Superbank Circus

[Karlos]

From Swellnet:

http://www.swellnet.com.au/sessions/Sup ... 120207.php

Check the last image (it's also the Wave Of The Day on the homepage), which almost makes me think Sydney ain't as bad as I think it is... Naah, who am I kidding?

Surely there are other options on the Goldy when it gets good?

[reggie]

Surely there are other options on the Goldy when it gets good?

The pub.

I'm sure you dont really want people to disclose their spots. It'll help turn them into snapper no.2!

[Karlos]

Surely there are other options on the Goldy when it gets good?

The pub.

I'm sure you dont really want people to disclose their spots. It'll help turn them into snapper no.2!

Nope, couldn't really care less as I'm not going to be up that way in the near future. It just seems amazing that you can get those sort of numbers out in the water there. I know it's a great wave & all, but sh*t, how great can it be when you ain't getting any waves. And I suspect the majority out there AREN'T getting too many. I was just curious as to why anyone would bother when there would have to be plenty of other spots firing as well, with (presumably) less numbers in the water.

[Natho]

Is it just me or is the SB more crowded than ever right now?

I was up there 2 weeks ago. On the Sunday I surfed Snapper with about 70 guys out at the point, I then moved down to Greenmount with about 90 guys in the water there. In the afternoon I surfed Dbah with at least 150 in the water there.

Is this just a normal Sunday at the Goldie? Waves were average to good.

[brendo]

natho you can thank swellnet and particularly coastalwatch for those small crowds. by putting reports/pics/cams of ballina lennox all over the internet, goldie crew are piling into wagons and are down there in 1hr.
at least before they took a punt driving there, or wouldnt start arriving till 8 or 9. now they get up at first light and the cams tell the story.

the locals are LIVID. those guys are coming down in ever increasing numbers, they think they own the breaks with their goldie ego attitudes, stuff the pecking order, everyone gets mad, and guys are now punching on.

putting cams/reports for metro areas is fair enough as its crowded anyway, but putting up resonably uncrowded waves that are readily accessible only a short drive away is faaarken rude.

swellnet and coastalwatch have alot to answer for on this issue.

[thermalben]

natho you can thank swellnet and particularly coastalwatch for those small crowds.

Brendo, you're confusing things. Natho asked about the Superbank, not about Lennox. As for the crowds at the Superbank, well if Swellnet is responsible, then I don't suppose the GCCC will mind chipping a small commission my way for the increase in revenue the Superbank has brought to the region. Then again, you could just attribute it to the 1400 people who move permanently to the Gold Coast every month...

swellnet.. have alot to answer for on this issue.

I'm not going to debate this issue in these forums. However, I will point out that my Ballina and Yamba reporters (1) are long time locals, and (2) both approached me personally about providing a daily surf report.

[brendo]

i know what natho was asking about. my point is that the crowds are heading south in increasing numbers, so theoretically decreasing them form absurdly ridiculous to just ridiculous....

im not having a shot at swellnet in general, like i said, reports and cams in metro areas do jack to crowd numbers. its the ballina and to lesser extent yamba reports, but mainly the cams, that are pissing people off.

and seriously, what long time local would want to do reports when they know how much more crowded its been getting with gc crew BEFORE those reports were ever done. ? the REAL locals dont know who it is...

10yrs aint a long time local either.....

[bc]

Is that a Jim Beam rashy?
Yikes

You'd do well in Salem brendo.

[thermalben]

A second-generation local is classed as "long time" in my book.

Re: your point about "crowds are heading south in increasing numbers" - I moved to the Goldy almost 4 years ago, and that was the first thing I did off my own back on a regular basis, as the crowds were so bad north of the border. I don't think it's such an unusual thing to do.

The number I stated before (1400 new GC residents per month) was given to me by a statistics lecturer at Griffith Uni, so if this figure is true, it means that there's been more than 50,000 people move to the Goldy since then. Therefore, there will be increasing numbers in the water, surfcams/reports/forecasts or not.

