February 2011 – Johnson Avenue Surfers

February 2011
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Surf report, Saturday night surf forecast (9:30 Pm) for Cape Canaveral n Cocoa Beach (posted 02/26/11)

February 26, 2011 by oldwaverider, posted in A summary of How the Waves were, Brevard Surf Predictions Cape Canaveral, Cocoa Beach and Satellite Beach

7 Day surf chart shows Wednesday incoming swell, compliments, magicseaweed.com

Wednesday morning, the 2nd of March, we have a decent size wind swell blowing in the 3 to 4 foot range. But Thursday afternoon, a secondary swell or a secondary part of the original swell, really hammers in, and then keeps rolling in thru Saturday or Sunday in the 6 to 8 foot range at around 8 seconds, maybe even 9 seconds.

Thursday night, the swell chart starts to catch up with the wave chart meaning, some strength starts to show, but the real punch of the wind swell is by Saturday morning-afternoon.

This swell looks so close to being a ground swell, that we’ll just have to see if any serious lines show up late Friday or Saturday morning.

It’s too early to tell if and when we’ll have some offshore winds, but right now the guess is for Sunday.

Okay, backing up a few days, here are some comments about the small swell we had Thursday and Friday.

Hind-site, I guess we should have said something about the Thursday-Friday swell that was upon us.

Thursday I surfed some fun thigh to waist high waves at Hangers, not glassy but very clean. Many 50 to 100 yard rides were to be had on long boards. Almost all lefts, pretty fun.

I was surfing with Rob, a guy visiting from Newport Beach, and we just alternated waves with plenty of spectators on the beach. Yeah we kooked ocassionally, when you’re over 45 you are allowed to kook. But great session. Enjoy the trip back to Newport Beach Rob.

Newport was a great place to surf back when Cliff (an old high school buddy) and I drove out to California in 1979, ouch!

Friday, the rock breaks weren’t really happening at 10 Am yet, so I checked on O’Club, and it was going off. Five people out on the North end, so me and Eric, a clammer tradesmen I met before heading out, we went to the south end, and caught a whole bunch of awesome lefts. Most of the lefts, you caught out side and rode a totally workable wall all the way to the beach without hardly any closeouts. 70 to 100 yards plus !

The sets were a lot of chest high glassy with 15 – 20 mph SSW winds on it, so some serious texture was to be had, but man, the lefts were going off totally. It was a normal footers chance to work a bunch of lefts, and that’s all we did. Incredible session. The current was semi-strong so we had to paddle a bit, and do a walk back south from time to time, but the paddle out was easy.

We’ll keep you updated on the incoming wind swell which looks to have some good size to it.

Later,

oldwaverider 🙂

Surf report, Friday afternoon surf forecast (4:30 Pm) for Cape Canaveral n Cocoa Beach (posted 02/18/11)

February 18, 2011February 18, 2011 by oldwaverider, posted in A summary of How the Waves were, Brevard Surf Predictions Cape Canaveral, Cocoa Beach and Satellite Beach

Two converging swells Saturday 9 Am, 3.6 feet at 10 seconds, the top one actually arrives late Sunday. Magicseaweed.com

Well my apologies for over estimating swell size for Friday. We did get the overhead waves down South on Thursday, but not today.

My guess Saturday morning, is fun waist-high waves early morning with 4 to 6 mph NW winds until 10 Am down south. At the Cape, I suspect barely rideable.

Today, at Hightowers was waist to stomach and semi-glassy, but since it was high tide when I had to go out, it was fairly weak in power (8 to 9 am). Long board only for sure. The short boarders just didn’t look like it was to fun for them.

I was pushing to get out early this morn, to catch the offshore winds, but it didn’t matter, hindsight I would have waited till mid-tide (right at 10:30) to paddle out down south.

At Johnson Ave., Dr. John got a couple of nice rides, a really nice left while I was watching, but our size here was knee-high with maybe an ocassional thigh high.

Saturday, we do have a converging Nor’easter coming to meet the easterly swell that may make a push on the swell we’ve had the last 2 days, and it looks like two 3.7 foot 10 second swells hitting the nearshore buoy. So maybe it will be chest high down South, but as weak as this easterly swell is, I’m not to optimistic. The new swell comes in late Sunday and full strength Sunday night , early Monday Am. Monday morning looks like chest high potential with off shore winds probable out of the SW.

