La Palue Surf Forecast and Surf Report

Alright folks, Rusty here, let's have a look at what's on the cards for the next couple of weeks. I’ll be honest with you, it’s a bit of a slow burn. We’re talking about a sixteen day window that starts off very quiet. The first whole week is pretty much a write-off for any decent waves, with only tiny bumps and poor conditions hanging around. You’re looking at a long gap of about 9 or 10 days before anything worth talking about shows up on the horizon.

The one break on the radar is La Palue, a real expert-only sandbank that needs a good swell to get going. Being an exposed beach break, it can handle a lot of west in the swell, and the optimum direction is a good old WSW. Right now, the water temp is about average for this time of year, so nothing to get excited about there.

Let’s run through it. From now through the first week of August, the swell is tiny, barely scraping 2 ft to 3 ft. The wind is mostly onshore or cross-onshore, and the wave energy is pitiful, with combined energy values reading between 20 and 100 (weak). It’s just not happening. You get a brief window Saturday morning, the 1st of August, with a light offshore breeze and clean conditions, but the swell is only 2 ft from the west with a 10-second period. Surfable, but very ordinary. The rest of the first week is crossed up and choppy, with fresh breezes making a mess of things.

That brings us to the one real standout in the whole 16 days. Mark your calendars for Saturday, the 8th of August. Overnight the ocean wakes up. We get a jump in swell to a solid 6 ft out of the southwest, with a period of 8 to 9 seconds. The combined wave energy jumps right up to 571 (moderate to strong energy). That’s a proper pulse. The morning looks to have light onshore winds, but it's clean enough to consider. This is the best on offer. For expert surfers only though – 6 ft is too big for beginners. It won’t be perfect, the short period means it might be a bit crumbly, but it’s the only real swell of the period. Expect crowds here because the locals will be out for it.

After that pulse, it fades fast. The next day, Sunday the 9th, the swell drops back to 4 ft with a strong cross-shore wind and lumpy conditions. Then we're back to tiny, weak, and choppy for the rest of the second week. There is a tiny glimmer on Friday the 14th of August with a 2 ft west swell and a light cross-offshore breeze making things clean, but again, it's barely a ripple.

So there you have it. A whole lot of flatness, saved only by that one Saturday pulse. Don't hold your breath for the rest of it.

Rusty.

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