Rod's
Dateline OC/Md: Thursday Night/Friday. Having weathered weeks
of paperwork and virtually no swell to ease the pain I was bolstered by
the forecasts for some pit sucking action over a 4-day weekend. Neal Carver
and I both had some leave time to burn and a desire for surf -- anywhere
on the East Coast was in play, from Florida to Maine. As we tracked the
forecasts we winnowed down the geographic range of surf chasing from Rhode
Island through the Outer Banks. In the end the best forecasts were pointing
to our local stomping grounds so we hunkered down at a favorite OC watering
hole with Big Blue. Alas, we missed what little swell there had been on
Thursday morning (what sweet shoulder high offshores those were) but hit
the road late Thursday evening, donked some brewskis, talked some story
and hit the sack early in the morning hour. I slept in until 10am
the next day (yes, I checked the mini-mackers at 7am during a relief run),
re-charged on some bloody marys and lazied away the day gazing with desperation
to the horizon in search of swell. Looks like it will be here on Sunday.
Uptown
OCMD - Saturday Foonbunker Report.
Steady NE breeze started before dawn wrecking clean conditions that amounted
to an occasional 2 foot roller. Our in-house prognosticator says that big
low out in the Atlantic will start filling in waist to chest swells by
evening. If not
he will be hung by the heels
from the Bunker Balcony like a bell with an empty gin bottle around his
neck as a clanger. Neal took off after dawn to meet Chris Smith at 48th
where rumors of bumpy mush have been circulating. Rodski continues to masquerade
as a hibernating bear logging mucho sack time, storing up energy for Sunday
or getting hung of the balcony which ever comes first. Looks like another
day hanging out waiting for things to improve. We've hardly put a dent
in the bottle of Big Blue. I suspect that will change today. Did I mention
the weather is superb? whuppty frickin doo.
-Foon
Rod's Dateline OC/Md: Saturday. Another
sleep-in day. Neal and Chris Smith did the honorable thing by rubbering
up and getting a little wet. I remember the four of us walking the boardwalk
later in the day, stopping by Malibu's to chew a few words, dining on ribs
and steak that evening, and praying for some swell and winds to cooperate
the next day. Foon and I skipped the surf this day although the other
two had a 2-sesher in small, choppy ones.
The
Saturday Report (by Chris Smith). I started my solo trek east bright
and early and put the calls out as the sun came up. Initial report
from Neal didn't sound good. I checked 8th, 37th, 48th, 62nd and
decided 48th had the most promise. Neal called me back as I was suiting
up to check it out in the water and said he would come on down and join
me. There was some mention of our prone rider that threatened to
do some stand up this weekend still sacking out. When I went out
I was the only one there, so it made finding me pretty easy for Neal.
I paddled out at the bar off 49th, the line up soon expanded to a few others
down around 47th. Later we were joined by a group of 4 (2 wahines) that
promptly floated by with the help of the wind. Neal and I were catching
some reasonable rides both left and right and frequently to the beach.
The first reform was the beach break and this would result in some step
offs. Most of the waves were knee waist, an occasional waist plus
would come in about every 30 minutes. I was unsuccessful in convincing
Big Wave Dave to paddle out. Shame I was looking forward to the stoke
he always brings to the lineup.
After almost four hours for
me, Neal and I decided we would head back to the Foon Bunker. Neal
had thoughtfully obtained a Bunker pass for me earlier. We arrived to find
Rod sporting the Super Plaid Ensemble, pictures should have been taken.
Beverages were enjoyed by all present before we decided to head down to
the boardwalk for a healthy lunch of Thrashers fries and a visit to Malibu's.
On the way back north we checked breaks at 48th, 62nd, 81st and 121st and
decided 48th was probably best again. The crowd had swelled to almost
twenty folks in the water. While gathering our wetsuits from the
drying rack, we noticed a sneaky swell at the bunker and decided to try
it out for the remaining hours of daylight.
As soon as we paddled out,
we were greeted with a nice waist plus set and both caught rides quickly.