Enjoy what we do have, cause it’s sure better than flatness 🙂

Have a great weekend!

oldwaverider

Surf report, Thursday night for Cape Canaveral n Cocoa Beach (posted 02/17/11)

February 17, 2011February 17, 2011 by oldwaverider, posted in Brevard Surf Predictions Cape Canaveral, Cocoa Beach and Satellite Beach, World Big Wave Events and Articles

Skipping down the face. From the harbour Saint Jean de Luz, the Naturgas team motored out to Belharra surf break, at the bottom SW point of France, near the Spain Basque region. Compliments of magicseaweed.com

Quick update for Friday morning. Those of you willing to do dawn patrol, I believe we will have offshore winds, SW winds light, until 9:30 Am the very latest. Probably, only till 8:30 Am.

Size should be waist to chest at the Cape, and head high down south. There is a chance of a few over head waves down South. Probably more overhead sets than on Saturday.

Saturday, looks like NW winds till mid-morning at best, but also chest to head high, with possibly a few overhead waves.

oldwaverider

More from the new XXL entrant, Belharra break in SW France.

“Christian the Lion” – A video that cuts thru personal walls, a real gut wrencher (2/17/11)

February 17, 2011February 18, 2011 by oldwaverider, posted in Peace of Mind, Anxiety Reduction, Spiritual (risky)

Man, someone sent me this link on Facebook, and it’s amazing what a softy you find out you are when you see this.

It reminds me of “Born Free”, I don’t know if it’s the same people, but definitely a 2 minute video worth watching.

I apologize that it’s only 240 P resolution, but whatever 🙂

oldwaverider

This link will take you to the full narrated version at YouTube site , about 6 minutes long, without music, but just talking here.

Surf report, Thursday morning for Cape Canaveral n Cocoa Beach (posted 02/17/11)

February 17, 2011February 17, 2011 by oldwaverider, posted in Brevard Surf Predictions Cape Canaveral, Cocoa Beach and Satellite Beach, World Big Wave Events and Articles

Our incoming swell should bring us some waist to possible chest high waves at the Cape today, with chest to overhead sets coming in down South, at Patrick and Satellite Beach. It does look like the swell may not hit the size as the models showed 2 days ago.

I looked at the pier this morning, at dead high tide and it was waist high, with about 5 short-boarders out and 1 long-boarder. Not a strong swell but hopefully as the swell rolls in thru noon, it may strengthen. It looked fun though.

The winds will be ramping up today from 10 to 15 mph out of the ESE, but……..Friday morning at daybreak it looks like they will drop to 2 to 4 mph SE so there should be some really fun lines coming in, waist high plus at the Cape and chest high plus down South.

Saturday morning still looks like we will have offshore winds, it looks like 5 to 8 mph NW winds at daybreak, and waist here, and chest high down South. The water should jump up to 65 by Saturday, so toss the suits, and skin it while soaking in the sun at 78 degrees !

France Basque country gets huge XXL swell. See the great photos at magicseaweed.com

This video is from a swell that just hit France, a cove/bay called Saint Jean Luis, as you can see it’s at the far SW tip of France as it hits Spain. See the awesome still shots here.

This has got to be the best close up video footage I have seen of big wave surfing. The backs of these waves look like 20 foot, and the fronts look to be 20 to 30 foot plus overhead. A couple of the guys, just left that huge swell at Ireland, which was also a Billabong XXL big wave entrant. The footage is only a minute, but the waves looks so clean, perfect and makeable (and huge), that they almost look ridable for the average Joe.

Enjoy the swell we have, the warm sun and the kind of waves that Europe is getting right now. Later

oldwaverider

Surf report, Wednesday morning for Cape Canaveral n Cocoa Beach (posted 02/16/11)

February 16, 2011February 16, 2011 by oldwaverider, posted in Brevard Surf Predictions Cape Canaveral, Cocoa Beach and Satellite Beach

Recycled photo :) taken by a friend at Perkins, 2009 — Recycled photo 🙂 taken by a friend at Perkins, 2009

Our swell took perhaps a 10 hour delay or so to hit the 120 buoy, but it appears to be coming in there now. At 3 Am today it hit 6 feet at 9 seconds, and just jumped to 7.5 feet at 9 seconds at 9 Am this morning.

Anyhow, it looks like the bulk of the wave size at the beach should be Thursday morning, sometime between mid-morning at early afternoon, with winds (according to weather channel for Cocoa Beach) showing to be in the 3 to 6 mph range going from the SE at daybreak to SSE into mid-morning. (It seems to me that we would really need some stronger onshore winds Thursday morning to bring this swell in , like 10 to 20 mph, but I’m gonna leave weather channels prediction until I see how it looks tonight)

If that holds true, Thursday could be some fun overhead lines coming in down south with decent clean form, and waist to shoulder-high waves here at the Cape. Then the winds pick up gradually thru the day Thursday, 10 to 15 mph turning ESE, and then slowing down to 5 to 10 mph at daybreak Friday morning out of the SE. Again, it could be decent clean form Friday morning.

