Tawharanui Surf Forecast and Surf Report

G'day, Rusty here, and I've gotta be straight with you – it's a tough stretch ahead for Tawharanui. We're looking at a long, long run of days with pretty much nothing worth paddling out for, so you might wanna find something else to do for a while. The first proper chance of a wave doesn't pop up until the very end of the run, and even that comes with serious warnings.

From now, through the rest of August and into the first couple of days of September, it's a grim picture. The swell is tiny, often below 2 ft, and the wind is mostly cross or cross-off, which would be okay if there was any energy, but the combined swell energy barely scrapes into double figures. We're looking at combined energy figures like 41 or 28 all the way through the 22nd and 23rd, just weak, weak stuff. The water temp is about 58°, which is pretty average for this time of year, nothing wild there.

There's a brief moment on the afternoon of the 24th of August where it goes glassy and we get a tiny 2 ft pulse from the NNW with a period of just 5 seconds, but the combined energy is only 30, so it's gonna be weak and wobbly. Not worth getting excited about.

The real interest, if you can call it that, shows up on Sunday, the 30th of August. We get a jump in swell from the north, hitting 8 ft, but the period is a short 7 to 8 seconds. The combined energy is strong, reading 653 on the morning and blowing out to 962 on the afternoon. That's a lot of water moving. But here's the problem: it's coming straight onshore with a north-northeasterly wind, 16 mph and building, and it's gonna be a choppy, lumpy mess. Tawharanui is a beach and reef, and with that kind of onshore wind and short-period swell, it's gonna be ugly. 8 ft is also into the 'experts only' territory, and with the conditions, this is honestly looking more like a kite-surfing day than a day for a paddle board. Monday the 31st drops back to a messy 5 ft with more onshore wind and combined energy still at 293, but it's all cross-onshore chop.

So yeah, there's no standout here. No hidden gem, no clean offshore groundswell. The forecast confidence is high on the near-term being rubbish, and the long-range swell at the end is promising in size but let down by the direction and wind. It's a dry spell, plain and simple.

Stay patient, keep an eye on the charts, things can always change. This is Rusty, signing off.

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