Porthtowan Surf Forecast and Surf Report

Ah, alright, let’s swap the numbers for you, mate. I’ve been staring at the charts for Porthtowan and, well, honestly, it’s a bit of a grim stretch on the horizon. The water is sitting at 66°F with a touch warmer than normal anomaly, so it’s about 3°F above average for this time of year, which is a nice warm hug if you’re in the water, but the waves just aren’t backing it up for the next couple of weeks.

The whole 16-day period is a tough one. We’ve got a solid run of poor surf conditions right through, with very few windows that look even remotely worth waxing the board. The biggest issue is that the wind is almost always onshore or cross-onshore, keeping things lumpy, choppy, and just plain messy. The swell energy is mostly weak to moderate – we see a few days where the combined energy climbs into the 300s (like 352 on Thursday morning 20th August), but even then the swell is short period and wind-affected, so it’s not going to offer any real quality.

The swell direction is predominantly from the west and west-northwest, which is the optimum direction for Porthtowan, but it’s let down by the wind. Even when the swell gets up to 5 ft, it’s accompanied by a moderate cross-onshore breeze, making it a lumpy, uninviting mess. For beginners, that 5 ft is probably too much to handle in those conditions, and for anyone else, it’s just not worth the paddle out.

There is a small glimmer for the more patient surfer on the 26th and 27th of August, where we see some light easterly winds and a glassy morning on the 28th. The swell is tiny, though, only 2 ft, and the period is short, so you’re looking at knee-high dribble. The combined energy is in the 40s, so weak. It’s clean, but it’s not really surfable. The 28th morning has a glassy window with no wind, which is about as good as it gets for conditions, but the wave height is just too small to get excited about.

Honestly, if you’re looking for a session, I’d say the best bet, if you’re desperate, is the 28th morning with the glassy conditions and 2 ft from the southwest-west. But it’s a real long shot. The break is fairly consistent, so it’s not that it never breaks, it’s just that the quality is poor throughout. If you’re a kite surfer, the days with strong cross-onshore winds and a bit of chop might be more interesting, but for paddle surfing, it’s a quiet period. The forecast confidence is high for the near term, but the outlook doesn’t improve, so it is what it is.

Rusty.

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