Agate and Pearl Street Surf Forecast and Surf Report

G’day. Rusty here. Let’s be straight with you: the next two weeks are looking flat and frustrating. There’s a big dry spell ahead, so if you’re hanging for waves, you might want to find another hobby for a while.

The outlook gets going at Agate and Pearl Street, a reef setup that’s fairly consistent, but everything in the 16-day window is a struggle. The water is sitting at 73° which is much warmer than normal for this time of year—that’s a few degrees off, feels like a bath out there.

For the first week, from Saturday the 1st through to the 8th, it’s grim. The swell barely gets above 2ft, mostly from the SSW, with weak energy readings in the low hundreds. The wind is mostly a light cross-onshore, which just puts a bit of chop on an already tiny ocean. Saturday the 1st has a 3ft SSW swell but it’s short and messy, not worth the paddle. The period starts to get interesting around the 7th with a 19-second groundswell, but the size just isn’t there. It’s all tease, no payoff.

Then we hit a real dead zone from the 8th to the 13th. The swell drops to 1ft to 2ft, with westerly winds pushing things onshore. The energy readings are weak, mostly triple digits but not enough to do anything. This stretch is a total write-off. If you’re keen to get wet, you’re better off on a bodyboard or just floating around.

Around the 14th and 15th, the energy picks up a bit—readings of 392 and 422 on the 14th, then 422 and 462 on the 15th—and the swell pushes to 3ft from the SW. The period is still 16 seconds, which is decent, but the wind is light and onshore. It’s just not enough to make this reef break work. It’s frustrating because the energy is literally there but the swell height is too small to convert it into a wave.

The best of a bad bunch looks like Saturday the 15th morning: 3ft of SW swell, with a 16-second period. It’s still small but it’s the biggest of the whole run. The wind is light, which helps, but it’s not offshore. Expect a knee to waist-high wave, and even then, it’s inconsistent. For a reef break, you want more push.

The 16th slips back below 3ft with a 15-second swell and a moderate cross-onshore wind picking up in the afternoon. That’s about as good as it gets, and that’s saying something.

In short, there is no standout surf in this entire stretch. It’s a long, flat grind. Sometimes these breaks stay poor for a while, but with a fairly consistent setup, it won’t stay like this forever. Forecasts change. Keep the board waxed, but don’t hold your breath.

That’s all from me. Rusty out.

Read more