West Swell.

There is a surf movie called Big Wednesday.  It is not the best example of writing or acting out there, but it does pin the topic of west swells pretty well.  For anyone who likes to surf in California, the swells coming straight out of the west is what it is all about.  Sure, 95%, or more, of the time swells are coming from the deep south or out of the north-north west, but the west swells are the best.  Part of it is the fact that these swells seem to fill in every where.  When we get one, everywhere from along the coast will light up.  Another part of it is the time of year that they arrive.  Early fall.  Summer's flat doldrums become a memory, but even more importantly, they tend to arrive during fine, calm weather.

The days of groveling on fat, wide, boards for small summer waves are coming to a close.  Fall is here.

A decent sized, long period, west swell is due to arrive along the Santa Cruz coast some time on Monday.  Sure, we already have waves in the water tonight, but by tomorrow night, we will have some significant waves.  In town, these will show at perhaps a few feet overhead.  Kind of like a really good summer swell.  North of town, we could see some pushing into the double over head range.  And these are long period swells, packed with lots of energy.  Use caution when approaching the ocean the first part of this week.  Remember, this is the time of year that people tend to get too close to the ocean and get swept in by large waves.  As this first round backs off, we see some small south swell later in the week, with another south behind that for the weekend.  And the charts suggest another decent Gulf of Alaska storm this week, sending another westerly swell for the weekend.  Good times if you surf.  And the wind is too be light to boot.

As for the weather, it looks like we could continue to see some fag right along the immediate coast.  Light south winds keep that marine layer close, but with a bit of luck, we could see the winds shift into an offshore flow, blowing out that fog and returning us to sun.  The good news is that it is a different sunny pattern than last week, and we could see daytimes high slowly start to climb.  By next weekend we could be back into the mid 70s and sunny, offshore weather.  Could be a stellar weekend to close out the month.  Who cares.  I'm so excited about the surf this week, that hail would be fine.  Not really, but almost.  Anyway, fog lingers for another day or two, with high 60s.  Sun returns and mid 70s by Saturday.  Nice weather.

Oh, and the apples are off the hook right now.  Empires, from Billy Bob Orchards on sale at Saturday's Westside market.  Delicious.