And for what it's worth, there are plenty of unridden waves to be found every day between Cooly and Yamba.

[Clif]

keep pissin' into the wind Brendo ...

[Nappy]

Lennox has been crowded for years, sure you can get the ood week day with 5-10 ppl out..(well u used to be able) but u cant blame surf sites for increased crowds there (plus the reporters never give away the names of spots to surf), "famous" surf spots are only going to get more popular people want to "try them "so to speak..

Plus alot of Housing has been built in the ballina/byron shire in the past few years....its only going to get more crowded...... As for snapper you get alot of tourists who just want to say to themselves "i surfed superbank" the myth is better than the wave really....I liked it better without the sand when greenmount had its own point.

[Nappy]

Just adding.....The only thing that errks me about surf forecasting sites is that every man and his dog knows when a swell is coming, thats what brings crowds IMO ,not the daily reports. Thermalben (and the others) are only trying to make a living, if they stopped some else would do it. There here to stay, they have good and bad points, for me i love watching cams in other states .......

[mbphoto]

Is that a Jim Beam rashy?

Yep, they where the sponsors of a comp that was going on at the time. Shooting the water shots I had absolutely no idea how they where meant to compete while fighting through the crowds.

Also by the time Andrew Shield took the last shot the crowd had actually thinned out.

[Sausage]

I know the NN cam has 100,000 hits a month on CW, that's a figure that they quoted.
You can blame tourists, development all you want but the cameras are the main contributor.
Now I surf at 6am with 25 guys instead of 2 or 3 a few years ago.

[Karlos]

Is that a Jim Beam rashy?

Yep, they where the sponsors of a comp that was going on at the time. Shooting the water shots I had absolutely no idea how they where meant to compete while fighting through the crowds.

Also by the time Andrew Shield took the last shot the crowd had actually thinned out.

They actually tried to run a f*ckin' contest in amongst that mass of humanity? How'd you actually win? By not running over 16 Brazilians when you caught your one scoring wave? Sheeeit.

[brendo]

[quote="thermalben"]A second-generation local is classed as "long time" in my book.

Re: your point about "crowds are heading south in increasing numbers" - I moved to the Goldy almost 4 years ago, and that was the first thing I did off my own back on a regular basis, as the crowds were so bad north of the border. I don't think it's such an unusual thing to do.

its not unusual, its the cams which make it EASIER. when the goldy is small and you think 'geez, i wonder if ballina has waves' but your not really sure, its 50/50 whether you go. now everyman and his dog just looks at the cam at dawn, and the decision is made for them. i bet the goldie guys love it, cause i sure know the ballina guys hate it

sure there are unridden waves between cooly and yamba, but that only applies from cooly to byron then ballina to yamba.. you wont find any unridden between byron and ballina.

whats next i wonder? coastalwatch surf tours....coming to a beach near you....

[brendo]

I know the NN cam has 100,000 hits a month on CW, that's a figure that they quoted.
You can blame tourists, development all you want but the cameras are the main contributor.
Now I surf at 6am with 25 guys instead of 2 or 3 a few years ago.

BINGO.....

[thermalben]

Sausage, I suppose you also believe the publishing claims from most magazines as well - they're a marketing tool, and are used accordingly. Regardless, 100,000 "hits" (hits is actually a term not used in the industry, "page impressions" is a better reference) refers to the number of times that the page was viewed. Divide the month into days, and you're left with 3333 PI per day - which I might point out, also includes the number of times the page is refreshed by an individual.

On a slow day this may only be once or twice, but on a good day it could be 50 or more. For this example, lets go halfway - 25 PI per person, with 3333 PI per day, leaves us with 133 people.

Now sure, these figures are very elastic, and are bound to be significantly higher than what I've used in the example. However, I just wanted to clarify that the chances of 100,000 people looking at the Narra surf cam every day is rather low.