Surf Report # 25

Location: Grand Haven, MI – South Pier
Time: 1:30 pm- 3:30 pm
Air Temp: 46° F
Water Temp: 48° F
Wind: From NW 24 mph
Waves: 5-8 ft
Gear: 5/3 wetsuit, 5 mm boots, 3 mm gloves, .5 mm hood

Wind gusts up to about 42 mph, brown foul-smelling water pouring in from the Grand River channel, wave chop as bad as anything I’ve been out in. Oh well, I guess you take what you can get sometimes. Actually stayed pretty amused for the duration in spite of constantly fighting to keep the nastiest water I’ve ever been in out of my mouth and eyes. Had some fun rides, driven, I’m sure, largely by all the practice I had out west. Paddling out certainly was much easier than even the smaller stuff I had to paddle through in the Pacific. The wind was out of control to the point where if I wasn’t holding my board down, it would blow right off of the top of the water. Lots of photographers were out on the beach all afternoon getting shots of waves crashing over the pier and against the lighthouse.