Neal was trying out my 7'6" Takayama Flo Egg, complete with radioactive
pigment. Hopefully he doesn't want to have any more kids ; )
I considered the afternoon session to have been quite a bit of fun.
We finally decided to stop when the only light we had was that which was
generated by the board Neal was riding. We packed it in and grabbed
some good grub. At that point I had to head home and the boys went
back to the bunker for some more beverages and relaxation.
Hopefully Neal has been successful
in getting the Monkey off his back by Monday. Sorry to have missed the
contingent on Sunday, but I had foolishly volunteered to work.
Chris Smith
Big Sunday Report (El Mono). More
like "Big Crowd Sunday." Being distracted by work and honey-do lists
galore, I didn't coordinate with anybody prior to Sunday morning. Packed
the gear sat night and hopped in as soon as I woke up sunday. Foggy drive
across the
shore, no wrong turns but
blew through a few stoplights I didn't know where there... oops.
Heard mixed reports from
everywhere and heard a crowd was headed to the Cape, so I followed. Got
there after Paul Ma. and Mike , and right before Neal, Rod, Doug. The early
crowd (Ken W, Paul Mo., KC, Chris P) was already on it and getting plenty
of longboard lines.
Took the fat board and the
skinny board down to the beach, glad I brought both. Waves were 2-3' mush
early on, increasing in power and size toward low tide, I would call it
2-4' with the rare 5 footer. Took a steepish one in and brought the skinny
board back out to take the tighter drops. Took a few waves I'd like to
have back but had a couple great ones too, got to practice my turns off
the lip, so that was fun.
Crowd got a little contentious
for awhile but the ASC held its ground, on the rocks (Rod), the 1st point
(me, Paul Ma, Mike, Paul Mo), and particularly the second or "longboarders"
point... and didn't get out paddled for many waves -- at all. Saw every
single ASC guy catch waves and connect sections. That was nice. Crowd settled
back down and everybody continued to catch waves.
Doug caused me to miss the
wave of the day -- just kidding -- Doug out paddled my ass, on his big
old longboard, and from horrible positioning, and dropped in as I was still
paddling right beside him, in perfect position (I thought). Impressive...
That'll teach me.
Still jonesing after a work/flatness-induced
dry spell of 3 weeks, I drove down to Hen Hotel to again work on my Reho
Dumper Dropins. It was good practice--waves 3-6' and closing out, steep
but not quite hollow. Tried to remember the Suicidio Rodgers credo of "only
set waves are REAL waves".....I made 2 big drops (and got down the line),
made 2 more and bailed as they closed out, went OTF on one more, and backed
out of one more in about 45 minutes....no points for style but I'm still
trying to build shortboard bravery points....
Super fun day with less than
ideal but fun and sizable conditions....who can complain? Nice to meet
all the new guys and of course nice to see all the old compadres.
Buenos noches
- El Mono (aka Kirk Mantay)
The Moose Report. Well...not the superb
day I was expecting, but we still caught some fun ones. Ken and I planned
to meet at 6am at the 50 mall, and got a surprise bonus when KC and Chris
P showed up - Chris with his young nephew (He is a super uncle isn't
he?). We crossed the bridge at first light - the entire bay was glass,
shore to shore - we were psyched. We chatted up our usual racket
on the way there, missing turns in the fog and almost causing Chris to
rear end us at high speed. Chris got a high powered adrenaline rush
- we offered him some of our tequila to take the edge off, but he
declined, and suggested we switch to coffee. We arrived at NJ at 8am in
high spirits, and rushed to the bluff and saw... occasional 3-4 foot swells,
but mostly junky, wind torn up waves. Where did this wind come from??
We are standing on the bluff, feel hardly a trace of breeze, and yet the
surface is chunky and there is a moderate south chop messing up the long
period swell. Via cell phone we heard it was similar to the south
- so given that NJ's was clearly surfable, we went right to it.
