Chicama - El Cape / Keys Surf Forecast and Surf Report

Alright folks, Rusty here. Let’s get straight into it. We’ve got one spot on the radar for the next couple of weeks, and it’s a classic.

The overall picture is a bit of a mixed bag. We’re looking at a solid run of south-west swell hitting the coast, with wave energy building into the moderate range and even peaking with strong energy mid-week. The problem is that darn wind. For the vast majority of the period, the wind is hammering onshore from the south, absolutely killing the quality. There’s a long stretch of poor conditions, but we do have a couple of windows where things get a little more interesting.

Let’s start with the first real chance to get wet. Things start to look up around Friday the 4th morning. Chicama - El Cape / Keys (Chicama – El Cape / Keys) is seeing a 5ft swell from the SW, with a long period of 16 seconds. The wave energy is strong at 1391. The wind is a light breeze from the south, but it’s still onshore making it marginal. Better than what came before it, but don’t expect perfection.

The real standout, the one that gets my heart pumping a little, is Saturday the 5th morning. The swell drops slightly to 5ft from the SW, still with a nice 14-second period, and the energy is moderate at 862. But the wind swings to a light breeze from the SSW at only 6 mph. That’s as close to glassy as we’re going to get in this stretch. That is your window for clean, long, peeling waves at this point break. The water temp is about average for the time of year, so no surprises there.

After that, the onshore wind comes back with a vengeance and it’s a long, frustrating run of poor surf all the way through to the end of the forecast. The swell stays between 2ft and 4ft, which is small, but the persistent south wind will just chop it all up. You’ll see a few more “marginal” tags on the 16th of September morning with a light cross-onshore breeze, but honestly, it’s not worth paddling out for.

If you’re a beginner, those bigger days (over 5ft) are going to be a handful, especially with the wind, so stick to the smaller, cleaner window on the 5th. For the experts, the swell is never over 8ft, so it’s manageable.

That’s the long and short of it. A couple of mornings to keep your eye on, but a lot of waiting for the wind to play ball.

Rusty.

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