Beeg! Twelve and a half feet at Fifteen secs.

On the road again.......

Rain or snow for the entire drive south, loads of traffic. Got in the water at a spot, an off the beaten path reef break. Lotsa punch, head and a half on the sets. Grey and sharky just like home complete with sketchy cliff climb back. Just a few people out though a good vibe, empty waters north and south of us as far as the mist would let you see.


Today the sun came out and surf town was packed everywhere. We surfed with 70 of our closest friends. Hope you had fun......

Clay imitates Rock.

Inset or alongside.....? Artwork by Clayfin. Gift from my sweets.

Cutting edge tech......

I left the North Shore and instead of ending up in Alaska I found myself surfing the north-west in 1979.... the water was cold, the air was colder and I being a warm water surfer up till then, was horribly uncomfortable. Seattle and the coast was a surfing wasteland in that there were no surf shops to be found. Coastals headed south to buy gear and I had picked up a wetsuit maybe in Portland I can't remember where, a White Stag. A diver's suit really thicker and stiffer than usual seams untaped and it leaked through every stitch hole like a sieve, what a disaster that was.

Before getting another wetsuit I started looking into dry suits. Windsurfing was starting to take off and Helly Hansen made one, paper thin, all white a great adjunct to the all black wetsuits required north of the Golden Gate bridge, nothing to it....... that's what's I had to have and only $200 in 1981 dollars!
(Whidbey Island 1982)

I figured with some decent polypropylene underneath I should be warm as toast and extra flexible as I was not being wrapped in a 5mm wetsuit...... these are the sorts of things dreams are made of. For once I was spearheading a new trend not just part of the masses. I envisioned a possible sponsorship from HH as their sales in the north-west skyrocketed amongst surfers!

Damn was I wrong! That thin latex gave very little thermal value (i.e. I was colder than ever!)..... and I sweated now and the sweat got cold, this was going badly! If I got a pinhole leak, I was drenched and instantly cold. And a constant flush came through if the leak was in the water. A rip and it could be serious, like sinking to the bottom serious. There was no way it was possible to get out of the suit in an emergency of that sort anyway, it was not well thought this plan of mine....... And I had all kinds of issues with getting gloves to work too and ended up wearing dish washing gloves the most because they worked with the wrist gussets best, but my hands froze!
(Wetspot)

I also had to "burp" the suit whenever I zipped up, the gussets were tight enough to keep all the air inside and it made duck diving impossible! But the fear of a fin cut and the clammy underclothes after each session that defeated the word "dry" inherent in the suit, forced me to return to old ways. I gave it a decent shot, surfed that suit in some good conditions, averting any catastrophes along the way, but after a few months I returned to rubber. No sponsorship and no revolution.....

(unknown spot)

Merry Christmas!

A nice cold empty one.......


Santa dropped off a couple this year....

Darwinian......

Sometimes a go out shouldn't happen, like today for instance.......



Rolling logs in the shorie breaking up against the sand dune.........



If you have to do this walk at this beach...... you shouldn't be going out.


A high tide of 9.6ft and a swell height of 17ft...............
Another log rang the bell of the dory launch sign at the far end of the beach at the same time these two were getting their surf on.


Surge enough to sweep you off your feet......


Luckily for them there was no rescue today, or worse.......

5 days of good surf.

In a row,in December,in Oregon,is rare.
It has apparently infuriated my rash guard....... because my neck is sporting a lovely red irritated glaze.

Storm's aftermath.

This bar is brand spankin' new, this was shot just past high tide's peak. Low tide just before dark paddled out to get some fun ones as the light faded. The wave was now a full racer on the shallows. One wave ran from the house with 8 eyes, past the sign and kicking out around brown house. Double it's regular length. The peak and pack were a wee bit smaller, where did that freak come from?

(The Amazing Spaghetti Armed Surfer, needs no more describing than his title)

Went in and came out of the round room on the next one. And as I pulled away off the bottom, the lip came down on the deck of the board...voila...... tossed like a Ceaser salad right at the table. Floated like a butterfly(for a second), then got stung like a chump as I hit the water again, where did that freak come from?

God's pool sprung a leak......

Wish he'd build A-frames while he's draining it.


'Cos you aren't going to make the paddle....

Carnage

Something about the perfectly round hole, where a flipper should be......



Late season southern visitor met a bad end.

Monster Storm.

The entire beach for miles has a cliff cut along the edge, it was smooth and tapered 3 days ago.


Moonscaped by the south wind.


Signpost from the 70's?



Nature's sand castles built at 125knots

6 weeks early

(12/1/07)

Lat year we got snow 11 days into the new year, quite a bit of it and it hung around for awhile. This winter it's the first day of December,but it's just a dusting so far, hmmmmm.......... wonder what's in store for us.


(1/11/07)