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Sloth leads to Froth: December 2012 Surfing in Review

Posted in Surfing, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on January 22, 2013| Leave a Comment »

December has with absolutely no contest become my favorite month of the year.  As a surfer one would consider such a comment rather absurd.  The days are the shortest of the year, air and water some of the coldest.  Here in Santa Barbara it is one of the more consistent months with usually good conditions, even in this the shittiest of winters ever.  For me it means over half the month not having to work allowing me to remember what it was like back in the old days when there was always time to find the best possible spot with the best possible conditions any day any time.

The smash and grab short sessions I am usually afforded courtesy of the rat race, although nourishing barely fulfill the daily/weekly does of stoke it takes me to get through this drudgery that is life.  It is very refreshing to have that luxury for over 15 days ever December to be able to just kick back and surf.  There were some key days this months.  Rincon dished up over a week of epic conditions mid month that left my legs hurting so bad by the end of it I was walking cowboy style.  The beach breaks decided to remind me just how deep I could ride the tube thanks to hard offshore winds and some really good sand bars. Even town managed to serve up a day or two.  Here are how the numbers panned out.

Surf Sessions: 27
Days Surfed: 25
Total Time Spent in the Water: 48.5 hrs
Waves Surfed: 740
Average Waves per Hour: 15

Spots Surfed:
Rincon: 7
New Jetty: 6
Emma Wood: 6
Mesa Lane: 3
Hollywood by the Sea: 2
Hammonds: 2
Silver Strand: 1

Top 3 Sessions (as per the Surflog)

3)12/22/12 PM Session: 3-5+ft, Rincon
Time in Water: 2hrs
Waves Surfed: 16
Wow I went to fucking fancy town last night.  Too much booze, too much party and a bit too much gnar for one night if you ask me.  Pat and I woke up at around 1pm all fucked up and hung over with little if any recollection of what happened. We got some breaky at Garrett’s since neither of us were in any condition to surf at that moment. Also it was cold, rainy and there appeared to be a SE wind plaguing things anyhow.  After a fine repast we got our act together and cruised to Rincon where it was mother fucking firing.  Things had glassed off.  The lines were perfect and there were barrels everywhere.  I had about six waves through the cove that could have been the waves of other’s lives, as for me it was just another perfect day at Rincon.  I got one in the cove where I was in the barrel for nearly the entire ride.  Had to easily be a ten second plus tube.  Sooooooooooooooooooo Goooooooooooooooooooooooood.   Now its time for Round three at the Wild Cat.

2)12/16/12 PM Session: 2-3+ft, New Jetty
Time in Water: 2hrs
Waves Surfed: 54
What a surf…See blog “We Certainly Could Have a Worse Lot in Life“

1)12/29/12 PM Session: 5-7+ft, Hollywood by the Sea
Time in Water: 2hrs 15mins
Waves Surfed: 25
I woke up on my couch yet again with a pile of crumpled up tortilla chips all over me around 8am.  Another failed night at the Cat.  Failure?  I think not. All my friends were there, my favorite bar tenders were working.  I had a hell of a time.  I looked out my window and the wind was onshore and the tide super high.  Awesome I could sleep in.  By noon a slew of calls started coming in about how the wind was off shore in Oxnard.  Hollywood had some good sand the previous day so I figured I would just go there.  Trevor and I rolled down there and it was fucking firing although a bit inconsistent.  Just head high plus barrels every where with virtually no crowd.  My boy Ryan was surfing at Orange House and we joined him.  From there it was on.  I got a triple barrel on one wave and had some crazy deep ones.  Then this freak set of like 15 10 foot waves came in and cleaned us all up.  I was pushed all the way back to the beach then the reverse rip was so bad I almost thought I was not going to make it back to the line up.  Besides that it was a pretty unreal session.  I told my boys “now if I can only get laid at the bar tonight this may be one of the best days of my life”.

December was one big speed blur of surfing, kind of like this frame grab from Silver Strand.

December was one big speed blur of surfing, kind of like this frame grab from Silver Strand.

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A Month of Non Surfing Related Travel: September 2012 Surf Sessions in Review

Posted in Anger, News From Lisanti Land, Surfing, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on December 26, 2012| 9 Comments »

I did mention there would be an abnormal amount of monthly recaps in the coming weeks courtesy of my laziness.  So September in December?  Well its better then a Christmas blog, don’t worry there were no arrests and no stabbings in Lisanti Land this year.  (see Christmas Dread Part I, Part II and Part III for more on that) As a matter of fact I did not even make it to the bar Christmas night.  Instead I ended up just falling asleep on my couch watching Seinfeld.  Very exciting stuff I know.

