdiff, paddle out at 9 to catch the peak tide push. Was well rewarded with fast shredable wall/sections to the beach, surprisingly uncrowdiffed. Part of waves to jam, parts to put on edge on do full roundies.

One wave, as I'm hitting the inside shorie section, bro on shoulder points to beach. Meaning, "Hey, I can see this one is going to set up awesome, but you need to fade to set up for the deep to drive goods". It worked splendidly with fade turning into backdoor "barrel" This is Crowdiff, we don't do proper barrels here. Dude this afternoon pulled into barrel, did not end well, we'll get back to that. I don't know where everybody else surfs, but I really like a wave that has multiple sections, and can actually get bigger as you ride through different areas of the lineup. Anyways, the high tide session was super fun, no probs with crowds and kooks. 000 would have dominated the lefts!

Funny chit, at one point, I'm sitting on the boils five other guys around me. I'm old, these guys were all mid 60's. Old time bro from Black's on giant paddle board, walrus stach kneeboarder, guy on finless, Cravey on the 11' double eagle, and some guy that sucks, I say "You guys make me feel like a kid", they didn't laugh.

Bro on SUB somehow got into incident and his paddle got ran over and snapped in half dangling, didn't see it, but saw paddle :poke:

I turned around and admired the houses on the road above rail tracks, wondering where Machado was surfing today.

Round two, leave house at 2:15. Back to same spot, swell has increased, it is completely glassy, and tide is going out until sunset. I live for this.

Beach area is madhouse, I'm thinking about quadruple backup parking options. Just about to hit the entrance to lot, I see gentleman and wife with fluffy looking like they're leaving, I pull in and up, window down, "Sir, do you have any Grey Poupon?". I didn't, but still got only space in the lot, instantly. Good omens abound, going to be a good session!

I took these right before paddling out. I caught better ones.
20210102_142809[1].jpg
20210102_142811[1].jpg

20210102_142812[1].jpg

As I mentioned earlier, this was somehow "my" day where I caught the best wave of each set. "It's nice to be king". Caught double handfuls of knife drops to max rail bottom turns and full speed top turn compressions to get to next bottoms turns. Full drive speed runs. If I did top gouging, it was a weak one. PPK sees this done at his spot every day. One wave I felt bad as I went in front of rando. By the time I hit first turn and acceleration, rando never had a chance, never was going to make it either. Other wave, a kid I know from PPP was deep, he barked, lol, more like a yelp, two guys in front of me pulled back. Same thing, after one turn, it was clear it wasn't a burn, it was pure left in dust, spinning wheels. LOL, kid has worked me at PPP, payback. When this happens to me, I try to think that I got honestly burned, and really had no chance.

Funny/cool chit.
Somehow wind up talking with guy, he mentions his son was out in morning and he was filming. I asked "Vans logo"? Kinda surprised, he said yes. I laughed and mentioned session two months ago or so at PPP where he and his pals just aboluly worked me over. I said now that I know dad, it's all cool. Later on, in the lot, I'm out of wetsuit, kid catches one, carves it up and pulls a big floater on end section, looked like some credible horizontal air, comes in. As always lately, car is right there, pretty much next to me, kid comes walking up, all stocked from his double session today. I call out, "Hey, I saw that wave!". Kid was stocked. Now, I kinda have a beef with this kid, but since I met pops and told him the PPP story, we're cool. Kid don't know this though, walk over and say, "Here's the deal, I'll be cool with you and your friends here, but you guys gots to be cool with me at PPP next season". Kid had such a stocked day, he agreed, heh heh heh.

Poor dad though. Remember earlier, about we don't do barrels here? Pop pulled in on the shorepound and snapped his
looked to me brand new Christenson in half, with a buckle next to the snap. OUCH.

Sick chit.
For a year, the state dredged the lagoon from pretty far inland. the flow right now is triple stanky.
What am I to think of dads teaching 5 year olds "to surf" in the whitewash were all the taint is just plain sintky at best? I hold my breath when I'm coming in through this and can't hit the shower fast enough!
 

