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There were some very nice waves wrapping past the cape in Byron Bay today. So what’s so unusual about that?  Well it was sunny, warm, consistent with crystal clear water the town is full of schoolies and tourists, yet it was utterly uncrowded all day until the afternoon crew turned up after work. So why so empty? Simple the Coastalwatch camera was offline this morning. End of argument, I’ve seen this before we’ll see it again. They go down the crowd goes down. When it’s offline, we get uncrowded waves. Funny isn’t it? When we were kids we used to have a blast cruising around in beat up old cars with our crew of blokes and girls. The surf check was all part of the ritual; it was as much a part of surfing as getting waves. These days, people go online and if the cameras are down, they don’t turn up, kinda lucky for us really. Maybe they assume the surf just disappeared along with the camera, who knows? What I do know is this. Those who still do a surf check the old way, by actually getting up from the screen and turning up to look, were rewarded for their efforts. There were some mighty happy people who were very grateful indeed for, a peaceful moment delivered by the failure of a certain streaming video camera, In Byron Bay Today.