HIGH-TIDE CLOSEOUTS, MON 13JAN2014

Loc: El Porto

Time: 0815-1000

Conditions: 2-4 FT, sunny, offshore, glassy, high tide, walled.

     I had to work over the weekend, so I had to listen to Briana’s stories about how she scored local surf with all our friends.

     I had planned to wake up at 0545, but I snoozed until 0700. I couldn’t help it.

     Driving down Main St. in El Segundo, the street is packed with cars and school kids. It’s that time of year, back to life and reality for everyone. I wonder if the lineup will be a little emptier now.

     When I reach the Porto lot, I see that the conditions are clean, but the waves are high-tide walls. Soft too. I check my favorite spot more south, and it’s even smaller.

     I score free parking on Highland again. I also have to shit again, so I walk down the hill first for a poop and a surf recon.

     Even though there aren’t many defined peaks, the water just looks so inviting that I can’t help but go in. I contemplate on heading to Huntington. It would make sense since the tide is high and it’s going down now, but I’m impatient after three days of not being able to surf.

#

     It’s a long paddle out to the lineup, and there’s a surf couple on shortboards caught in the impact zone. Both of them, guy and girl, have ditched their shortboards. When the whitewash comes in, they dive underwater while their boards flail behind them. I think about what I’ll say if their boards hit me. Luckily, I make it out incident free.

     By the time I make it out, I’m winded. Those three days of not surfing have really taken me out of surfer condition.

     The current’s going north, so I paddle south in front of the sandwich shack. Even though Porto’s crowded this morning, for some reason it doesn’t get to me. I’m so happy just to be out that I have no expectations, and I’m ready to share some waves.

     When the sets come in, they’re all walled with a little shoulder all the way at the end. I try to get into position, but I’m either forced to pull into closeouts or go straight.

     My wave of the day is a left where I’m in perfect position on the shoulder. I pop up and clear the first section, bottom turn, and get a little top turn off the lip. After that, the wave tapers off, and I get a little check to end it.     

     I’m hoping that the lowering tide will make the conditions better, but it doesn’t. A local guy who has a shaved head and blue earplugs says, “Mo’ betta high tide!”

     And maybe it was better at high tide. I should’ve gotten up earlier. Never again. This is 2014 damnit. No more second shifts. I gotta start going to bed early and dawn patrolling.

     After jostling the lineup, I manage a couple more rides that are more than closeouts. There’s a right. One little turn. Guys out the back are watching. I fall. Then there’s a fast left. I don’t get a turn, but I’m flying down the line trying to make the face. It never opens up and turns sectiony. Before the wave closes out, I climb the face, and the bottom of my board glances off the lip as it’s coming down. Below me, the whitewash explodes, and I stick the landing. I don’t want to call this a floater because I didn’t float above the lip, but it was nice to stick that landing.

     By 1000 I’m done. The surf isn’t improving despite the pristine conditions. It’s even warmer now, and I’m roasting in my 4/3. But I’m gone. A closeout to shore. That’s it.

WHEN IT’S NOT WALLED (double), WED 08JAN2014

Loc: El Porto

Crew: Gary C.

Time: 0715-1115

Conditions: 3-4 FT+, consistent, foggy, fast.

     Free parking and Porto don’t go hand in hand, but I have no choice but to bust a U turn when I see a free spot open on Highland Ave. The morning’s so foggy that I could have easily skipped the surf session, making the call that it’s miserable outside. It would have been so easy to just curl back up into my comforter and turn off the alarm. Instead, I’m walking down the hill to get a peek at the ocean.

     Now I stand here at the strand, eyeing the half-empty parking lot. I lose visibility half way to shore. The most I can see are the stones and patches of grass by the bike path, but I hear waves.

     After suiting up, I’m walking back down again, and every step on the down slope is jarring my shit looser and looser. I can hold in my shit though. It shouldn’t be that serious, but it hits me. The pressure builds against my anus. If it had been summer, I would’ve just shit in my shorts in the lineup, but I’m inconveniently already in my wetsuit.