The bigger waves did peal
nicely and we caught some good rides - if you picked your wave well and
you worked the bowls right you could take it all the way down the line
to the far beach break. I got a number of those - which made my surf
day. As the tide dropped, the size of the swells also dropped, and
often the down the line "wall" was only knee high, but there were plenty
of rides and lots of fun was had. I kept seeing Ken popping up and
whizzing down the line from the second peak to the shore. Chris
caught some rides and helped his young 'un to catch a few also. KC
was happy to be in the water after a long hiatus, but feeling spaghetti-armed.
Loads of ASC'ers and a few others came as the tide dropped. It was
a tad crowded at times, but the ASC party was fun for most of us -
the other folks were wondering "who the hell are those guys", - especially
that hooded paipo guy who was riding a longboard on his knees. :)
The surf cleaned up a little
during the day, but never really got fully clean. Chris left about 11 or
noon, and the rest of us surfed until about 2pm, then hung in the parking
lot, chatted over a beer. Home by dinner which made the wife and kids happy.
A good day of surf - but given the superb condition I have seen several
times this fall and was anticipating again - a tad disappointing.
The Surfing Relatives Report. My nephew
and I (13 years old) met up with KC, Doug and Paul at the antiques mall
at 6 am for a memorable drive to NJs which included wrong turns
and burning brake stops.
Water was choppy and a bit
colder than expected but after the drive we suited up and jumped in.
Played with the big boys by the jetty for a bit then went in and rode the
soup with my nephew who redefined "cold water stoke" You gotta love
cold weather surf! As I was packing it in another 4 or 5 ASCer's
were suiting up and jumping in. Nice contingency on a beautiful day.
Chris P
Uptown OCMD - Sunday Foonbunker Quandary.
Yeah the swell showed, and yeah the wind got on it early. Still, if you
looked long and hard somewhere in OC waves were ridable, a few right out
my back door. The Bunker guests were working the phone lines early and
often to determine a maximum value for the morning go session and in the
long run decided to head North to meet up with other ASCers. Regrets on
my part for opting out in the interest of packing up and going home early
after three days of entertaining guests. My plan was to clean the Bunker
of the frat party detritus, check from midtown North and maybe get a short
session at the cleanest spot before leaving at noon. Unfortunately a faulty
dishwasher decided to flood my kitchen and I spent my morning mopping up
suds in stead of surf. In all a slow weekend for waves but the weather
was superb. Had a good time hosting Rod and Neal, seeing Chris Smith for
a day and enjoying a drive by visit from Doug Rhodes.
My season ending hopes rest
on a three day window of opportunity in Wilmington, NC over Turkey Day.
How 'bout those frickin' Ravens??!!
-Foon
Rod's Dateline OC/Md: Sunday. The
big swell day has arrived! The shore is pounding a 2-4, 11 sec. period
swell, fighting the extra high tide and a light on-shore wind that's making
it uglier than reasonable. A large contingent of Club members are
driving down to catch what we can and some of us are already down here.
The cell phones are buzzing this morning. After several checks and guesses,
Neal and I decide to head up to NJs, leaving Foon to wrap up some last
minute chores and maybe hit the Foonbunker breakers before heading home.
El Pico and I arrive to the NJ parking lot to see some of our own in the
lot, others walking up the path for refreshments and still others out in
the water. We had the good fortune to meet some new members today: Paul
Moos, Ken Walsh and Mike McDowell. Finally! Great to see KC Filer
again since he has been stuck cleaning up after Isabel. So good to see
Kirko in good spirits, again (more on that later).
Suited up, waxed the board
and paddled out into some small surf. Headed for the tip of the jetty for
starters even though it wasn't working very well on the ENE swell. Someplace
to start. Caught a few there and then moved north to the next peak. To
put it conservatively -- these waves were punchless on my riding craft...
no power, no tubes, no punch. Paddled in and hung out on the beach for
10 minutes but was itching to be back in the water. Paul Moos loaned me
his 9'2" (that's qualifies as a *longboard* - what a travesty), eventually
figured out how to strap on a leg rope and paddled out. No knee paddling
today on this small, this longboard. Caught my first wave and just kneelo'd
it for a short 30-50 yds. Stood up on my second wave riding straight ahead
in the chop, somehow maintaining some balance in a modified squat dog stance
before a less than graceful dismount. On my third wave, I stood, turned
right and angled down the line about 30 yds before a splashing dismount.
