Simmons Reef Surf Forecast and Surf Report

G'day, Rusty here. Look, I've had a proper look at what's on the table for the next couple of weeks, and I gotta be straight with you – it's a bit of a slow grind. The only game in town is Simmons Reef, a reef break for the advanced crew, and it's a pretty consistent spot, but the offerings are mostly marginal at best. For the first two weeks, the swell is just too small and the wind is messy. The best chance to actually get a halfway decent wave comes right at the tail end of the period.

Simmons Reef is a fairly exposed reef break that wants a WNW swell direction, but we're getting a lot of SW swell. The water temperature is sitting about average for this time of year. The first real day we can talk about is the 21st of August, and it's a flat start. The swell is only 2ft, coming from the SW with a period of 13 seconds, but the wind is onshore and the combined energy is weak (241). It's a poor surf call. The same story rolls through the 22nd, 23rd, 24th, and 25th – tiny swell, onshore or cross-onshore winds, and the energy stays low, bouncing between 182 and 519. We're looking at a solid week of nothing worth paddling out for.

Things start to lift a bit on Wednesday the 26th of August. The swell bumps up to 4ft from the SSW, with a 13-second period. The wind is cross-shore, which keeps it from being perfect, but the combined energy jumps to a moderate 901. It's still a marginal call, but it's the first sign of life. The 27th holds similar 4ft swell, but the wind gets a bit stronger, and by the afternoon the swell hits 5ft, which is getting into the expert-only zone. The 28th of August sees the swell drop back to 4ft, but the wind is light cross-onshore, and the energy is moderate at 679. Not great.

We hit another lull from the 29th of August through to the 3rd of September. The swell is back under 3ft, and while the wind is sometimes light, the energy is low and the surf is poor. It's a blank stretch of about six days.

Now, the standout. On the 4th of September, a Friday morning, we finally get a glimpse of something good. The swell is a modest 3ft from the SW, with a long 17-second period. The wind is glassy – completely still – and the combined energy is a moderate 451. The forecast says "expect good surf conditions." This is the one to circle. It's a long period groundswell, and on a reef like Simmons Reef, that can produce some really nice lines. The sets will be clean and the paddle out should be easy between them. It's 16 days away, so it's a promising call, not a certainty, but it's the best on the table. The rest of the period fades out into small, poor surf again.

Because the swell is small and the quality is poor for most of the run, and Simmons Reef is a reef setup, some of those days with 4ft to 5ft and cross-shore wind might actually look more interesting for the kite surfers than for paddle surfing.

Rusty.

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