St Agnes Surf Forecast and Surf Report

Right. Lookin’ at the charts for St Agnes, and I gotta be straight with you – it’s a tough stretch ahead. There’s a real flat spell to start, and the first few days are just not worth paddling out for. We’re looking at a gap of nearly a week before anything even remotely interesting shows up.

The water temperature is sitting at 64°F which is a touch warmer than normal for this time of year, so at least you won’t need the thickest wetsuit.

From Thursday the 23rd through to about Wednesday the 29th, it’s a write-off. Tiny swell, mostly cross-onshore or onshore wind, and the wave energy is pathetic – we’re talking combined energy values in the double digits, like 60 or 39 or 23. It’s choppy, lumpy, and just plain messy. Don’t bother.

Thursday the 30th and Friday the 31st are still poor, but keep an eye on Friday afternoon. The swell direction swings to the southwest and the height bumps up to 7ft, but the period is a short 8 seconds and the wind is cross-shore. The combined energy jumps to 512 (moderate), but the conditions are still listed as poor. It’s a tease.

Now, here’s the one glimmer. Saturday the 1st of August and Sunday the 2nd of August. This is the only real standout in the whole 16-day window. The swell builds from a solid 8ft to 10ft out of the west and west-southwest, with a period of 10 seconds – that’s proper groundswell energy. The combined energy readings are strong: 1374 on Saturday morning and 1852 on Saturday afternoon. That’s serious power. The wind is cross-offshore, which should keep the faces clean, and the wave comment is “marginal” but the conditions are described as “clean”. This is big, powerful surf for experts only. Anything over 8ft is not for beginners, and this is pushing into that territory. The swell direction is from the west-southwest, which is close to the optimum of WSW for St Agnes, so the setup should be decent. Crowds are likely to be an issue though, as it’s often crowded there.

After that, things drop off again. Sunday afternoon the 2nd sees the swell fading to 5ft with a cross-shore wind, and from Monday the 3rd onwards it’s back to tiny, weak, and mostly blown out. The combined energy values drop back to triple and double digits, like 117 and 88. The last few days of the forecast are just poor.

So, bottom line: the first week is a total washout. Your only real chance is the 1st and 2nd of August, when a solid, clean groundswell rolls in. It’s powerful, so know your limits. If you’re an experienced surfer, that’s your window. The rest of the time, the setup looks more interesting for kite surfing than paddle surfing, given the strong winds and poor surf quality.

Rusty.

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