     On the sand, I see the city workers standing in front of the bathroom entrance. I jog in place, waiting for them to leave, but they don’t. I walk right past them, wetsuit, surfboard, and all. They all look at me, but I try to avoid eye contact. Yes, I am the man who is about to blow up your toilet.

     If you’ve surfed El Porto before then you know that the bathroom stalls don’t have doors. When I walk in, there’s already another guy in here taking a shit. He doesn’t look up, but I feel connected with him. Here, two souls had made the same mistake earlier by not shitting at home. Together we can pay the price side by side.

    

NOT FOR BEGINNERS:

     Paddling out this morning, two images are ingrained in my mind.

1.  There’s a chick on a foamboard stuck on the inside. She’s wearing booties and gloves, even has a boonie hat on to keep out the sun, but the hat just looks ridiculous since it’s so fucking foggy out. Maybe the booties too. Maybe the board. Or maybe it’s just her. The inside whitewash is so consistent that she keeps getting knocked off of her board. The front brim of her hat is stuck in the up position. The whole time, she’s struggling with her board as if it was a mechanical bull, and the bull’s winning. At least she has all of her gear, but her gear is useless. The swell’s turned on a bit, and the noobies who were able to make it out the last some-odd days will do no such thing today.
2. A blonde guy on a blue fish is stuck on the inside too. Instead of trying to get back on his board, he’s off of it and resting his arms on top of its deck. The whitewash continues to slam into him, and he’s making no effort to get back onto his board. He has an aimless gaze as I paddle past him, and the look on his face says it all:
1. I didn’t expect it to be this hard to make it out
2. I thought I was better than this
3. I thought my paddle was stronger
4. I thought my duckdive was stronger
5. Surfing is a lot harder than I thought it was.

HOMIES:

     I hear someone yell, “Mateo!” in the lineup. All the guys around me are wearing wetsuits with hoodies, so I can’t see their faces. One of them waves at me. Upon closer inspection I see that it’s Gary.

     I have my own surf crew, but we’re spread pretty thin nowadays. Most of them have hectic work schedules, are injured, or have unfortunately lost dedication and love for surfing. I’m such a surf geek that it makes me upset to think about it sometimes, but I have to accept that surfing isn’t for everyone, and other people find other things to love besides it. But not me, surfing’s got me hooked, like a skank with a huge ass that always lets you hit no matter what.

     The water is so glassy and smooth, but the fog makes it a bit eerie, like a pirate ship is about to cruise through the lineup. The sun’s blocked out by the fog which creates a thick peach haze. The swell direction is making the waves break differently. They are peaky and standing up, but they are still a bit sectiony and closing out. However, there are some shoulders here and there.

     Since Gary has to go to work, I let him take some of the waves I’m in position for. In the middle of our exchange, a three-foot left comes my way. I get one snappy top turn and throw some spray out the back before it closes out.

     An hour later, the fog clears up. Gary is gone, and the lowering tide has the waves standing up even more. The waves are still rideable, but they are so fast that I can only pull. The window for carves has closed.

TRAINING:

     The rest of the session I’m pulling in. The barrels look makeable if I can just pop up on the shoulders. There are two waves where the shoulders throw out and go hollow. I pull in on each. I should be able to make it out, but I don’t. I don’t hold my line strong enough. Maybe I’m too upright. Maybe I thought I was better at riding barrels.

     After that, I try to be picky and choose the waves with shape that might at least give me some driving distance in the tube, but I don’t make it out on any.

     By the time I’m done surfing, there’s so much water in my sinuses from wiping out that I have a headache.

FOUR HOURS:

     But I’m not complaining about the surf. The conditions are perfect. It looks more like summer than the winter now that the fog’s cleared. What amazes me most is how even on the low tide, there is still some shape.

     Four hours later, and I’m back at the car changing. I can’t see the tan line on my neck, but I know it’s bad. My body doesn’t match with my head, and wearing a tank top or anything exposing my sternum would make a bad joke out of me.

     And it’s funny how I had woken up at first light this morning, and it’s already almost noon now. Half the day goes by just like that, and so does my energy. My back muscles are toast.

