thursday

[Beanpole]

The bower was an absolute sh** fight this arvo.
The only highlite was the mal rider who kept dropping in on the self designated franchise holder for every set wave.

I really think people should have a think about what they achieve by going for every wave someone else is going for. They usually end up staring at each other as the wave goes by or blowing the takeoff for both of them.

[Revolution]

why would you go to the bower (not you but people in general) when at most 15 mins away was uncrowded beachies with perfect banks & only the odd sneaker set coming thru.

[Beanpole]

True. I thought I could slip out and have a quiet wave since the rest of Manly looked megacrowded. I didn't have much time and thought the southerly was going to come up but it stayed pretty wsw. Pretty grindy looking at Nth Steine. Pity about the crowds.

[Lou]

F**k yeah, disappointment .. if you didn't surf.

Another three hrs this arvo in 8-10' surf, gorgeous blue faces, again with nobody out for an hour, then one guy for another hour, then three guys paddled out on dusk, not real high on the skill meter. Left 'em out there, hopefully not to drown.

A friend of mine flew Sydney from Ours to Palm Beach at 10:30 am, shooting from a copter, and reckoned there were about 30 people in the water altogether.

So much for surf forecasts, city crowds, blah blah blah.

What a sweeeeet swell this is. I went out early today at a northern Northern Beach, solid 6', with the odd 8' freight train set to keep everyone honest. Good lefts and rights, perfect big clean faces holding up into serious pits...Winter heaven. Yet only 3 others out! And this is a spot with a straightforward rock-off (just time it right) that makes getting out the back easy. Plus, I have barely surfed for 6 weeks (was o.s. in a waveless enivon ), and so I'm haven't even been 'blooded' on the epic June waves y'all just had. NC's right, so much for all the big talk, it gets beyond a certain size and the hordes evaporate..

...not that I'm complaining

[Revolution]

crowds are quite odd, i wonder if they headed there due to not liking surfing alone? something odd about it. So shocked when i saw on the queensy cam the crowd then popped a few hills away and was alone in bigger cleaner surf with no1 else. Quite stoked with my session. But that wind chill

What was winki/deadmans looking like? was close to heading there but put crowds into consideration.

[andycumo]

so NC how was the path on thursday avo? shame tomo didnt get out there...

[Nick Carroll]

It was f**ken sick, crazy. I pulled up at the front carpark at 2:25pm. Wetsuit on and 7'1" in hand. Saw a guy there who'd been having a go in the rip down the beach, he was kind of freaking out. Ran down the beach and climbed over the rocks; surfing the Path at that size requires you heading out from the back side of the set up, so the water sucks you out into the bay between the Pool and the Path. Clambering over the rocks I found three bodyboards and a surfboard just lying there. Heard a commotion up in the bushes above. Out through a gap in the bushes came Harry Woolvern, one of the young Newy locals, followed by three or four booger mates. "We went out there," Harry said, "I got SMASHED." Harry's got the right stuff. I jumped and got out into the open without any trouble other than a slight scrape to the right fin. Paddled through all that open water, totally alone, paddling into empty water, breathing deep, getting a focus. While the water in many places has been dirty and brown lately thanks to runoff, the outside Path is a long way offshore and clean as can be; it was glowing a deep blue, and you could feel the ocean vibrating. Almost as soon as I paddled into the zone, a 12' set hit off the bombie and stormed through onto the Path reef. This reef is unlike most Australian spots in that it draws into very deep outer water and there's no rip, no sand, no interference with the waterflow other than the bounce off the exposed rock. The tide was still pretty low so a lot of that interference was blocked by the reef. The set stood up square, magnificent and truly terrifying -- a deep blue wave face, drawing and sucking clean and way out of my reach. I watched in complete awe as it drew and pitched, roaring like a wild animal. Once the set had passed I paddled in deeper and started catching waves, first an 8' ledge that bent wide into the open water and bowled a couple of times on the way, then a 10' peaking bowl that sucked and bubbled and pulled back hard on the reef. I surfed waves like that alone for about an hour, until a bloke I know, a goofyfoot, pretty good surfer who's willing to charge, came out and sat a bit wide for a while. A set came, I got a wave, paddled out, he got one. "I've got the worst flu!" he said, when he made it back out. "I shouldn't be out here but..." I liked his spirit. Got another one, a full on bomb this time, thought it would close out into the bay, but no, it held up long enough for me to get around and into clean water. Fading back down the face, I was filled with a glorious sense of everything, the cliffs to the side, the open sky to the northwest, the foam, the deeps and the shallows, the sun lighting it all, the impossibility of it, the impossible beauty of such a day on the rim of a reef and the clean water and the foam line and the feeling of a turn down the face of a 10' wave. Paddled back out and me and the goofyfoot watched as another one of those 12' sets hit. We watched in complete slack jawed amazement. I thought about my 8'1" Sunset gun, sitting in the rafters of a mate's house on Oahu, it coulda caught one of those waves. Maybe I coulda, on the 7'1", if it was 15 years ago. I said as much to my mate, he said, "Nah, too much side wash." Maybe he was right.

So then he went in to a doctor's appointment, a few other crew paddled out, and suddenly the tide was too high -- an ugly bounce off the reef ruined the entry into the sets. The surf was over and I realised it, but didn't act on it for a little while. The evening set in. I caught a last wave and paddled all the way across to the mid-beach rip, and got a small right to the beach. Almost all of Newport Beach was gone by this time, but still there was a small cliff of sand left facing the rip, a cliff just metres from the council's dune preservation system, where once 30 years before as a grommet, I'd lit fires to warm up after a session. I slid up on a shorebreak foamie, turned, and the next shorie wave came exploding up across the sand and slammed me back against the cliff. I threw my board and let it slam me, laughing.

So yeah that's how it was, sort of.

[bro]

Big ups to you NC and all those who 'honestly' got amongst it at its peak.
I wish I had the life experiences that would have allowed me to do the same

[crack]

[img][img]http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa79 ... copy-1.jpg[/img] This guys first wave out southy after paddling out[/img]

[crack]

I know my photoshop work is shit,was trying to use curves

[Lucky Al]

Nick Carroll, you vile odious obnoxious grommet.

[SSS]

its on again

Thu: Very large S'ly swell building to 8-10ft+ at south-facing beaches. Smaller at most beaches around 5-6ft+, with 3-4ft surf inside southern corners. Strong to gale force S/SW winds, although we may see SW winds in areas.

i dont like the sound of that "gale force wind" ... but we will just have to wait and see