September is usually one of the better months for surfing in California.  Especially up here in the Ventura/Santa Barbara area.   All bets have been off this year considering it is by far one of the worst and strangest years of surfing I have ever experienced.  September did not disappoint in disappointing everyone.  There was a total of one NW swell that was the biggest let down since cheese in a can. One South swell I missed thanks to a non-surfing trip I took to Portland, Oregon for a family wedding and subsequent Vacation.  On said trip I managed to get myself into a family squabble impart because of a blog I wrote critiquing the wedding (see Portland Blogs: Part I, Part II, Part III and Part IV) and further proved to my parents what a fuck up I am.

There was one near epic day of crazy barrels at River Mouth that as far as I am concerned was the only worthy session of the whole month.  The city of Santa Barbara decided to close the Mesa Lane steps pretty much denying access to the only really consistently short board-able wave in town.  On top of all this I had to make a week long trip New Jersey for my sister’s wedding at the end of the month where I did manage among all the drinking to sneak in a couple of average surfs.  To continue with the theme of 2012 September was just another month of let downs and screw ups.  Here is how the numbers worked out:

Number of Surf Sessions: 19
Actual Days Surfed: 18
Total Time Spent in the Water: 31.5 hrs
Number of Waves Surfed: 531
Average Waves Caught Per Hour: 17

Spots Surfed:
New Jetty: 6
Emma Wood: 3
Santa Clara River Mouth: 2
The Pipe, Spring Lake, NJ: 2
Manasquan Inlet, Manasquan, NJ: 1
Riddle Way, Manasquan,  NJ: 1
Hollywood by the Sea: 1
Little Rincon: 1
Gold Coast: 1
Gudalupe Dunes: 1

Top 3 Surf Sessions (as per Surflog)

3) 9/12/12 AM Session: 2-3+ft, New Jetty
Time in Water: 1.5 hrs
Waves Surfed: 26
New Jetty is back baby.  I had heard rumors in my long hiatus from surfing that it was the case.   Then on Tuesday my friend Lindsay confirmed it.  I decided I would wake up and see for myself if it was true.  Expecting a lie and then a subsequent terrible Emma Wood session I climbed the dunes in low spirits.  Especially since the wind was whipping out of the west.  Sure enough I saw a set of chest high waves break off the jetty and just peel.  Stoked I called my boy Ryan and it was on.  The crowd was about eight strong but everyone was taking turns.  I was surfing really well although found that my lack of surfing had left me out of shape and struggling in the paddling department. Serves me right for nearly three weeks of drinking, partying and sloth.  After the session I went to the Ventura swap meet where I scored a boss ass lamp for my living room $15, an alarm clock $3, “Breakfast and Tiffany’s” and “The Young Frankenstein” $1 and Candide and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn $1.  What a score.  Then I had my dinner party which was ten strong including myself.  I served Chicken Parm over Linguine Rigati with garlic bread and stuffed apples for desert.  It was a fine evening.

2)  9/17/12 AM Session: 2-3+ft, Gold Coast
Time in Water: 1.5 hrs
Waves Surfed: 37
What a fun ass surf courtesy of more tropical action.  Its seems like all the best swells this summer were thanks to cyclones.  I started at Ventura harbor but it was all swampy with the tide at New Jetty and I could not judge River Mouth.  I had seen some good ones at Emma and went back there.  As I was checking Emma I noticed some decent looking lines coming in at Gold Coast, which loves these short period tropical swells.   I pulled up near the concrete retainer wall in the middle of the beach and picked a really fun peak.  For a change I was surfing incredible and the crowd was easy and fun as it usually is there.  Some how I pulled a front side submersible reverse.  I think I have only stuck maybe three of those in my entire life.  Nothing like a good day of surfing even if they are few an far between these days.

1) 9/26/12 AM Session: 5-7+ft, Santa Clara River Mouth
Time in Water: 3hrs
Waves Surfed: 40
Fucking barrel fest.  By far the biggest heaviest, most hallow day at the River Mouth of the season. I was a bit slow getting down this morning and very sore from all the surfing yesterday.  When I got up on the dunes I could not believe my eyes.  All I saw everywhere was spitting huge open tubes.  I almost fainted.  I ran back to the car, tore on my suit and joined the party.  I did not even do a turn till my 7th wave.  Everything was just a take off right into the pit.  Then the wind kind of got on it and made it a bit harder to get tubed but there were still plenty of heavy double ups that would let you in even if then did not let you out.  I had three where I was in a tube so big I could have drove a Mack truck through them.  Sooo fucking good.  It will make missing a week of solid swell while I am in shitty flat New Jersey tolerable at least.

