Dawn Patrol

Dawn patrol-sneaking a session in before work or any session beginning before 7.30 qualifies.

Windsurfing at dawn to a hard core windsurfer is like most people getting up early and going to a coffee shop.

The forecast for today looked good west south west 6-7 with swell, only between 3am till 11am , I had a session alert from Matt via txt and a call went out to the boys the night before to go for a early morning session down Vazon to catch the conditions before the wind swung to the north west and dropped to a force 4. As we have had a very cold and windless period we were keen,very keen to get sailing.Finally it looked like there might be some wind in the early morning to get a quick sail in.

Two early birds, Matt and myself turned up down the beach at around 7.30 (still dark) and rigged 80 ltr's and a 5.3, as the wind looked like it was starting to drop.

Jumping over the storm barracade at the top off the slip as the sun started to rise over the horizon we were to find the tide was way up against the sea wall and left very little beach to launch from.It had blown all night and had thrown up a chunky sized swell,the wind had already started to drop so the early bird's caught the worm and we were still fully juiced on our 5.3s.

Sailed on the beach for a few runs then headed up wind to T'others for a session on suck ups,which was a little gusty on the wind front for any decent wave riding or jumping.By this time the tide had risen even more and we had no chance of getting out from where we launched.

So it was the walk of shame along the coast road until we bumped into Stu Martel coming down the road and we thumbed a lift back to the vans.

We hung around till the tide came off the sea wall and Matt went back in ,but got seriously spanked by the shore break ( or should I say the sand ) and broke his rope on his boom and was forced to do the swim of shame to catch up with his kit. Nice wipe out by the way Matt.

The first wave sailing of 2011 not epic but just nice to be out on the water after a long cold and windless few months

The wind turned to the Northwest and dropped as predicted.Well the swell is still running.........I hope it's still on,with no wind,for a quick early morning surf tomorrow......