MathDebater

Michael Peterson status
Apr 13, 2016
2,580
6,117
113
SD
First surf of the year, forecast was for some size but buoy readings didn’t agree. Took my banjo and blackbird and figured I’d have fun one way or another. Definitely did. Rode the banjo in 3-5’ relatively consistent sets with some fun sections. A few head dips and fin drifts made the year start right!
 

Havoc

Phil Edwards status
May 23, 2016
7,680
12,214
113
in da hood next to paradise
ok ill play.

nyd. while k was practicing duck dives, hit up a little nook i figured would have a few. figured it would be borderline small but surprised with the amount of quality swell in the water.

not as surprised at the crowd factor. stayed manageable at 5 and under but the wfh rando scene is fvcking weird.

two instalocs from 5 fvchn hrs away thinking they were running the show. one guy giving the hard stare while his bud is hand signaling directions. been a few decades since i lived in sc, but fuk me runnin guys do this sh!t down there now.

nother dude shows up with his caravan of two pos trailers, piles out with like 8 rugrats and a couple chicks. board under his arm askingme if im going out. ? trying to wrap my head around this dudes mormon game but then he goes and bends my ear in the water about how jacked his shoulder is. i forget trying to figure out how hes banging the two chickys and popping out babies cause he talks all the time and cant catch sh!t and eventually gets washed. thank fvcking god.

by this time im wondering if anybody i know is ever going to show up for a couple. not that i like other surfers all that much but a familiar face would be more relatable than the sc bros about now.

finally a stoked out loc from up north clammers out a bit before dusk and starts tossing buckets. not the sharpest knife in the drawer but no denying his enthusiasm.

beautiful afternoon and lots of waves
ur like the west coast ver of sharkbiscuit
 

doc_flavonoid

Billy Hamilton status
Dec 27, 2019
1,740
3,198
113
Wowzers, doc_flavs with the quotables. Were you so enthusiastic when we were 16?

This is good chit "finally a stoked out loc from up north clammers out a bit before dusk and starts tossing buckets"
Leaverite can you help us translate. lol. I miss surfing with guys like this.

Today was full on stokaboka for me. Double session, super rare. A day where "All you waves belong to me". It's not always like this, been surfing this chunk of ocean for 30+ years. Always there on the best days, know all the dudes, all the history, blah blah. This was on top of that, just on "ON" day.
So much stuff, This is gonna be long. Hope I can entertain. Maybe some quoteables.

Wakeup, check the random free cam at 6:15 that has incredible low-light. It's never good when you see people coming in that early in the day. Dude was doing keep turning around am I blowing look back. Hmm, not going out. Cranked out dishes from last nights pizza extravaganza (need separate thread for that). Slept bad last night, went back to bed 730 to 8:15. Yeah guy, whole new day, check the cam, looking fun now. Drive down to Crowdiff, paddle out at 9 to catch the peak tide push. Was well rewarded with fast shredable wall/sections to the beach, surprisingly uncrowdiffed. Part of waves to jam, parts to put on edge on do full roundies.

One wave, as I'm hitting the inside shorie section, bro on shoulder points to beach. Meaning, "Hey, I can see this one is going to set up awesome, but you need to fade to set up for the deep to drive goods". It worked splendidly with fade turning into backdoor "barrel" This is Crowdiff, we don't do proper barrels here. Dude this afternoon pulled into barrel, did not end well, we'll get back to that. I don't know where everybody else surfs, but I really like a wave that has multiple sections, and can actually get bigger as you ride through different areas of the lineup. Anyways, the high tide session was super fun, no probs with crowds and kooks. 000 would have dominated the lefts!

Funny chit, at one point, I'm sitting on the boils five other guys around me. I'm old, these guys were all mid 60's. Old time bro from Black's on giant paddle board, walrus stach kneeboarder, guy on finless, Cravey on the 11' double eagle, and some guy that sucks, I say "You guys make me feel like a kid", they didn't laugh.