The only really worthy session of September looked something like this only bigger!

The only really worthy session of September looked something like this only bigger!

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A Month of Surfing Sloth: December 2011 Surfing in Review

Posted in News From Lisanti Land, Surfing, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on February 17, 2012| 2 Comments »

December 2011 Surf Sessions in Review

With each session review I get closer to compiling enough data to bring a 2011 year of surfing in review to this site.  It will be the first of its kind and I must say I am rather excited to see the results of 12 months of useless surfing data.  I know I am crazy.  OCD is a terrible disease.  I guess one could say I am the Rain Man of surfing except I do not have the ability to count cards.

December started out slow surf wise then the north west swells just began to pour in and as of the moment really have not stopped. Believe me there are no complaints here.  My only gripe is with myself and the fact that I blew a number of potential surf sessions thanks to either pure laziness, partying too hard or due to injuries incurred from partying, all of which amounted to December becoming the most underutilized month of the year for me.  That being said there were still plenty of good times all around.

In life I managed to begin the renovations on my apartment, which at press time are just about finished.  Mentally and emotionally I worked through a ton of issues I have been harboring as well.  Maybe not surfing my brains out amounted to some positive in the end.  Only time will tell.  Here are the stats for December:

Number of Surf Sessions: 23
Days Surfed: 18
Total Time Spent in the Water: 35hrs, 25 mins
Waves Surfed: 442
Average Waves Caught in an Hour: 13

Spots Surfed:
Rincon: 8
Emma Wood: 3
Hollywood By The Sea: 3
Little Rincon: 2
New Jetty: 2
Oxnard Shores: 2
C Street: 1
Kooks Peak: 1

Top Three Surf Sessions:

3) 12/20/11 PM Session: 2-3+ft, C Street
Time in Water: 1hr
Waves Surfed: 1o
Mother fucking Cstreet, are you kidding me.  Is that really where I have had the best session in the last five?  Apparently.  Kooky and I car surfed down to Emma finding nothing.  The choice came down to running back to Rincon or going to Cstreet.  I had a feeling it could be fun at the latter so it was on.  Not even looking at it we suited up.  Out of time it was a make it or break it kind of session, sometimes the best ones.  There were two distinct peaks up at pipe.  Straight out of the gates I was nailing good waves.  I caught ten waves and eight of those had no less then six turns.  My last three were sick and some of the better backside turns I have done on my new board.  My last wave was so good I quit on it even though I still had easily another 15 minutes of light left.  Unfortunately Kooky not really knowing where to sit had a frustrating session.  C Street can givith and take it away just as fast.

2) 12/4/11 AM Session: 2-4ft, Oxnard Shores
Time in Water: 1hr
Waves Surfed: 17
Finally a surf and a good one at that.  I got down to Ventura Harbor and it was all closed out.  I was left with a choice of either going to a steadily draining tide Emma Wood or a gamble at the shores.  If I choose the shores and lost then I would have once again blew my gas on yet another wasted car surf.  My prayers were answered as I came up the beach to head high offshore spitting barrels in every direction I looked.  Kooky and I were on it.  What ensued was a full on barrel fest.  I had some drainers.  I saw Kooky get blasted out of a few good ones  too.  My last wave was one of the better left hand barrels I have caught in a long time. It may have been three days in the making but the first session of the month was on.

1) 12/25/11 AM Session: 3-4+ft, Rincon
Time in Water: 3hrs
Waves Surfed: 24
See a Christmas of Epic Proportions Part I and Part II for more details.

 Well there you have it another month of surfing in Lisanti Land folks.  As always you can keep a daily tab on my surfing sessions or just the gnarl that happens in my life that keeps me from surfing at the surflog.

Rincon on Christmas morning, the best session of the month with out a doubt.

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What a Difference a Year Makes: October 2010

Posted in Surfing, User Choice BLog, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on November 6, 2010| 1 Comment »

This week the UCB gods, err; just me actually (I am in no way insinuating that I am The God or a god although I could be a god, but I would just settle for leader of some type of sick twisted cult that wears all black sneakers with bright orange shoe laces, spandex shorts and white netted tank tops and worships the invention of processed cheese in a can) makes a winner out of my friend Devin who suggested I do a comparison blog on the surf of last season (being the start of NW season is September and runs through May) to this one.  I thought it a rather good idea and not just worthy of a UCB but a new monthly segment.  As a result for his genius (Devin may really be a genius, he definitely is one of the smartest people I know) I will award him 2 points!

