The surf in Puerto Rico has been fairly weak and inconsistent this past Summer. It was hot, flat, and miserable. When all hope seemed lost. Hurricane Gonzalo showed up. He survived intense wind shear on his path across the Atlantic until he found a little bubble of low shear and high heat. What happened next was beautiful. He crept right into our swell window, strengthened in a Category 4 Hurricane, and dumped solid swell at us for almost an entire week, all while keeping the winds offshore the entire time for North facing beaches. I still can’t believe it. Every day I would wake up and shoot the report expecting either a drop in size or some change it wind, but it was just perfect every single day of the swell. With so many spots working and offshore winds blowing all day, there was plenty of opportunities to surf with light crowds and it was great!

My arms are dead, but it’s not over yet

This week has been raging! So many days with good waves and several options for spots. The crowds have been light at most of the spots and there has been plenty of waves. Looks like Saturday will be the last of the head high days with some bigger sets on occasion. Sunday will probably be waist to chest high with some head high sets still left in there. We should stay waist to chest high through early next week as a new NE swell fills in on Monday and Tuesday. So basically still plenty of waves out in the Atlantic. After staying flat for so long, this feels great! I am happy again. Hurricane Gonzalo has been a wonderful swell event for surfing Puerto Rico.

In the long range, the GFS is trending on a decent cold-front to dip out off the states towards the end of the month. That will be another solid swell event. I’ve been sweating my brains out all summer waiting for this! Hopefully we’ll see some cooler temps and continue to get good waves.

Hurricane Gonzalo is kind of a big deal…

Hurricane Gonzalo just reached Category 3 strength making him a major hurricane. He’s forecast to continue to strengthen into a Category 4 Hurricane tomorrow. He’s very well put together and is feasting on all the heat stored up down here. There’s also a considerably large cold-front sweeping across the Eastern US. Between the two we should have plenty of surf for a week or longer. Tomorrow and Thursday should be the biggest. With hard south winds, several hundreds of miles of Puerto Rico coastline should be firing. Spread out and don’t fight with each other. If Hurricane Gonzalo keeps his current forecast path, he’ll be his strongest right in our swell window.

Rincon: We should be head high plus tomorrow with glassy conditions on the North side of Rincon. With the storm being as close as it is, we might see some doubled-up conditions. Thursday will probably have the best form since the weird double-up should have got cleaned out by then. Friday will drop off a little bit to probably waist to chest high again and keep that size through the weekend.

Isabela/Aguadilla: As long as the spot doesn’t face west, just about everywhere should be raging tomorrow. Several spots might be maxed out though and suffer from the double-up issue tomorrow as well. Thursday will be cleaner and still overhead. You’ll stay chest to head high through next week. The winds will eventually go back to East into the weekend and beyond, so enjoy the next two days and the offshores.