WHEN CONDITIONS CHANGE, WED 08JAN2014

Loc: El Porto

Crew: Bri, Khang, Dais

Time: 1500-1630

Conditions: 3-4 FT+, consistent, walled, onshore, choppy.

     I had sold Bri on the surf sesh this morning, and despite the report for onshore wind in the afternoon, I’m hoping that the conditions will still be decent.

     Khang and Dais have the afternoon off, so they’re heading to Porto too.

     When Bri and I get to the lot, there is texture on the water’s surface from the wind. Peaks are still rolling through like this morning, but just a hair smaller. The surf looks walled, but I make out some corners from pure desperation of wanting to paddle out again. 

     Bri and I paddle out first with the boys following shortly behind. We start off in front of the bathrooms, but a north current pulls us south towards Rosecrans.

     I get a racy little left, just pumping and pulling off a minor floater on the end section. Sets start rolling in, and they’re all walled.

     45^th has the most heads, and the right there is kind of working, but that’s where the evening patrollers are.

     Khang and Dais paddle north against the current, perching just north of the bathrooms. Bri gets the longest ride of the session, somehow making it down the line on a long racy right and literally going all the way to shore, walking on the sand with board in hand.

     I tell Khang and Dais how good it was earlier, and I’m trying to get a good ride to show that the surf is still good. I get a right and get one backhand snap, but that’s it.

     The boys do all right, getting one wave each that has some shape, but everything else is just walled. Bri has to pay for it on her longboard, getting worked on the inside too.

     “I think I’m going for my last one,” says Khang. We’ve only been out for an hour. I don’t blame him.

HOT WINTER, SUN 05JAN2014

Loc: El Porto

Crew: Bri, Dave T., Gary C., John A.

Time: 0700-0915

Conditions: 2-3 FT, inconsistent, offshore, sunny, crowded.

     For the first time this winter I’m finally in a consistent surfing groove. Bri and I have been dawn patrolling for the last four days in a row. I actually go to bed early now, which for me means before one in the morning. It’s always hard getting up when it’s cold, but my body is adjusting to the surf routine again, shaking off any discombobulation by the time the toothbrush hits my teeth.

     Bri and I check Manhattan Beach first at a break a bit south of Porto. We get here at about 0630. This spot is usually crowded when the swell is pumping, but on this cool clear morning, there is only one guy out. Small, one-foot closeouts break over the low tide. From the parking lot, only four guys congregate, watching the surf. Usually this lot is packed with its small crowd of dedicated vets, but the lot is empty.

     Klaude can’t surf today because he’s sick. I get texts from Christina and Shan, asking where Bri and I are paddling out. I shoot out the bat signal for Porto.

     I hate paying for meters, and luckily for me there’s one free parking spot on Highland and 41^st Street. I bust a bitch and score on the free parking.

     Now the rest of the morning is easy. I don’t have to race against the Gestapo-like meter maids or the street cleaners, so Bri and I take our time changing.

     Down in the lot, I look for Rick’s van but can’t find him. The surf is clean, and the tide is much better too since it’s lower now. I’d say that the break between 45^th and the bathrooms has the best peak right now because there’s already a thick crowd sitting on it. I walk south from the 42^nd Street Tower and watch a three-foot peak peel on the outside. To think that Surfline rated today one-to-three feet with poor-to-fair conditions, but I don’t see the “poor” at all. Sure, it would be nice if we had a little more size, but Porto isn’t looking all that bad with a faded swell and a very small northwest. Right now Porto’s working like the famed magnet that old timers have pumped it up to be, attracting swell energy from the west and northwest. Just driving five minutes north from the first spot I had checked has made a major difference.

     There’s a short stocky guy going left. He looks like a gorilla on a surfboard, pumping hard with his arms dangling low to his knees. Upon closer examination I see it’s the homie Gary. Next to him I see John A. and Dave T. but still no Rick.

     John gets a left as well, dropping in well behind the section, but he pumps and climbs over the whitewash to the open face. The surf isn’t big, but it’s so clean and glassy. I have the feeling it’s going to be a good day.

