Big Cornwall

John Carter muses over the dilemma that many of us face when weighing up weather forecasts. Do you go out searching for that pot of gold, or do you stay at home in your comfort zone, but spend the day fearing that your mates are scoring a session you are going to live to regret missing?

- John Carter

WAKE-UP CALL

I wake up at 6:20 a.m. to a buzzing phone, I leave it for a few minutes to see who was calling, but I reckon I know who it was and what it’s about. There had been talk of a massive swell today but nothing has been organised. Earlier in the week I had even been on the brink of flying down to catch the first big session of the season at Nazare in Portugal, but light onshore winds had put me off. It had looked like this day was going to slip through the net. Magicseaweed was calling for strong southerly winds combined with a 15 feet long period swell emanating from extreme winds in the North Atlantic and the first major storm of the winter season. A hardcore crew had already tucked into perfect barrels at Mullaghmore in Ireland, while the hellmen that hang out in Portugal had towed into huge life threatening surf at Nazare. My phone buzzes again and I reach down to see the anticipated message from Timo. “Headed to Wales or Cornwall leaving at 9. Swell is going to be massive”. Oh crikey, here we go again! A couple of days advance notice would have been nice, but this message literally means I have to decide within the next ten minutes if I want to spend five or six hours driving to a beach. The forecast is for cloud and rain, so I was not anticipating this early wake-up call at all.

“MAGICSEAWEED WAS CALLING FOR STRONG SOUTHERLY WINDS COMBINED WITH A 15 FEET LONG PERIOD SWELL.”

FOMO