Here is how this segment is going to work.  At the close of every month I will pick my five favorite sessions for the Surf Log and compare them to my favorite 5 sessions from Last winter’s unprecedented near epic El Nino season.  I will also throw down a by the numbers on how many sessions I had for the month, how many days I surfed and which spots I surfed the most.  Enjoy!

October 2010 by the numbers:

Number of Sessions – 31
Days Surfed – 25
Average Wave Height – 2-3ft

Surf Spots

New Jetty – 9
Rincon – 7
River Mouth – 4
C Street – 3
Emma Wood – 3
Pitas – 2
Hollywood – 1
Jalama – 1
Leo Carrillo – 1

Top 5 Sessions

5: 10/13/10 AM Session – 2-4ft, Leo Carrillo
I had high hopes for this session, but when I got to Ventura it was foggy, cold, windy and small.   This led me to car surf for over two hours before using the benefit of intel from both my friends Ryan and Devin I decided to go to Malibu for some late season south swell action and better winds.  I met Devin at Leo where it was a bit inconsistent but fun chest to head high peaks coming in with a light crowd of ten or so sitting on the rock.  Leo is a super tight line up so on an inconsistent day like this ten was still almost too crowded.  I had the whole day and in the course of a three and a half hour session managed to surf a bunch of fun rights despite the typical rude selfish L.A. surf mentality.

4: 10/14/10 PM Session – 2-4ft, Santa Clarita River Mouth
I never have high hopes for an after work session especially if I have to go to Ventura where more times then not the wind is going to be on it.  The Cstreet cam was showing clean chest to head high waves coming in behooving me to believe that the harbor would have good conditions also. I headed that way figuring on surfing New Jetty, but upon checking it noticed that the late season south swell was working its magic on the ledgey sand bars at river mouth, a sight I have not seen since late spring time this year.  I called this new guy at work Kevin, who met me in the parking lot at the knoll and together with about five other guys spread along 8 different peaks we enjoyed glassy slab lefts.  It was a fucking below sea level, backless barrel fest.

3: 10/5/10 AM Session – 2-4+ft, New Jetty

Its pretty ironic that today was also what I would call a “Jersey Session” except unlike yesterday I am using it to describe an awesome surf.  The wind was offshore, a California rarity, sure there is always that myth about “Santa Anna Winds”.  They blow for like a day and a half.  I think if I see a dozen true offshore days a year out here it is a lot.  This morning was one of them.  I pulled up to New Jetty and Im not going to lie it looked a little fat with the high tide and around eight guys one it not making it look all that fun. Then after ten minutes of watching I saw a left or two a bit up the beach from the usual take off spot suck out and throw.  That was enough for me.  What ensued was an onslaught of barrels.  If I did 12 turns the entire session it was a lot.  I got pitted off my ass on left and right keggers all fucking morning till the wind went side shore at noon but it was fine cause I had been out since around 8:30.

2: 10/15/10 AM Session – 3-5ft, Jalama
There is nothing like getting a break from humanity and making the trek up to Jalama especially with no wind and a holding south swell.  Conditions were glassy and the sand bars have finally gotten back to normal allowing for plenty of fun barrels.  I ended up cruising up with Lindsay being her first time there she was more then amped on the conditions. Crowd was surprisingly heavy with a solid thirty guys from T-Cracks to inside Tarantulas.  I mean this time of year your lucky if there are more then five guys out, but the water was crazy warm so I guess it evens out and besides I still got a ton of great waves.    I also found out they sell a Jalama pass for $44 bucks for the year.  Im all over that.

1: 10/29/10 – AM Session – 4-6ft, River Mouth

There are good surf session, there are great surf session and then there are sessions that go down as all time. This morning at River Mouth was one of the latter. It was a barrel factory out there. The first hour was nothing but perfect left and right hand draining barrels with light offshore winds. By 11am I had gotten so many deep barrels I had lost count. It reminded me of really good Hatteras. Everywhere you looked someone was getting spit out of a tube or there was a perfect cylinder running through unridden. After three solid hours the wind came up ending one of the better sessions I have had this fall and in the last six months.

***If you like these little synopses of my surf sessions feel free to visit my surf log on this blog where I post my surf sessions daily.***

Here is my favorite picture of me from October and also from the best session as well.

This guy is all ready to join the cult.

mmmmmm...processed cheese in a can

Stay tuned for last October’s comparisons tomorrow!

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