First taste of winter

5th November


Surf 56/21
I woke at 4.15am with a kick from my wife... 'Cody Needs Changing and I've been up all night feeding' she said in an irritated way. The last time I checked my watch it was 11pm.... woho that was 5 hours of solid sleep! I crawled out of bed and grabbed my screaming baby, a heavy nappy, but thankfully my smelling sensors seemed to be switched off. Handing Cody to Char to feed, I grabbed my phone to check the buoys... 6ft, 10sec and 7 mile an hour northerly wind! Game On!


Going back to sleep was now futile, although with first light at around 6.30am I had to wait, I was left to imagine perfect empty waves peeling off some of my favourite spots. I put 3 boards in the car and looked at my lovely new dry Snug wetsuit, that can stay at home, surely it's not cold enough for that suit yet. Driving west on the empty dark roads I felt that buzz of excitement, anticipating some quality waves somewhere along Dorset's Jurassic Coast, I was thinking the usual spots would be busy, it was Saturday and everyone knows these days! 


I pulled up, got out of the car and the wind was howling, it was freezing and my hands were quickly turning white. The thought of putting my very wet old Xcel suit suddenly felt like a nasty proposition. Grit your teeth, do it and don't hang around. The suit was very wet and was getting stuck around my knees wile the cold wind blasted my naked chest, for a second I thought 'can I do this', it's only November 'come on Ben man up' 


Just as I had changed, Spanish Ben (as I'm now going to call him) and Gav turned up, Gav reminded me I hadn't seen him for about 9 months, time does fly as it didn't feel that long. Getting to the sea the strong cross-off-shore wind was making a nice mellow swell look a bit bumpy and hard to get on, the waves on my preferable spot were looking slow and weak, the swell wasn't quite big enough and the wind was holding it up a bit too much. 


We ended up surfing spot "S" and completely avoided the massing crowds at the more obvious spots, just the 3 of us had a golden 40 minutes where the wind was holding up the heavy fast lefts just enough to make them makable. Wooping each other into every wave our confidence was growing, after witnessing some deep thick barrels we all wanted to sit a bit deeper and attempt one, but the swell started to drop, the tide started to push and just after we felt we'd got started the waves disappeared. On the long paddle and walk home my hands started to freeze again and a quick change and full heaters were needed to warm up. 


Driving home I passed lots of locals, regulars and recognisable vans on the pilgrimage, but they were to be disappointed. It was only 9.30am and the game was over.