Here is another one from ACE – Albert C Ellliott – taken mid-day, at Mystery outer reef break, Tuesday, December 18.
ACE says this is one of our local MYSTO spots. It’s hard to see, hard to photograph and hard to surf. I asked him what size of wave he thought it was.
He responded:
Hard to tell – maybe a California 10’ – 12’ wave. Wave size depends on who you ask.
The spot is sooo far out there it is really hard to get a good read on what is going on from the cliff with a long lens.
I surfed out there a few times when I was young. Real shifty wave with sneaker sets. Hard to get a good line up spot on land. You never really know if you are in the right spot until a set comes in. … They say there is no surf there until there is…
Mystery outer reef break. Only breaks when it is big.
Saw this going off on Monday evening. I had never seen it break. Really cool.
Surfed there a number of times myself. Kinda shifty, indeed.
Definitely worth the paddle (but then again, most waves are).
It’s hard to tell by the photo but the mystery spot could be called “Indicators” outside No Surf. Adjacent to Luscombs. It’s a tricky wave when it brakes. Hard to line up. But if you connect, hold on.
Looks like Indicator to me as well.
The left I saw breaking WAY out there was not Indicators. It was a section of reef I’ve never seen a wave form before.
These waaaay outside reefs, west of Indicators, broke a couple of times during the 70s during Giant New Zealand swells and not just big norths in Winter like this one (I assume is a big N or NW?). A couple of people I knew took out Zodiacs or a Whaler to get to them unless the channel was closing out between the jetties. Couldn’t do beach launches when it was that big, too much whitewater to get through. I’d hitch a ride whenever possible!
But you’d sink an anchor and even in the channel the swells would lift and drag it so somebody always had to stay in the boat on a rotating basis.
Riding pocket rocket pintails-1975 or thereabouts (I had a purple 7’4″ Channin for this size wave then). Or we paddled which was a long-ass trek out and I can’t imagine doing that paddle on a 6′ trifin because our boards floated far better back then!
Unfortunately most of my friends didn’t have the cash for good cameras or telescopic lens to take pictures. Part of this time was during Nixon’s ‘Stag-flation’ economic downturn…we were all just scratching to eat and pay bills. So I really liked seeing this picture of an old surfer’s memory of a wave I’ve probably been on before. Nice Winter Solstice and b-day present! Great catch photo dude!
sealintheSelkirks
I surfed indicators only once. I believe it was winter of 82/83 with John Durwood and Raz.. ( I worked at Canyon) We just gotten off the plane and back from the North shore of Oahu and caught as the swell hit here. There was nobody out …people on the cliffs watching and the fire department was there ….we three the only people that paddled out. Spooky long paddle . You have no idea about lineup cuz you’re so far out …until a set comes and then you realize you’re in the wrong place. I rode one of my boards from Hawaii 7-2 pintail. You need a lot of board there . Wish we had had some pictures oh well memories.
I was there. Breaking over OB pier..crazy..3 guys and a knee boarder paddled out.. there are pics of it. More of a wtf moment…all lived..crazy
Dummy: I might have been one of those guys you saw at OB Pier. I absolutely loved those big left point/outside peak waves when I was a little kid hanging out on the cliff at my Granny K’s (too chicken to paddle out) and was a teen when I started surfing them (after the pier was built), but became a dedicated Southside/First Sunset Cliffs reef wave surfer when I moved back to OB with my shop from MB in 1980. Low tide Dawn Patrol waves way the hell outside in the fog past the T, oh yeah!
Ass-kicker of a paddle-out of course, even with the Pier pilings to hide behind,. But then those kind of days always were! I generally rode a yellow 6’4″ double-winged pintail single fin, my Seal’s Ding Repair ‘team rider ‘bigger wave’ board that was a direct copy taken off a Town & Country that came over from the Islands. Bill Ward and I shaped it together in his shaping garage on Cape May, then I had the board airbrushed with my shop logo by Chris Miller over in MB, and glassed it in my shop at 2151 Sunset Cliffs Blvd.
Funny that I can see the face of the young OBcean Jason in my memory and his ^T&C board that he let me try out, but can’t remember his last name.
I rarely rode the copy we shaped but it worked so damn good when it got big being shaped for Island-style waves. This was mainly before trifins came in and took over, and I had found that the twinnies didn’t work in those way outside conditions. Many old school single fins would be dusted off on those days back then…
You said there are pics of that day? Really? Question is which day it was. I’ve got pictures from ’82 in stand-up tubes at Rockslide (Sonshine Surf Shop photog took them, I was doing their ding repair) but not any of those big outside days at the Pier.
If it was one of the days I’m thinking of when I was out there, any chance of snagging a copy for my wall? If it’s me of course! Yellow board, mustache, long hair…oh wait there was a lot of us then!!
I still have that board by the way hanging in my sew shop rafters out back. And the hair is still long and the mustache is still there but they all turned white. But the poor board ended up getting seriously trashed when it blew out of the back of the truck on the I-90 west heading for the Olympic Peninsula and some cold water reefs more than a decade ago. It bounced pretty hard and danced on tail and nose in the rearview mirror before blowing into the rocks on the shoulder, but at least it didn’t get run over by the traffic behind me and it didn’t break in half. One of these days maybe I’ll get out the repair box and ‘seal’ it all up. Need some yellow pigment.
At 70mph you can imagine the damage inflicted on a 30 yr old board…
Sure were some goods days to have lived back then.
sealintheSelkirks