A Saturday morning break.

Not raining right now as I type.  Santa Cruz only received about a 1/4" here on the west side of twon.  Sure felt like more than that, but I was out at Happy Valley during the heaviest rain.  The closest gauge to where I was shows over an inch of rain yesterday.  Scott Valley records about .4 inches and Lompico 1.4 inches.  Micro climates.  A solid rain day for mid October, especially considering there is more to come.  Get out there early today to enjoy some puddle stomping or artificial turf soccer ball kicking.  This next system looks fairly matured and will run into us later this afternoon and evening.  It is just about 50F here in town this morning; expect things to warm to about 65F.

Pushing the clean surf that is coming back next week.  

It still looks like we will only get light showers at the most during the daylight hours today.  The biggest push seems to come after midnight Saturday.  We should see some moderate rain lasting through sunrise on Sunday, and tapering through mid day.  Another half inch is expected here in town with more in the mountains.  A third wave arrive mid day, and fills the rain back in.  We may not even notice the afore mentioned tapering.  Moderate showers now look like they will move as far south as Big Sur Sunday evening into Monday morning.  Rain should end by around sunrise Monday.  Still plan for a wet commute as the roads at least will be slick.  All said and done, we should get up to about 1.5" here in town and several in the Santa Cruz mountains.  The north Sierra is looking at 5 plus inches and the NW part of the state could be pushing ten inches in total water accumulation in select locations.  SoCal, where the water is most needed remains dry as a bone.

Plan for beach weather next week.  Big somewhat stormy surf out there this morning.  Might be worth a paddle if you like a challenge.  Things settle by Monday with still some moderate size surf.  Conditions improve significantly.  The sun comes out.  Low 80's by end of next work week.  Welcome to fall in Santa Cruz.

And a quick snow update.  All rain below 9K yesterday, so the resorts are mostly dry.  Still good wetting occurred and the peaks look pretty.  The Sunday evening round of rain might be a bit cooler, with snow down to 7000 feet, which is below base level for a few resorts, and near base level for most others.  Still are not expecting snow down to the lake just yet.  But hey, it is not even Halloween.  And it is not 2004 (we had 5 feet on the ground at 7K by Halloween that year!!)