Los Cocos Surf Forecast and Surf Report

G’day, Rusty here. Look, I’ve stared at the charts for your patch, and I’m not gonna sugarcoat it – the next 16 days are a real mixed bag, and mostly a frustrating one. We’ve got a long dry spell of just poor conditions before a late hope pops up. Hang in there, because things might get interesting.

For starters, there is no surf worth paddling out for right now. We’re looking at a painful run from Saturday 29 August all the way through to Monday 8 September. That’s over a week and a half of nothing but cross-shore winds, weak swell energy, and poor surf quality. The swell is tiny, mostly around 2 ft to 4 ft, with periods between 6 and 7 seconds – that’s short-period wind slop. Combined swell energy is low, barely hitting triple digits, and often sitting in the weak range (86 to 204). Winds are consistently from the E/ENE at 6 to 12 mph, blowing cross-shore, so the surface will have a cross-chop or ripples. Every single session in that stretch is scored a zero for me. It’s just not on.

Things finally shift around the middle of the second week. On Wednesday 9 September, the afternoon shows a pulse of swell – 8 ft from the ENE at 8 seconds. Combined energy jumps to 1170 (moderate to strong). The wind goes light and cross-shore from the ENE at 6 mph, which keeps the surface from getting too messy. This one’s only marginal for surf quality and tide, but it’s the first sign of life we’ve seen. For the morning of Thursday 10 September, we’ve got 7 ft from the ENE at 8 seconds, with 521 energy (moderate), but a moderate cross-shore breeze at 12 mph will chop it up. The stand-out of the whole period is that Wednesday 9 September afternoon. At Los Cocos, a beach/jetty setup, this swell is moderate size, but the period is still short at 8 seconds, so it won’t have the power of a proper groundswell. It’s also onshore-angled from the ENE, and while the break prefers NNE optimally, the cleaner winds might make it workable for intermediate and up. The water temperature isn’t flagged as notable – it’s about average for late August and early September.

Honestly, this forecast is more interesting for kite surfing than paddle surfing through most of it. The beach setup at Los Cocos with consistent cross-winds and moderate to strong energy on those latter days would be a kite’s dream. For us surfers, that afternoon on 9 September is the only window I’d pencil in, and even then, keep expectations in check.

Rusty.

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