On my fourth wave I figured it was time to walk the plank towards the nose
-- made some progress on the nice longboarding face but caught a rail and
bailed. It was a refreshing experience, the tide was approaching low, so
time to get the real equipment out there again. Caught a few more punchless
waves and paddled back in. Not great, but it was wet.
Almost forgot: Midnight Mono
was ripping today! He backsided one wall for nearly 100 yds working
up and down the line, slashing that sucker. Good to see him on his game
and feeling good in the water. He has broken that barrier and is now surfing
at the next level. Keep going! Seems like everyone else had a good
time as well, everyone catching waves.
Sunday + Alternative Wave Riding Vehicles (kW
reports). I have plowed through all the reprises of Sunday's
club jam at NJs. Let me echo what others have said: I truly was glad
to meet at one fell swoop a substantial number of active club members who
were previously just names to me. Let's see if I can remember them
all: Chris & his nephew Troy, KC, Mike, D Rhodes (u rule on the waves,
dude), Rod, Neal the Carver, Chet (it was Chet with the yellow funshape,
wasn't it?), Paul Sk., and Kirk. If I missed anyone please forgive
the oversight. Nice group of guys! But where oh where were
the wahines?.
I was cruising http://ww.slalomskateboarder.com
where I saw a post about resurgent knee riding surfboards. Visit http://www.ksusa.org.
Looks like they might use fins to get in. Couldn't figure out who
the manufacturers are though. Anybody know?
About the vibe on Sunday,
it was generally cool. I did have one incident however where I caught
a smallish wave after a long paddle and as I cut right I almost ran over
a non-ASC guy down the line. I serenely called his attention to my
presence: "yo, dude, behind you!" He pulled out right away
but as we paddled back out he remarked, "Man, I was into that wave way
before you! grumble grumble" To smooth things out (I hate conflict),
I said that I was sorry and that I had never seen him until I was upon
him. He paddled away in a huff. From then on I gave him and
his group lots of space. There is something to being up first but
doesn't being deeper in the wave trump that? I think he was the guy
on the shortish white longboard who was surfing in the middle with two
buds. Pretty good surfer too.
In 2002, I probably had no
more than 17 days where I surfed. In 2003 I started day trippin'
in May but then my old van went kaput. I did three days over the
4th in Rodanthe with wifie in our "new" 96 Windstar. Then I surfed
San Diego a few hours per day for fifteen days in August. I joined
the club in September. Since then I have surfed every weekend but
two - and I made up for those absences by playin' hooky a couple of times.
I have put in some serious water time. Now here is what is becoming
apparent. The more I surf, the better I'm surfing. On Sunday,
I made more than my share of goofs: there were some waves I never should
have paddled for; I purled on a couple; I paddled so long for one
that when I finally felt it lifting me there was only one way to go (straight
over with the lip and into the soup); on at least three occasions I displayed
my most prominent flaw, namely a slow, nay marry, a completely late pop-up.
So I'm still a goofy, geezin', old-enough-to-be-a grandpa wave rider -
- not that I was ever bothered by that. And I can't envision ever
being greater than outright mediocre. But, now here's the "but,"
with all the water time I've been putting in, I would seem to have become
somewhat less suckie overall. Being in the club has been great, because
it makes me wanna surf more. Getting better would be cool and that
seems to happening slowly but that's not the point. The point is that I'm
having a total blast and isn't it better to have a blast with like-minded
surf-crazed, forgive me, nutballs. So there you have it: I'm like
totally into the whole asc thing about sharing the ride, the waves, and
some laughs along the way. So thanks a lot, guys.
Surfing better is a goal
but I'm not obsessed about it. One goal I do have however is to surf
bigger and bigger waves as I age. I don't know how realistic this
is and I can't begin to estimate the true circumference of my proverbial
cojones but I want to find out. I wanna go big but don't know
if that capacity is within me. I wanna know exactly how gnarly I
can become. In this world there are big bitchin' waves. The people
that ride them are gnarly bitchin' dudes and dudettes. I aspire to
become such a dude. So far my record on big waves isn't so good.
