4.15.18 Swampy on a Flaking Swell at Playa Wyoming

The tide was at its apex at about 2:30.  I left the condo around three thinking with a slow-ish walk I'd get to enjoy it a little bit more hollow with a little less backwash.

My new neighbor offered me a ride in his SUV.  I grabbed on to his roof rack and stepped on to his runner.  I got there the fastest I ever have from my place.  He has never surfed so I offered to teach him if he gets a board in exchange for his kindness.

Unfortunately, battling the wind's effect on my board at high speed was the most excitement I would experience during this session.

Every wave of mine was a closeout except for a couple.

I had another right which closed out right away.  I went for an immediate floater so as to make something of it.  I either put too much weight on my heels or my trajectory was bad from the get-go.  I was riding on top of the back of the wave although I did feel my fins catch and I began turning with them.  Had I been three inches closer to the beach I would have been able to say I successfully botched a backside taildrop 360 floater!

I pumped on a left and unfortunately didn't unweight my front foot when going for a lip tap (in preparation for gathering more speed for the upcoming section).  I bogged hard and ended my ride prematurely.

My last wave was a left and I was able to pump and do a pretty good cutback/slash on it as it fizzled.

There was no magical ride on a wave today.  And there was no magical ride back home.

4.11.18 PM Dropping Tide Playa Idaho

I calculated that at fifteen steps every ten seconds, and at ninety steps a minute, it takes me about twenty minutes to walk 1800 steps to Playa Colorado.  At 2.33' a stride extrapolated out to sixty minutes, I'm walking at about 2.38 miles per hour. 

You see, it's this bitchin content which keeps the hits coming to EddieSurfs.com!

As is tradition, I slightly got my hopes up when seeing and hearing the closeouts past the estuary (and an estuary it will stay until the rains make the rivers break out).  Playa Colorado itself was EMPTY.  This would have been unsurprising if you'd been there looking at it with me.  The best sets were racy to the point of being unmakeable and the average ones were close-outs.  I overcame my temptation to try to find a golden corner where conceivably none existed.

Playa Wyoming looked better, though still very racy.  After watching it for a couple of minutes and seeing dudes getting gobbled up by the whitewater, I resigned myself to having to resort to Panga Drops to get my surf jollies.  I walked slowly, eyes on the ocean.  I saw a guy take off on what looked like a disaster northwest of Playa Wyoming.  I muttered to myself, "Why even bother?".  He hung on, pigdogged and got a slight cover-up. 

That's it, I had to surf here.  It was the first made barrel, albeit slight, I'd seen in months.

The tide was dropping though the backwash was still hitting some of the waves.

A lot of paddling around and jockeying for position later, I was in position for an overhead banger.  I made the drop with no issue, and felt my face contort into panic as I pumped up hard, then down.  I tucked down slightly and I was enveloped in the squarish barrel (likely a product of the tide and the angle of the wave hitting the bottom in a weird way).  I did another pump in the tube, this one less ambitious.  It felt like I'd backdoored the section that initially enveloped me, then I made it through another section before the foamball worked me.  I surfaced energized.

I went on another wave after a guy farther up the line couldn't catch it.  I tucked in and this one didn't benefit from bathymetry/swell angle synergy.  I barely fit inside it and it tunneled off without me.

Little by little, guys started filing in to the beach much to my delight.  Then a panga showed up.  Guys in the panga were wearing t-shirts and there were fishing poles visible so I hoped they were fishermen.  But the fact that they were anchored off one of the premier waves of the area didn't bode well for my optimism. 

Sure enough one, then five boards were thrown overboard followed by their riders.  It got semi-crowded again.  It wasn't bad at all with them in the water, but the further dropping tide meant there would be fewer rideable waves from which to choose.

I caught a right and did a drawn-out bottom turn, smashed it in a tight arc but turned into the whitewash and lost stability with no fin bite in the water.  I also managed to punch myself in the side of the head with my thumb knuckle somehow as I was underwater.

The first wave described was a doozy and one that will get me amping for my next go-out.