Surf Forecast Surf Report
  • Country flag icon
  • Country flag icon
  • Country flag icon
  • Country flag icon
  • Country flag icon
  • Country flag icon
app storeplay store

Makalawena Surf Stats

All swells

(any wind direction)

Good Surf

(light / offshore wind)

This picture shows the range of swells directed at Makalawena through an average March. It is based on 3460 NWW3 model predictions since 2007 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind or surf right at the coastline so we have chosen the optimum grid node based on what we know about Makalawena. In the case of Makalawena, the best grid node is 23 km away (14 miles). The rose diagram describes the distribution of swell sizes and swell direction, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but without direction information. Five colours show increasing wave sizes. The smallest swells, less than 0.5m (1.5 feet), high are coloured blue. These were forecast only 60% of the time. Green and yellow represent increasing swell sizes and red illustrates biggest swells greater than >3m (>10ft). In each graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how often that size swell was forecast. The diagram indicates that the dominant swell direction, shown by the longest spokes, was WNW, whereas the the prevailing wind blows from the N. Because the wave model grid is out to sea, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Makalawena and offshore. We group these with the no surf category of the bar chart. To keep it simple we don't show these in the rose plot. Because wind determines whether or not waves are surfable at Makalawena, you can load a different image that shows only the swells that were forecast to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. In a typical March, swells large enough to cause good for surfing waves at Makalawena run for about 10% of the time.

Also see Makalawena wind stats

Compare Makalawena with another surf break

Nearest
Nearest