With December slowly ending the best two surf months in recent history are almost behind us. I really don’t remember conditions like this since I have started surfing. If you did not have a job and would spend all your time by the sea you could get like 20 surf days in November and not a lot less in December. That is, speaking for Adriatic sea, almost insane. And most of these surf days were also really good, not just some windblown mush when you go into the sea just so you can say that you have surfed. We had solid back to back wind swells, spots that rarely work working more times that in the past few years combined, we had new spots discovered and surfed… man, I could get used to this. Especially after a few not that good seasons. So last three surf days…
Out of three days of onshore surf Wednesday looked the most promising, wind dying down before picking up again and still nice waves coming from the south. Since I didn’t have time to surf all three days I picked Wednesday and it was fun right up to sunset when the devil wind kicked in while the waves dropped turning the lineup to shit.
NOA, 18.12.2019
Then came the weekend. Lots of planing and organization went into who will sit with whom to optimize the cost of the island ferry. The end result was that we made it to the island Friday late at night, and the rest of the crew that waited for the morning ferry did not. Strong winds and waves make it impossible for the ferry to land and when that happens they stop the service. So we were “stuck” on the island alone with two local surfers and not another surfer or windsurfer in sight. Which is not a bad things :). Tide was extremely low so the waves were breaking way outside, the current was extra strong, in was raining hard all the time… one of the more challenging conditions as the WSL comentators like to put it :). Waves were sick, but really hard to get with everything going on. I had three sessions and was dead tired by 3pm when I could have had another one. We drove around doing a bit of “The search”. And then drove around looking for LPG. Not so fun fact, you can not buy a bottle of LPG gas in Croatia, you can only swap an empty one for a full one if yours is the same as theirs of course. To buy a new full one you have to call 3 days in advance or something. Weird. So after some cold food shopping it was time to go back to the mainland.
Parked at the top of the usual spot the wind kicked in hard in the second part of the night. Van shaking, raindrops blasting on the roof and walls… for me that is actually a really fun way to sleep :). Wind didn’t die down until noon. Then we had a mix of solid waves with glassy conditions, side shore and offshore wind. At times when it all came together there were some really epic rides to be had. Stronger offshore made us move to another spot that was supposed to work in the afternoon. It did not, but the bay that we have noticed on the way there did. A really fun left hand point breaking into the small harbor that only needed maybe another 0.5m of waves. That is almost always the case around here. You get a few waves and the the talk starts.
“Man, it’s quite good.”
“Yeah. If it was only maybe 0.5m more.”
“Yes, that would be sick. And no wind.”
“And warm water.”
“And barreling.”
“And girls in bikinis on the beach.”
“That escalated quickly”
lol, classic.
Island, NOA, Peroj, 21.-22.12.2019