everyone hits the pothole, for the love of clam strips, killer close outs, gramps gets the parking space, dog eats dog

swell: 5-7

wetsuit: 4.3

booties and gloves (first time wearing them of the season)

air temp: 

sunny/partly sunny

light wind

board: sasha, 8’0

checked the surf report and the swell still looked solid—5-7 feet, big for us around here, so it was on.

we remembered dan was missing a fin about five minutes before we hopped in the car, so we visited our friends at surfari, grabbed some fins, and took advantage of their columbus day weekend sale.

as soon as we hit the beach, we saw three surfers getting out of the water; always a questionable sign, but there were still a few SUPs and surfers out so we paddled in. 

and then we waited.

and waited. 

and waited. 

monstrous mountains kept rolling through but close outs were serious so ya. 

a couple guys next to us got on a few waves but everything was closing out hard and the smaller rollers I was aiming for had no push and I stalled out every time.  

I tried to move some to the right, after dan and i wondered if it might be a little more chill further right and got shit-slammed and experienced the joys of a three wave hold down. but i learned if i got really low right before a monster wave hit, i could just let go of my board and miss the washing machine. not safe if other surfers are around, but fine in my case since there weren’t.

i spent most of the day in the washing machine, punching myself over the waves, barely turtling or just calling uncle and getting as low as i could as the big waves crashed over me. 

when i nearly broke my neck on a killer close out, i thanked patcha mama and poseidon for sparing me and got out. all the dogs in town were on the beach—a goony great dane, a hundred labs, springer spaniels. they love running up and down the beach.   

when dan got out, we decided to hit cape ann brewery but i didn’t want to leave our new boards on the top, so we tetris’ed it up and finagled them into the car. dan couldn’t see anything as we pulled out but we made it to the pub, where the clam strips were glorious as were the beers. with the return of cape ann’s imperial pumpkin stout, what more could you want? 

where to surf according to the guy on the beach from jersey: who’s surfed everywhere  

costa rica

santa teresa

malpais

ecuador

montanita

nova scotia