"Stay happy and you'll be perfectly fine" - Jack Norris

California postcard: real, real tiny here too

Hello Friends and Happy New Year to you,

The Collaroy of Santa Barbara showing the tiniest of lines mid-afternoon.
The Collaroy of Santa Barbara showing the tiniest of lines mid-afternoon.

A couple hours ago I went by Rincon. It was very small, but not too tiny for a mal or a standup paddleboard (neither of which do I have). Nearly as I can make out, that was one of the better spots along the the southern California coast. I took a couple pictures for you of the wave situation in Santa Barbara (which is roughly half an hour north of Rincon). Bears a remarkable resemblence to the fine images already posted by our man Rob in Dee Why.

Once again the weather here is beautiful, although it has to be added that many of the beaches north from Santa Barbara are likely shrouded in fog. Kind of odd to see the greyness this time of year as it is usually very much a late spring to mid-summmer phenomenon along this coast.

From the look of the charts, Sydney could have some little south windswelly junk following a late south change tonight. Sadly it seems that there will be 15-25 kts of S-SE wind in on top of it in the morning. With luck though there should be at least a little something at semi-protected south swell favouring spots. It then appears that said south windswell will fade out through Saturday as Sydney gets another dose of summer smallness for a couple days. The good thing is that the models are showing a NE to E pulse developing up toward the Queensland border and spreading south from around late Mon to early Tues. Depending on the interpretation, some are showing  chest to head high plus conditions for around Weds as far south as Sydney. Good luck on that one boys and girls.

Knee high set wraps into the cove at Leadbetter. That's Santa Barbara in the background.
Knee high set wraps into the cove at Leadbetter. That

Here in Santa Barbara, the prospects are fairly grim for the next week. If we’re lucky there might be some waist high dribble over the weekend. Unfortunately, although there is a reasonable amount of activity out in the north Pacific, precious little of the energy is aimed at us. I may be forced to go north to the even more frigid waters of Santa Cruz to find something resembling a wave.

Anyway, I’ll try to stay in touch on a regular basis.

Have yourself a top old day and go well with all your endeavours!