Lots of Weather Today!

Between downpouring rain, loud thunder claps, and flash lightning strikes, everything weather-wise was thrown at the OBX today. Topping the mix was warm air temps pushing past the 70 degree mark, and strong south winds! All day, the IWS meters were pegged in the mid to upper 20s. I made two recon runs during the day. The first was around noon to Enterprise Street in Nags Head. Rain poured down, but the ocean scene was quite inviting with a decent outer bar wave in the overhead high range. Large plumes of water sprayed off the breaking outside surf, but on the beach there was no wind due to all the buildings along the ocean front. The angle had just a tad too much west in it for a Nags Head ocean launch. However, if the water was warm, I would have swam the gear out to the wind line since power appeared available on the outer bar.

The second recon run was to Coquina Beach near Oregon Inlet around 3:30pm. By that time, the rain and squally weather had moved offshore, and the sun broke out highlighting a fun peeling wave on the outer bar. Again, conditions looked quite inviting with chest to head high set waves with smooth flats in between. The wind by this time hovered in the "tempting" range (upper teens/low 20s); and I was enticed to go but since I was solo on the beach (not even any fishermen around), and the water hovered around 50 degrees, I decided to remain dry. Though the mistake I made was not driving further south to check the Boiler. I believe the wind line must have sat somewhere just south of Oregon Inlet since from that point, south, all the meters remained pegged in the upper 20s though sunset.

I am going to chalk this day as a "Missed It" in the calendar, since it was definitely sailable, and looked fun, but with no one around and cold water, I decided to save it for another day. Some of the crew did catch a session at the Point in Hatteras. Stay tuned to Lost In Hatteras for the details!

Upon returning to Nags Head, I stopped by the Nags Head pier and caught this photo of the break on the south side. If some of you were on the blog today checking the Live Pier Cam feed, you may have seen these guys in the water.