In Santa Cruz one day in 78 I was out in waves with maybe 18' faces.
I remember being seriously afraid and balking before takeoff out of sheer
instinctual fear. Maybe I caught something inside that day but none
of the biggies - that's for sure or i'd remember. After a twenty
year hiatus from surfing, I took up the passion again. The biggest
waves I have seen on the east coast since 98 were on the last weekend of
August on 99 at Rodanthe
(Saturday) and Kitty Hawk
(Sunday). Two storms, Cindy and Dennis, were sending up massive lines on
bars 400 yards out in the 10 to maybe 15 foot range. I got a few of the
smaller ones on my mini-long board but would only tackle the bigger ones
riding prone on a bodyboard. I remember the whole balking thing
from that weekend too. The waves were peaky and hard to catch but
I know that there were a few that I could've had a chance on if I hadn't
bailed. The same thing happened when I was out with Matt at Assateague
(I think right after Isabel). The waves were really thumping and pretty
damn clean. The biggest ones were definitely way overhead but there
I was bailing on the biggies and trying to pick off the inside sets.
Yeah I'd like to get better, improve my pop-up etc., show better judgment
and all that. And I know that will all happen with time but what I really
aspire to is go bigger and bigger, to overcome the late bail, to learn
to just go, you idiot, just go, to become truly gnarly.
To those of you who are still
with me, I bid you a fond farewell until later. The ASC
Rules! I remain in Silver "Friggin" Spring Maryland,
- Ken "The Gnarly Dude Wanna
Be" Walsh
PS: I spent two years
in Santa Cruz in 76-78. I noticed then that when the waves got really
big the line up "pleasure point" and the hook was a lot less crowded with
recreational surfers.
PPS: Proposed club
rule: At any club gathering of 6 or more, every wave shall be a party
wave.
MM
Reports on Big Sunday. I can say I had a great time on Sunday
despite the session ending early due to the crowd factor, but sometimes
you got to share em. Was nice to get on my repaired WRV since riding the
Velzy for a while. Was also nice to meet everyone that I haven't
met in the past and sorry for any close calls, but I like a late drop sometimes.
We embarrassed ourselves later in Rehobeth with some dredging waves. I
started my repair process on my Greg Loehr short board. Looked ugly
at first, but I will have it fixed up soon and making a fool of myself
in no time.
- Mike McDowell
The
Mini-Reports
I'll
just say - - - I had a blast! - - Thanks to everyone that decided
to surf together.... ASC
rules!
- Doug |
I
had a blast too, Doug, even if the surf didn't live up to my hype.
I especially enjoyed finally meeting so many ASC'ers that I had only known
from the listserv.
Long live the ASC!!
- Paul Moos |
Paul & Ken sorry I was
a no show on Sunday. Got held up in Baltimore on Saturday night and
it would have been a 3:30 departure to get my gear in Silver Spring and
then make it to Parole at 5:30. Weather on Sunday was great in central
MD, warm and no wind. Let me know what I missed out on. Will
try to be on it again soon. Looking forward to the approaching 5-day
weekend.
- Matt |
Camped
out last night at assateague, weren't any waves when we got there, same
when we left... not that it matters any because i got a
nice dose of sinus problems
and was feeling pretty ill... looking towards the next "swell"...
- Todd |
I didn't really see much
crowd factor or any bad attitude on anyone's part while I was there.
Maybe that is because I was catching them up by the rocks mostly, so nobody
was contesting my waves once I was on them. The only thing I noticed
was that many people often paddled for the same wave, creating some confusion
and some loss of arm strength on everyone's part. It works a lot
better if people just share waves and call out when they want it - or say
go to somebody else. It is a better vibe and you use all of your strength
on waves you are gonna ride. But it only works if everyone does it
- otherwise it is quickly back to "competitive" mode and noodle-armed frustration.
- Paul Moos |
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