don't be deceived...

...thanks to Alex's photographic skill, his great camera and the great light that the offshore wind and sunny sky provided, the conditions look great but they were really not at all.

Alex did send me those photos from Wednesday and they are so good that they deserve a post of their own.
They are in chronological order, but this first one is probably also my favorite.
I love the way the black Superfreak of Petch stands out on the light blue background. Might be worth to click on the photo... might be worth to click on all photos, actually!


Blog author.


So, why was it not as good as it looks? I got three reasons for you:
1) the wind was extremely light. The more you got closer to the impact zone, the lighter it got.
Most of the times, you could catch a wave only if you were in a spot where the wave was steep enough to allow kind of a "no paddling surfing take off". Once on the wave, of course, it was fine (if the wave didn't close out in front of you, which most of the times it did), but with such limited mobility, most of the times you were not in that spot and you would either miss the wave or get worked by a closing out wave... and that means a lot of swimming before you could start again (I did 95% uphauling and 5% water starts)
2) the closing out section was particularly downwind and that allowed for mostly one turn only
3) the wind was super offshore. Check the graph of iWindsurf.com (just renewed the subscription, couldn't live without it!): straight south. If it was stronger it might have been ok, but not at average 10mph...


Blog author and French guy. We just shared a big wave both completely screaming down the line, but Alex didn't send that photo. My guess is that we were covered by the waves in front and the related photo is not as good as this one.


OR, Alex got distracted...


Glenn hits the water.


Blog author hits a lip.


Glenn hits an aerial.


Mum whale checks out the air.


Calf whale does the same.


Thanks a lot Alex, those photos are great!

Forecast looks fantastic for surfing again. Here's the NOAA summary:
Outlook through Thursday Dec 24: a north-northeast swell is expected to reach the advisory level threshold of 8 feet along exposed east facing shores this weekend. A series of increasingly larger northwest swells is expected from this weekend into Christmas day. The surf could reach warning levels toward the end of next week.
My thought goes to all the Maui residents that went to see their families for Christmas...