Surf? I've been surfing
A lot has been happening in my non-surfing life, causing me to ignore this blog. Poor blog. Poor Blog. But I have been surfing when I can. There's nothing really to write about from the local front. Just as everyone else has been saying, the surf has been less than marginal. Poor, gutless, wind blown knee slappers. I did get to go out and surf a couple of new spots, err, relatively new to me. Those were fun sessions.
Then I ended up down in Mexico for some warm water, uncrowded surf. The breaks I ended up at were fun; kinda scarier than I am used to. This is partly because the lineup is pretty scarce and I surfed alone. There were plenty of internal conflict on whether to paddle out or not. I skipped a world class break because I would have ended up out there by myself. In retrospect, I should of at least gone out to check it out.
I got one memorable session the day after a tropical storm blew through. The tide was high, and the waves were peaky and wedgey. Mostly head high peaks that threw over and fizzled away, but I had to get in and get a few. A channel was running right near the outside peak and paddling outside was easy. I made a dry hair paddle out and in no time, I was sitting on the outside; watching schools of fish reflect off the light as small swell lines pulsed through. Schools of flying fish were jumping in and out of the water also. With the tide high, most of the waves would roll all the way to the inside and break in the shallows. You'd have to wait for the bigger sets to come through.
I positioned on the second outside peak and just waited. People were taking waves when they can; but I waited. After feeling more comfortable, I started paddling for some of the peaks that came through. The first one I stroked into was a small warm-up wave. I paddled back out with a little more confidence to pick some of the bigger ones. When one did come by, I turned and paddled, and got to my feet at the top of the wave. It threw over and I was speeding down the line of this head high peeler. I didn't come off the top or anything like that, but I did make a clean exit and paddled back out for more. I grabbed a few more just like that and headed in. It was the last session before jumping on an airplane, and I am glad I got a few.
It was definitely a confidence booster and was a stokey session. When I got back, I ended up surfing a nice lonely peak that I shared with two other surfers. I felt more comfortable and am waiting for those bigger fall swell lines to show itself.