Our chance for perfect offshore winds Saturday morning has dimmed some, GET OUT THERE BEFORE 8 AM! TO GET THE BEST CONDITIONS because the moving swell chart models show NNW winds in the 1 to 3 mph range, however I think the way land warms quicker than sea which creates kind of a mini-high pressure may throw NW winds for a couple of hours without any charts telling us so, but I would say get out early Saturday morning to take advantage of the slight offshore winds, because by late morning it should be direct onshore winds in the 5 to 10 range.

Sorry this report got really anal, but it’s a lot of non-uniform data for this swell.

By the way, I recycled the pic of me at Perkins cause I’ve run out of surf pics, and until some Johnson Avenue area surfers shoot me some jpegs, I’ll have to use my own , and or some big wave pics going on worldwide.

Be sure to check out the new slide show of a new XXL entrant for Mullaghmore Head in Ireland. (kind of in the LaHinch Beach area). Richie Fitzgerald (from the British Isles) got drilled really bad and tore some ligaments in his leg from a massive closeout, and got held down twice and almost passed out. One tough individual. It is being called the Teahupoo of the North Atlantic, with 20 foot barrels inside. See the slide show from magicseaweed.com here.

oldwaverider

Surf report update, Monday morning for Cape Canaveral n Cocoa Beach (posted 02/14/11)

February 14, 2011February 14, 2011 by oldwaverider, posted in Brevard Surf Predictions Cape Canaveral, Cocoa Beach and Satellite Beach

Predicted Swell chart for Wed. 2/16 PM EST, compliments of Magicseaweed.com

We have an easterly kinda nor-easterly swell that should be hitting us sometime Tuesday evening, and full size Wednesday probably in the afternoon, hoorah!

However, (always a negative to go with it in surf reports), the swell appears to be a strong ground swell but big chop, until my guess Saturday and possibly Sunday morning. The winds may only be 10 to 15 mph by Wednesday after noon, slowing down from 15 to 20 in the morning.

The swell is coming mostly from the east and should be dropping overhead chop by Wednesday morning, we will probably see some head high waves in the Cape, with overhead waves in Satellite Beach and 2nd light. By mid-afternoon, the winds should be down to 10 to 15 mph, and the easiest paddle out time with cleanest conditions Wednesday would be around 3 PM. (it’s low going high at that time, although high going low is always better, but at least the paddle out into the chop will be the most smooth at 3 PM. high going low it will be dark out so that’s a no brainer 🙂

Conditions change as the storm speeds up, slows down and other factors of course. (the classic C.Y.A. statement 🙂

Saturday could be chest high plus and glassy down south. And on Friday, Playalinda could have some offshore winds there since direct South winds in Playalinda are 32 degrees off shore, and Friday it looks like the winds turn southerly in the mid-day around 6 to 10 mph.

Be ready for some glass anytime between Friday and Monday, from waist-high to head high depending on how well the swell does. We’ll provide updates as it moves closer to our epic surf shores.

oldwaverider

Surf report update, Saturday morning for Cape Canaveral n Cocoa Beach (posted 02/05/11), with leftover Hurricane Earl photos.

February 5, 2011February 5, 2011 by oldwaverider, posted in Brevard Huge Swell and Hurricane Photos

Hurricane Earl, Sept. 2nd, 2010, nice clean right, taken by Mike Melito.

Asleep at the wheel. Nahhhh, it’s not this good today, but we do have a small small ground swell happening. This photo is Hurricane Earl!

A small ground swell crept in and I wasn’t paying attention. It came in from the east, but the winds delivering it were from the south, so it’s just barely hitting the beaches.

The good thing is, there may be a few thigh to waist high waves at mid-tide, high going low, around 12 Noon, I can’t guarantee it, but I am going to take a drive down there with my board. The winds are SSW right now, pretty strong so it may keep it from even breaking, but then again, it may back off to 10-12 mph SW, hopefully earlier than 4 or 5 o’clock.

Satellite Beach, O’club again, should sport the most size, so I figure to head down there after we get the photographer of these leftover Hurricane Earl pictures moved into his new Condo in Cocoa Beach.

I figured, we’ve had kind of a lull here for a while, so I’d post the rest of the Sept. 2nd, 2010 Hurricane Earl photos that Mike took at the pier. Enjoy the photos and hopefully the brief