Afternoon brought a cold drizzle. I knew it was coming from the conversation I had on the phone earlier that morning. B-Rad had informed me of the nasty, freezing mist that had fallen upon his dwelling near Half Moon Bay. Storms must move fast, because not hours after hearing about the potential for rain we had a minor inundation. But when you are camping outside and still cold from more than two hours immersed in the chilly Pacific Ocean, even minor mist systems such as these pose a question: do I want to be wet and cold? Well, yes, if I am surfing. But, no if I am trying to read a book and no if I am trying to write a few lines of prose or poetry. Time to enact the evacuation!

Within twenty minutes my gear is packed, my truck is loaded and I realize that I have not rested for more than a heartbeat the entire morning. Luckily I had some hearty sustenance to provide fuel for the energy needed to attack the waves again that afternoon.

Time to charge! When observing the reef lineup for only the second time in my life I notice quite a few differences from the session that had occurred in the AM. First of all, there was only one person out at the large A-frame reef, and he was not going for many waves. Next, there was a group of seven or eight guys surfing an inside chunk of the reef that I never even dreamed could break. In the morning it was totally invisible. But with the change of tide and the DEFINITE increase in swell size, it did not take a genius to see why they were surfing there and not . . . way out there.

I didn't come all this way to make excuses like: my wetsuit has holes in it, I'm cold, too tired, nobody is out, not really familiar with the setup, it's much bigger than this morning, or many other things that were going through my mind at the time. Boom - flash change into freezing cold wetsuit, standing in the Sycamores with a chilly drizzle dropping all over me. There was odd foam collecting on the ground from the poison in the dropped leaves.

After jogging down to the beach, stretching for a few moments, I realized by seeing a guy ride in on his chest on whitewater that I would LITERALLY be the only person out. What happened to all those people earlier? Food, family, life? What about those macking sets breaking way out on the reef? I paddle out on the southern side of the reef instead of the northern side per earlier in the morning. Following the edge of the horseshoe of rocks sticking out above the surface, I navigated my way into deeper water, leaving large tubes of kelp horns back in the shallows. They were forced there by so much wave activity, and there was a pile of broken bits of seaweed and kelp that rendered the image of a psychedelic snow bank.

I made an intentionally wide path around the top of the reef, watching the inner impact zone the whole time. Gulp. It was grinding over the top of dry reef! Massive wedges continued to unload tons of force during the set that I watched safely from one hundred yards wide. Twenty minutes later I was positioned way outside, and once again hoping to grab some of the massive lefts instead of go for glory death barrels on the rights. Each set impressed me more. Definitely ten foot, some sets twelve, maybe a little bigger. But they weren't breaking top to bottom, they had a tidal influence holding them back, holding them back, until BOOM! They finally break well after they show a wave face on the outer reef. I paddle in timidly for a few waves, realize that I am way too far outside to possibly catch one and begin to gather adrenaline and paddle closer, and closer to the impact zone. Time to go. I pick the third wave of the next big set and start paddling early, very early. I was scratching, clawing, pulling for the shore in the direction to catch the lump of energy residing within that ocean blue breaker. I feel it grab me and my board starts to slide in, I pop to my drop-knee stance and make a thrilling, long, seemingly bottomless drop. Coming back up to the top of the wave, I carve off the very top and use the rebound force of the turn to propel myself back down the breaking face of the wave. Yes! I repeat the process after a lengthy paddle out and suffice with two waves, already shaking from the useless three-year-old wetsuit. Good enough for me, two huge waves garnered in about an hour and a half, with the only witness the sky and seagulls circling above. I found gold in the hills of Montana De Oro. The Spanish name rings true.

ER Harris