The good news is, we have surf. Hurricane Dean is passing just south of us right now, some of the cities on the South side of the island like Ponce are getting some wind and rain, but we haven’t had to deal with much here. We have had moderate gusts for the past two days but nothing I would associate with a hurricane.
Yesterday morning I surfed some waist high clean surf for about an hour and my arms were shot…I am out of surf shape big time. After a couple hours of work, I went back out just to get wet again and the sets started stacking. It was head high plus and lined up…not too crowded but the current was ripping down the beach. By the time I paddled in I had to paddle against the current on the inside to get to a safe, urchin free, in/out spot on the reef.
This morning, the surf has some morning sickness (that is why I am writing this post) with the low tide and the wind…but it is overhead on the sets.
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Stefan:
Good to hear you and Summer avoided the heavy parts of the storm. Reading about what it could do to Jamaica and ultimately the SE US is rather scary, as it could grow to a Cat. 5 hurricane.
Stay safe.
Good to see waves in Puerto Rico! How do you know where the urchin-free in/out spots are? Is it just knowledge of the break or is there a way to tell visually? Yo no quiero pies de urchin!
When there isn’t a tidal surge, you need to know where the in and out spots are, this comes with experience surfing each break. Usually, I have landmarks on the beach that I line myself up with when I get in and out of the water. If I haven’t surfed somewhere, I’ll watch the lineup for a while and wait for someone to get in and out, note if they had difficulty (or scream in pain) and line up my in/out spot based on theirs.
When the tidal surge brings in a lot of water along with surf, the in/out zone grows quite a bit. If you decide to take some whitewater in banking you will remain above the shelf floating in, it is safest to watch the turbulance created by the waves ahead of you…if it sucks out bumpy, there is probably shallow reef there and urchins in the cracks. If the reef isn’t shallow, you just float over the reef and slide off your stomach onto the sand before the suck out pulls you back onto the urchin covered shelf.
You should make some Uni (sea urchin) sashimi.
its been overhead all week with perfect barrels and not a person in the water…ok maybe not. Whats the water temp? Its been like 74 up here. Perfect and clear, but typical summer waves, or lack there of.