Big Wednesday

December 21, 2005

Big Wednesday? Yes! We have Big Wave Surfing in San Clemente! On Dec 21, 2005 (pictured above) 18 foot waves pounded the pier. Hardly anybody went out except for a few brave (or stupid) souls.

It was 8ft-12ft with occasional 15ft, well that’s what the board said. But any one in the water described it as “BIG”. Or, my favorite, Katie from the Surfline Surf Report started off of her report with “wholly moly it’s Big”

I was on the pier at around 8:30am when the tide started to come up and the waves started to break on to the pier!

Well, that quickly put the authorities in to action and we were kicked off the pier in no time by lifeguards.

The rest of the day the pier was roped off with this sign that said pier closed due to large surf.

So we took a walk down to T-Street to check it out there. It was also pumping with 10 or so people so far out on the reef that the zoom on my camera could barely make out their faces.

It was a steady 30 – 45 minute paddle out from T-Street, if you were strong enough. Most people opted to watch and heckle from the sand like myself.

Wyatt, 14 yrs old, found a fun spot. The waves were so big that, when they hit the bank of the T-Street run off outlet, the back wash wave was big enough to surf! (Wyatt also went out into the 15 footers, this day)

Statistically the biggest average surf in San Clemente comes in the winter months of December – February.

We often get overlooked by the winter northern-latitude swells due to the fact that most San Clemente Beaches face a southerly direction and Catalina Shelters the city from the big northern storm swells.

So this Big Wednesday was a treat.

Is it Big Wednesday today? Check out the Surf Cam!