Must be truly Blessed....it rained again.



We had a wild day of sailing Saturday three days ago. The night before a tropical down pour hit us, heavy rain and winds. The next morning we woke up to huge pounding shore break with strong onshore winds. The day was brilliant, deep blue sky and crystal clear air. The shore break was straight onshore a very different direction for Los Barrilies. The shore break was also very BIG, really BIG waves with 4 to 6 foot faces. Combined with the onshore wind it was impossible to get out to sail.

By 2 p.m. the wind changed to side onshore. However the shore break remained onshore and BIG. From shore the water looked wild with swells and waves coming from every direction. The wind was also hard to read because of its direction. Another sailor (Travis) and I watch it for a short while and decided to go out. The hesitation for us sailing was the fear of getting out though the BIG shore break, I mean really BIG, 4 to 6 foot faces. Watching the sets come in we were able to time a low set with 2 foot faces every third set. Ran into the water, threw the board out ahead, jump on and pump like crazy to get out before the BIG stuff hit. I had guessed a 4.7 would work, wrong. Once out side the 4.7 was ok for downwind but a pain to run back up wind play the inside swells. I was however able to work the swells, FUN BIG smoothies inside and out, I wouldn't ride in too close to shore getting max turns as usual. I was afraid I wouldn't have enough power to sail back out and get caught in the washing (crunching) machine. Travis and I did sail for about hour. We both quit only when the wind back off. Landing was a trip in itself. Because I didn't have a lot of power I couldn't pick and chose the set I was going in on. Once I committed to landing I had to ride what ever swell I was on. Basically I just rode a swell in. Then abandoned my rig when I was a couple of feet from shore. Cool, the rig wash up onto the beach unscathed and I walk in right behind after getting slammed by the following break. There were only three only people out with us, one sailor and two kiters. Every one else sat on the beach watching. No one took any pictures, the picture on this blog was from last year. Only difference was last year was the wind was too light to sail and the swells were smaller.

Posted: Tue - February 8, 2005 at 02:51 PM          

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