Session 49 - Mar 25 - East side surf tour

Tuesday Mar 25, 11-1:30, 6'8 Taylor

For the adventurous paddlers out there, a pretty good way to tour the east side surf spots is to simply get in the water and start paddling...like Joel and I did yesterday. I rode my new (to me) surf-rack equipped bike down the street a bit to the local beachbreak, where we started our session with some shorebreak pound...got a couple, it's a bit of a thrill to catch those things and see the sand sucking up the wave as the water is pulling out from underneath you...then punching through the closeout as hard as you can to avoid a pummeling (and possibly a broken board) from the sand below...caught a few of those and that was enough. So, we paddled down a bit further to this pretty heavy and shifty left that a pro was on before (complete with photographer and all) after he got out. I see now why he got out, that wave was a disaster, pretty heavy and really bowling up BIG TIME, definitely a wave a bit over my skill level at this point, but nobody was there so I tried throwing myself into the pit a couple times, with pretty much the same result, a decent thrashing...surf was nothing big or anything, but just the way that wave works, it's a tough one. No paddling for the shoulder, you got to really commit to the drop...and as far as drops go, it's a pretty vertical shot down. Tried that for a while, then decided to keep paddling, paddled out around the rocks to get to my more normal surf spots, caught a couple rights at this finicky little local spot that one other guy was on, tide a bit too high, pretty bumpy but still fun, then paddled some more out to 1st peak/sewers, more of a crowd, caught one quick wave there and surfed it pretty much all the way to inside 2nd peak, quickly caught one more there and surfed it nearly all the way to 38th, and didn't mess with 38th as I'm not catching anything there on the 6'8 and plus -- what timing -- I saw dad the surfing wizard getting out of the water as well having just ended his morning session as well. So we got out and walked back home and cracked opened a couple beers.