6:30: My body clock is back in synch with the local time, after a trip to Japan, and now I am waking up well before the sun rise. I got out the bed at 6:30. Today was, counting each session of this year, the 250th session, and it so happens that it is the Christmas day holiday!
6:50: I put on the wet suit and I get out and it was only 40 F outside as indicated by the outside thermometer on my car dashboard. In fact, when it is at or below 40 F, a road-frost warning light also comes on, so it was colder than usual. I was actually looking forward to get in the water because in the past sessions, after the initial plunge, the water was actually warmer than being standing outside.
No coffee and pastry option this morning, so I had to head straight to the beach. The traffic was light.
6:55: There is a shopping center I pass by on the way to the beach, and a Macdonald's always has flags up on the pole. Aren?t you supposed to bring down the U.S. flag down at night? I am glad they don't bring them down because that is a good spot to check the wind. The flag was not flapping around, so that was good.
Basically, no matter how flat the condition is out at the Jetty, there usually is one or two surfers out there every morning. But this morning, I was the first to arrive and for the first 30-40 minutes of the session I had the entire beach to myself. I could paddle anywhere and take off on any waves without a worry. And while I cut the session short to less than an hour, I caught so many waves.
7:10: Put the booties on, put a light coat of was on the Fish and I am heading out crossing the highway. A woman driver passes by but she gave me a wide smile. I am sure she was stoked about seeing someone surfing on a Christmas morning.
The bay was a bit filled in with the water and with the long period swells filling in the water were hitting the rocks. But it was clean paddle out, so I started to paddle out. Light was becoming better as the Sun is starting to come out of the Santa Cruz Mountains.
The waves were fairly small, may be up to shoulder levels, some were real fast closeouts and some had good shoulders, and I caught many waves, as I paddle back quickly.
On the second ride, I had an "air" in the ride. As I have written before when the waves are bouncing in the Jetty, the inside gets really bumpy, and I have ridden over these inside bumps, but today as the bump approached it happened that I bent the knees to absorb the bump. I had a good speed, so as I did this, I went over the bump and then I was launched on the air for a few seconds. The remarkable thing about this one is that I was still on a riding posture, and when I landed, I continued to ride. So this morning, I happened to get some "aerial" move, and it was fun.
I was paddling up and down to find good spots, and caught many waves after that.
Finally at 8:00 people started to arrive, and I thought, it would be a good time to cut the session and start to get into the Christmas sort of things with Wendy and her mom.
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