Huge Christmas Day North Shore swell

Christmas Day provided the promised ‘wish-list’ monster swell. You can follow the build-up and and the drop-off below in the Hawaii Swell Journal entries from 23rd to 37th December with photos. a full slide show is far below.

Perfect sunbathing conditions : photo Joliphotos.com

Hawaiian Swell Journal. December 23, 2009.
The surf forecast for this week is all over the place. It reads – “There will be a series of north west swells through the week.” Well all I can say is that’s a big help. Yesterday morning was small and clean, and today was bigger and clean. Pipe was the spot with a solid 10’ swell running. Not a lot of barrels but enough to keep the local crew happy. Garrett McNamara, not a guy who shies away from publicity, was out at 2nd reef on a thick wooden board. His board was somewhere around 10 to 12 feet and it had a long drawn out tail. He struggled to ride it, but it made for some weird rides when he did. Lots of action on the beach with the holidays approaching. The coconut wireless is going mad with the talk of a jumbo swell due on Christmas Day.

Rockpiles : photo Joliphotos.com

Hawaiian Swell Journal. December 24, 2009.
Where’s the swell? Yesterday was solid in the 10ft range. Today it’s half the size. Lots of crew watching but nobody really surfing. The early morning check looked good but as soon as the sun came up the wind started to blow. Most crew were over it and headed for the Malls for some last minute Christmas shopping. A monstrous swell is due tomorrow. Crew are trying to figure out where to go. Jaws, Waimea or other islands? Jamie O’Brien wanted to head for Jaws but there are no Red Bull ski’s alive, because they were all destroyed on the rocks at Jaws during the Eddie swell. Crew are trying to figure out how they can juggle family commitments and also get a surf in on Christmas day. Can’t wait to see what Santa brings us.

Kahea Hart : photo Joliphotos.com

Hawaiian Swell Journal. December 25, 2009.
Who put a big swell on their Christmas wish list? Whoever it was wasn’t a photographer. We got our monster swell but we also got rain and overcast conditions all day. I reckon the sun broke through about three times for a few seconds at a time the whole day, not great for photographers, but if you were a big wave rider then Santa delivered big time!

Just before I went to bed on Christmas Eve I checked the wave buoys and they were showing the swell was on the way down. They were registering a very big swell, but all the indications were that it was going to peak sometime during the night and for us daylight creatures it would be biggest around 8 am. Well all I can say is that it didn’t turn out that way.

Stoked survivor : photo Joliphotos.com 

The Bay was breaking in the 25ft range at 8am, and every 40 minutes or so a bigger set would roll through. At around 1.30 pm one of the biggest sets I’ve ever seen rolled into the Bay. It was already a wall of white water at least 100 meters outside the normal take off zone! There were about 30 surfers in the water at the time, and everyone of them was caught inside by the close out set. It caused absolute mayhem! At least 8-10 boards were washed ashore, another 8-9 boards broken, and crew were scattered all over the Bay. The rescue ski brought guys to the beach in relays while others swam or paddled in. When calm was restored there were only about 5 guys left in the line up.

On Christmas night crew were recalling where they were when the “close out” set hit the North Shore. There were stories of tow in crews out running the set down at Himalayas, or Phantoms or spectators watching it at Waimea or Sunset. The lifeguards at Waimea estimated it was 40ft plus, and I’m sure anyone who saw wouldn’t disagree.

Perfect peak, Pipe/Backdoor : photo Joliphotos  

Hawaiian Swell Journal. December 26, 2009.
The swell forecast this week has pretty much been on the money. The North West swells all arrived. It has been up and down. There has been plenty of waves, and plenty of variety. Yesterday’s massive swell more than halved overnight. Sunset is drawing all the tourists’ crowds while Pipe is the spot of choice for surfers. Pipe is in the 8ft plus range today. It is sunny and the trade wind is blowing. Pipe is super clean, but if you stuck around long enough you’d realize there aren’t that many barrels out there. The onshore Kona wind blew in around 2 o’clock spoiling the fun day at the beach. The highlight of the day was Jamie O’Brien surfing Pipe with a big black afro wig on with his front teeth blacked out with texta. Not sure what he was up to, but he looked like he was having lots of fun. Maybe it was an act to scare the tourists off? The river mouth at Waimea also provided a few laughs when it broke. Jamie O dominated that fun session too. Look out for a full feature on the fun flowrider style Waimea river mouth wave on coastalwatch in the coming weeks.

Perfect O.T.W. early AM : photo Joliphotos

Hawaiian Swell Journal. December 27, 2009.
The early morning surf check reveals the swell is down around 6ft. It is super clean and perfect as the sun comes up. Mark Mathews, Ryan Hipwood and Deano are all out for the early at Backdoor. Deano’s wedding guests are still on the North Shore and have been taking advantage of the recent perfect empty line ups. Hippo and the Hazza’s have been hanging at the Volcom Pipe house and hitting the line up whenever it looks uncrowded.

The early morning sessions are horrible for photographers because of the poor light, but I’m sure the video guys have been scoring. The swell dropped during the day so the holiday tourists enjoy the beach. There was a yacht anchored inside Waimea Bay this afternoon. Two days ago there were 25ft waves breaking in the same spot!

In the coming week.
The good news is that the waves are due to keep coming. More North West and West swells this week and there are whispers on the coconut wireless that the biggest swell of the winter may be heading our way around New Year. It’s been a very interesting winter and it’s not over yet.

Joliphotos