Sunday, September 16, 2007

Ropy signs of fall.


A quick trip back to clear the mailbox and the mind. Saturday morning was a glassy inconsistent head high west swell, just a few heads in town. Two big football games and a regional beer fest took it's toll on the weekend crew, plus the Either/Or surf contest down the road in LC, had a good handful of the locals down that way.

Beauty afternoon though as Andy, Nm and I headed over the dune for the righthanders. Long lulls punctuated with solid sets of 3 and 4 waves, just had to paddle like hell to stay around the take-off spot. Decent rides of 75 yards were available on the good ones.

Later in the afternoon on the full tide, a peak with a few guys on it was throwing with authority. Sets outside the crab pots were in the 1 1/2 to 2x overhead, big indicators were giving signals from the north and then layed down lines like uncoiled ropes to us on the next peak south. A wicked south bound sideshore current kept trying to keep us out of the zone. Some screamers on the fish took me to the 2nd to last house on the dunes and then the bitch paddle back up against the gut....... The pots and the murky water as well as the sealions hanging around, kept me aware it's fall and it's that time of the year again, shivery time.

What am I mumbling about? This is an email that I got from a friend today..........

"we had a shark scare saturday. a friend was just getting ready to jump in when he saw a sea lion getting bit. the guy made it in, but lost one of his flippers. another sea lion was outside freaking out. even made the news last night. i was still at work, but was going to be there within the hour."

and then I checked the news, sure enough...........

"i got the call it was going off at 4 and i would have been in the water by 5. the sighting call came in at 4:15. it was a big one too. the sea lion he got is still alive because he also was a big one and must have put up a helluva fight. i feel like i knew that damn sea lion because he was always out there with us, actually surfing the waves. i surfed it alone the day before for about 1.5 hours in murky waters too. the sighting made the news (kptv) last night."

Keep your eyes peeled.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

glad you had some fun!

Wave Farmer said...

My trek today yielded:

-A dessicated baby shark carcass being worried by a miniature schnauzer

-Plunging of the hand into the freaky weird soft body/tenatacles of a jellyfish...minor freak, like seeing a mouse...slight sting

-Banter about last night USCG rescue off the south rocks at IB

-Sea Lion popping up on the inside about 5 feet away..."Nice Ride!" he said..."Damn! A talking sea lion", I thought to myself.

Hope you're well...call if you need anything

ras said...

great post G. I love the desciptions of paddling against the sideshore. and the sea lion too.

glad to see tht your son is doing well. cheers.