All Hallows Eve Surf & Culture Report 10310
Lost Boys & Co...
All Hallows Eve Surf & Culture Report
Friday, October 31, 2008
Boo!
Kinda sneaked up on you there didn't we. Yeah, we're pretty stealthy when we want to be. In case you just came back to planet earth, today is Halloween. Actually, this evening is Halloween. So if you haven't decided on your costume it's getting pretty damned late. Our own empirical evidence suggests that Sarah Palin is the most popular costume with women who just happen to have shotguns and winged glasses. For men it's pirates again this year.
Meanwhile the surf seems to be responding directly to the weather. We have 10 miles visibility and cloudy skies with scattered showers. It was actually raining at about 4am our time, but not enough to create Danger Boy scaring runoff. The winds are offshore by 9.7kts and the sea surface is glassy with a bit of cat's paw from the offshore. The air temp is 64.2f and the water has dropped a couple of degrees to 62.6f. High tide is at 10:28am +5.7' and low tide will follow at 5:57pm +0.1'. The buoy is reading 2.6' and the surf is in the 1' to 3' range. We checked out El Porthole this morning on the advice of Jose Barahona (the new improved Becker) and there were some hip high speeders, but still a bit walled up. Maybe high tide helped all of that.
Speaking of Jose, we spent a couple of days hanging out at the Becker/Mangiagli shop this week. So we've included a shot of Jose mowing some foam on the Professor's new blade. Jose inherited the shaping business from Becker (who had been his mentor.) After watching Jose exercise his craft we're convinced he's every bit as good as Phil and we think a tad better. Becker had the uncomfortable habit of leaving the rails a bit too boxy for our taste (okay - he was shaping thousands of boards, so he was in a bit of a hurry.) Jose takes all the time he needs and gets things down to exactly what you want. He's an excellent craftsman and a really nice guy as well.
The second shot is Birdie wrapping the Professor's board in a thin candy shell. If you've ever tried to glass a board you know what a daunting task that can be. Birdie goes at it with the confidence born of having done literally thousands of boards. And talk about multi-tasking! He was sanding epoxy boards, doing conventional resin on a couple of sticks and applying putty to the epoxy boards while waiting for the epoxy room to get down to temperature before he could glass that blank. We didn't know that when you're doing epoxy glassing you have to have the room chilled so that the glass job won't bubble. It's fascinating to watch him work. He says he likes to have company, but we'd suggest you clear it with him beforehand. He was telling us that business has slowed, but it still looked pretty busy to us.
Be careful either trick-or-treating or driving tonight. Lots of little Sarah Palins running around out there and their packing heat!
"When the surf breaks, we'll fix it..."
The Professor!!
Friday, October 31, 2008
Boo!
Kinda sneaked up on you there didn't we. Yeah, we're pretty stealthy when we want to be. In case you just came back to planet earth, today is Halloween. Actually, this evening is Halloween. So if you haven't decided on your costume it's getting pretty damned late. Our own empirical evidence suggests that Sarah Palin is the most popular costume with women who just happen to have shotguns and winged glasses. For men it's pirates again this year.
Meanwhile the surf seems to be responding directly to the weather. We have 10 miles visibility and cloudy skies with scattered showers. It was actually raining at about 4am our time, but not enough to create Danger Boy scaring runoff. The winds are offshore by 9.7kts and the sea surface is glassy with a bit of cat's paw from the offshore. The air temp is 64.2f and the water has dropped a couple of degrees to 62.6f. High tide is at 10:28am +5.7' and low tide will follow at 5:57pm +0.1'. The buoy is reading 2.6' and the surf is in the 1' to 3' range. We checked out El Porthole this morning on the advice of Jose Barahona (the new improved Becker) and there were some hip high speeders, but still a bit walled up. Maybe high tide helped all of that.
Speaking of Jose, we spent a couple of days hanging out at the Becker/Mangiagli shop this week. So we've included a shot of Jose mowing some foam on the Professor's new blade. Jose inherited the shaping business from Becker (who had been his mentor.) After watching Jose exercise his craft we're convinced he's every bit as good as Phil and we think a tad better. Becker had the uncomfortable habit of leaving the rails a bit too boxy for our taste (okay - he was shaping thousands of boards, so he was in a bit of a hurry.) Jose takes all the time he needs and gets things down to exactly what you want. He's an excellent craftsman and a really nice guy as well.
The second shot is Birdie wrapping the Professor's board in a thin candy shell. If you've ever tried to glass a board you know what a daunting task that can be. Birdie goes at it with the confidence born of having done literally thousands of boards. And talk about multi-tasking! He was sanding epoxy boards, doing conventional resin on a couple of sticks and applying putty to the epoxy boards while waiting for the epoxy room to get down to temperature before he could glass that blank. We didn't know that when you're doing epoxy glassing you have to have the room chilled so that the glass job won't bubble. It's fascinating to watch him work. He says he likes to have company, but we'd suggest you clear it with him beforehand. He was telling us that business has slowed, but it still looked pretty busy to us.
Be careful either trick-or-treating or driving tonight. Lots of little Sarah Palins running around out there and their packing heat!
"When the surf breaks, we'll fix it..."
The Professor!!