Bro on SUB somehow got into incident and his paddle got ran over and snapped in half dangling, didn't see it, but saw paddle :poke:

I turned around and admired the houses on the road above rail tracks, wondering where Machado was surfing today.

Round two, leave house at 2:15. Back to same spot, swell has increased, it is completely glassy, and tide is going out until sunset. I live for this.

Beach area is madhouse, I'm thinking about quadruple backup parking options. Just about to hit the entrance to lot, I see gentleman and wife with fluffy looking like they're leaving, I pull in and up, window down, "Sir, do you have any Grey Poupon?". I didn't, but still got only space in the lot, instantly. Good omens abound, going to be a good session!

I took these right before paddling out. I caught better ones.
View attachment 103104
View attachment 103102

View attachment 103103

As I mentioned earlier, this was somehow "my" day where I caught the best wave of each set. "It's nice to be king". Caught double handfuls of knife drops to max rail bottom turns and full speed top turn compressions to get to next bottoms turns. Full drive speed runs. If I did top gouging, it was a weak one. PPK sees this done at his spot every day. One wave I felt bad as I went in front of rando. By the time I hit first turn and acceleration, rando never had a chance, never was going to make it either. Other wave, a kid I know from PPP was deep, he barked, lol, more like a yelp, two guys in front of me pulled back. Same thing, after one turn, it was clear it wasn't a burn, it was pure left in dust, spinning wheels. LOL, kid has worked me at PPP, payback. When this happens to me, I try to think that I got honestly burned, and really had no chance.

Funny/cool chit.
Somehow wind up talking with guy, he mentions his son was out in morning and he was filming. I asked "Vans logo"? Kinda surprised, he said yes. I laughed and mentioned session two months ago or so at PPP where he and his pals just aboluly worked me over. I said now that I know dad, it's all cool. Later on, in the lot, I'm out of wetsuit, kid catches one, carves it up and pulls a big floater on end section, looked like some credible horizontal air, comes in. As always lately, car is right there, pretty much next to me, kid comes walking up, all stocked from his double session today. I call out, "Hey, I saw that wave!". Kid was stocked. Now, I kinda have a beef with this kid, but since I met pops and told him the PPP story, we're cool. Kid don't know this though, walk over and say, "Here's the deal, I'll be cool with you and your friends here, but you guys gots to be cool with me at PPP next season". Kid had such a stocked day, he agreed, heh heh heh.

Poor dad though. Remember earlier, about we don't do barrels here? Pop pulled in on the shorepound and snapped his
looked to me brand new Christenson in half, with a buckle next to the snap. OUCH.

Sick chit.
For a year, the state dredged the lagoon from pretty far inland. the flow right now is triple stanky.
What am I to think of dads teaching 5 year olds "to surf" in the whitewash were all the taint is just plain sintky at best? I hold my breath when I'm coming in through this and can't hit the shower fast enough!
epic sopa but youll be feelin the dubble sesh tomorrow. king for a day, queen the next.

swell headed your way... ask me how i know
 
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jkb

Tom Curren status
Feb 22, 2005
10,041
8,978
113
Central California
glad JKB got this posted. I had a post up and ready to go... but I didn't surf.... so I couldn't bring myself to snake him like that. maybe next year!
I snaked Oceanslide on this thing since he was usually the one who put it up but he was late one year, I had surfed, and was ready to post my journal entry.

BTW, got some smokers this morning at the spot you mentioned yesterday ;)
 

b.r.

Phil Edwards status
Dec 19, 2003
5,921
3,033
113
Leucadia
www.youtube.com
Spent the morning prepping for my reality tv show I am starring in which starts back up tomorrow morning and waited until the tide dropped and hoped for a repeat of last night but it was bumpy bigger and more closed out. Played cat n mouse with the sets and snagged 3 legit down the line waves in the midst of a ton of close outs. 3 counts as a session according to dAily Dale so I called it a day. 3/3 in 2021.