     Bri and I paddle up to Gary and then wave at John and Dave. It turns out that Rick is on the beach watching his youngest daughter, according to John.

     The moshpit of surfers remains at 45^th, but I can see why they’re there. The peaks are a hair bigger there, and clean right handers line up all the way to shore. But at the same time, there are at least three guys on every wave with lots of people on the inside, so I’m glad I’m by the swing set south of the restaurant.

     And the peaks roll in, but a lot of them are walled. We could use a little more water on the tide push. Regardless, I manage to get down the line on a left, pumping and sticking the landing from a check off the closing lip. Feels good.

     It doesn’t take long before the crowd gets thicker, but I Understand. With the unmolested sun peeking out over the houses on the strand, the air temp goes up a couple of degrees. It’s a classic SoCal beach day. The wind is a light offshore, and it’s supposed to be like this all day, so who wouldn’t paddle out?

     But the incoming crowd gets to me. I hesitate on a left because there are so many guys on the shoulder. I pop up anyway, but I’m late, riding the wave poorly and missing the rippable sections. More and more surfers enter the water, and the huge empty gap between the main crowd and us is now filled. Even John and Gary can’t get any waves to themselves, so they stay busy by moving around until I realize that they’re gone.

     Bri is handling the crowd well on her NSP as usual. I’m frustrated, and Bri’s presence is more like a flicker or a strobe because she’s either on a wave, all the way on the inside paddling back, or smiling before she disappears again.

     However, by 0830 a lot of people call it a morning and leave. The first shift of surfers is done. Sunday obligations? Maybe the tide got too high? I can see why people are frustrated. Even though there are waves, they are soft. Still rippable if a good wave comes your way, but ideally it’s the longboarders and guys with the fishes who are killing it. Suddenly, I wish I had one of Cheryl’s or Christina’s fishes. A fish would be perfect for today.

     Before the changing of the guard, Bri and I have the spot to ourselves, and I’m able to catch an unchallenged left. It’s racy, but I’m able to pump and keep up with it, connecting two turns before it closes out. And that’s the session. Wave of the day right there and at the right time too. The whole morning was worth it—everything from waking up to this morning. Worth it.

     By 0900 the second shift arrives. From as far as the smoke stacks to 33^rd Street and Parks, all I see are surfers.

     Bri and I have drifted south to Rosecrans near another pack, and that’s when I make the call to leave. We’ve surfed for over two hours and caught the best window of surf before the tide gets too high.

     On the sand, we turn around and look at the ocean. Is this really winter? I’m roasting in my 4/3. I could have 3/2’d it today, and I mean leaky 3/2.

     At Rosecrans, Don Kadowaki’s on one of his fatter boards going left. I mean, the man is doing work—carve after carve, top to bottom, spray out the back. He’s only on a three footer, but he’s surfing it so well. He does a wrap around cutback, but the wave dissolves on the inside, so he kicks out and paddles back to the lineup. Don usually surfs more south, but he’s here. Everyone’s here. Porto is the place to be today, and I’m glad I made it.

#

     A truck pulls up to wait for Bri and me to finish changing. Another truck pulls up, the guy inside asks if we’re leaving. “There’s already somebody waiting,” I say. And as Bri and I drive away, cars and trucks with surfboards, inside or on the roof, patrol the streets outside of the parking lot like sharks smelling blood in the water. It isn’t until I make the right on 45^th to get back to El Segundo that I see the lot closed off by the Manhattan Beach meter maids. A tow truck sluggishly makes its way through the narrow streets, a black Toyota Prius its first victim, perhaps the first of many today.

     “Don’t you love that feeling?” says Bri. “Everyone else is here so late, and we’re already done!”

     It’s only 0930. We’ll be home for breakfast in five minutes. We’ll be at the gym after that. And by noon, we’ll have the rest of the day to scratch our asses.

     Driving north on Vista Del Mar, I see a stand-up paddle boarder at Hammerlands wearing shorts with no shirt. It’s a good winter day in the South Bay.