Whangamata Beach Surf Forecast and Surf Report

Grab your board and let’s talk about what’s on the horizon for Whangamata Beach. It’s a bit of a flat spell to kick things off, so don’t rush down there expecting much. The water is sitting at a pretty normal 59°F, which is about average for this time of year, nothing wild.

The first few days are pretty grim. Thursday and Friday are barely a ripple, with nothing over 1 foot, and the energy is just dead, measuring at a mere 19 in the morning. The swell is weak, short-period, and the winds are just messing with it. Saturday stays tiny, and Sunday morning is still flat, but that afternoon a bit of wind kicks up some lumpy, cross-onshore junk – that’s not for surfing, that’s for the kites. The energy is still weak, at 71, so just sit tight.

It’s not until Monday afternoon that things start to wake up. We finally get a pulse of swell, pushing to 5ft with a north direction, and the energy jumps to a moderate 302. The wind goes glassy, and it’s looking clean. That’s the start of something, and it carries into Tuesday morning with a slightly bigger 5ft, and the energy up to 341. The wind is dead calm, proper glassy, and it’s hitting our north-east exposure right. The period is a touch short at 8 seconds, so it won’t have massive grunt, but the conditions will be clean and fun. This is the first real highlight of the window – Tuesday morning is your best bet for a while.

Wednesday morning holds in at 5ft with a clean cross-off wind, energy at 338, so that’s another good session. The wave energy is still moderate but solid. Thursday drops back to 3ft. It’s glassy in the morning, but it’s just ordinary – nothing to get too excited about.

Then, hold on to your hat. Friday the 14th sees a serious pulse of swell – we’re talking 10ft wave, and the combined energy jumps way up to 1855 in the morning, and even higher in the afternoon at 2090. That’s strong, powerful stuff. But here’s the catch: the wind is howling onshore, 15 to 22 mph, and it’s cross-onshore with rain. This is big, messy, and blown out – experts only, and even then, it’s a washing machine. This setup is far more interesting for the kite crew than us paddlers. It passes by Saturday, dropping back to 5ft and cleaner with a cross-off breeze, but the energy is lower and it’s just a bit ordinary.

Sunday the 16th is the other standout. It’s 4ft, clean, glassy in the morning, with a solid 9-second period and energy at 350. That is a good, clean, fun wave. That’s your window for a proper surf, with the morning being the pick before the afternoon gets a touch of cross-on wind.

After that, the window closes pretty quickly. The wave heights drop off back to under 3 feet from Monday the 17th, with the energy falling back to weak levels. The winds get messy again, mostly cross-shore or cross-on, and the swell fades out. The period does stretch out to 10-11 seconds by the 20th and 21st, but the size is too small to do anything with it. That’s that.

Rusty

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