Surflies.
Surfline, the top surf forecasting site on the planet, failed miserably for the morning of day 181 of a year of consecutive surf.
The first text I got was at 6:10 a.m. — “sleep in, the wind is onshore.” I figured it was a fluke and things would shape up, remembering the marvelous predictions of how good the waves and wind were supposed to be on this very morning. Then a Facebook message came at 6:50 a.m. — “It’s 4′ and getting blown out on-shore. Nobody is out. If I were you I would check out Sapphire. I will check it again around 10 a.m. but it doesn’t look promising for today.” And last but not least – “Meet me in the Torrance lot. Knob is shit.”
I packed my gear and cruised down to Torrance Beach to meet my best friend Casey and photographer and surfer Brendan Simmons, looking at flags in the air the entire way down in disbelief about the strong onshore wind flicking them eastward.
I had told Casey, who was off work for the holiday, that I would have to do a short session locally and hit the responsibilities hard today. When we met Brendan in the lot and saw the “morning sickness” in the ocean, plans quickly changed, and we hit the road south to search for some comfortable waves for Casey to play around in, stoked to have the day off and wanting to get her feet wet with some fun rides. We drove the coast down through Huntington and Newport, and landed in Doheny, my home away from home.
As we came down the PCH exit, I saw a peek of the waves to come and nearly screamed with excitement. We. Scored. A heavy holiday crowd couldn’t take away any of the surf-stoke; the playful, long waves had us smiling ear to ear. And the crowd was full of my familiar “dohomie” faces – locals with the biggest smiles and biggest hearts.
We surfed our butts off for a few hours, then trickled back to the South Bay. Texts flew in that the wind eventually got better and it was all-time, but the long mellow waves and the Doho crew were all we needed for a solid session of surf and play.
