Santa Cruz contest- Memorial weekend.

The 26th Annual Santa Cruz contest at Steamer Lane was this year during Memorial day weekend. If you have never been there, I highly recommend it. We decided to make a road trip out of it, and have some fun.



Leaving San Diego on Friday, we stopped about half-way. that can be a long drive.....
We had to leave our hotel room by 4:45am to make it into Santa Cruz early Saturday morning. I was able to watch the sunrise on the 1 into Santa Cruz, it was colorful! I ended up finding parking by the Surf Museum, and I was so lucky I found that spot.



It was VERY crowded. Not just for the contest, but because of the holiday weekend as well.

The swell, wasnt hitting like I had wanted it too. Being 200lbs, I need to have some push or strength to the wave. It was doable...so I suited up for my first heat. The water was still super cold! and the direction of the wave moved mid-heat. I ended up getting 4th in my first heat, which was good, but only the first 3 advance. So the contest was over for me, but there was still plenty of places to surf before heading back.




We drove around for a bit, the tide was too low to really go out.



There was a few SUP'ers out, but not too many surfing. The conditions just werent there.




After a bitter-sweet meeting with the Aptos jumps, we decided to go back down south in search of a better spot to surf.

The 1 south, was a lot better then taking the 5. The coastal scenary is great to look at! The traffic wasnt too bad either. As long as we were up early to beat the crowd.

As we were driving down through Santa Barbra this wall of fog came in...so we decided to stop at Emma Wood State Beach, and check it out.



The surf didnt look that fun, but it looked better then it did north. So my dad and I went out for a quick surf...that lasted for about 4 hours!! It was so much fun. It wasnt too windy, and we were in a pocket of sunshine. There was fog to the left, right, and way, way outside...

That was the last surf session of the trip. The swell just didnt present itself to us that weekend. We made the last leg of the trip back into San Diego on Monday morning and actually made it through LA in less then an hour and a half! thats record breaking for me.

All in all it was a great trip, I spent time with the family, surfed in a contest, and got to see some amazing things along the way. It was a holiday weekend to remember.